Glass colored windows 1-1/2" thick in B&W...any ideas??

[John Kasaian]

Hello!

Interesting opportunity: I found an old church with glass windows that aren't stained glass, but colored glass, 1-1/2" thick and polished like gemstones. It is a very, very cool window and I'd like to take a photo of it with the 12x20, but I'm not sure if there are any special considerations since it is not a "stained glass" window. The light coming through it has a very different quality than that coming from the traditional leaded stained glass windows nearby. Since 12x20 film is rather costly, I'll make a few tests in 8x10 first, but I was wondering if anyone else here had run up against this sort of thing before and if there are any tips or advice you'd care to share. I assume I should use a reflected light meter since the light will be coming through the glass---fortunately I've got a seriously sensitive light meter. I'll be doing this in B+W which makes it even more of a challenge(kind of like getting a tomato to look good in monochrome.) Any ideas? Thoughts? Suggestions? SWAG guesses?

---Cheers!

[Donald Miller]

John, If it were me, I would pay very close attention to the effects of filters on the glass colors and make choices that would render the tonal scale to the greatest effect. I think that this is probably more of a consideration then metering the scene. Once the filter selection is made, then the metering would be fairly straightforward. I would agree with your using reflected light metering in this case since you are dealing with light transmission through the glass. I would enjoy seeing the results of your efforts. Good luck.

[Ralph Barker]

Sounds interesting, John. Without actually seeing the window, it's difficult to make specific suggestions. I concur with Donald's thought about using filters to establish the optimum B&W separation of the colors involved. But, I'd also suggest exploring the question of whether it's actually the colors, along with the nature of the light resulting from the unusual glass, that are creating the allure. In other words, the window might turn out to be a dud in B&W.

I think you're correct in your metering approach, though. I'd spot meter, and then "place" those values to get maximum saturation, and then think about filtration to get optimal separation of the B&W rendition of the colors.

Here's a vase made by the famed Blenko Glass Works. Pretty cool in color, but the B&W falls rather flat:

[neil poulsen]

Just a thought. You might try doing some experimentation with filters, etc., using the same film in a smaller format.

[John Kasaian]

Thanks for all the ideas! I hadn't thought about the effect of filters, so I'll be doing lots of testing. It looks like its time to get out the Nikon slr and filter kit out and run a sacrificial roll of FP4+ through it. Thanks!