Hi Monty, just thinking of you recently. Have you broken ground yet on that dream portrait studio? Get with it, you have the talent!
All the best,
Merg
Hi Monty, just thinking of you recently. Have you broken ground yet on that dream portrait studio? Get with it, you have the talent!
All the best,
Merg
For what it's worth, a friend who used to do wedding photography partnered with me to offer 8x10 Pt/Pd bridal sessions as an add-on to her packages. We did a few (over a few years time) for her higher end brides but, as best I could tell, no one cared that the final print was Pt/Pd or, even, that is was created on film with a large format camera. The ones we did photograph seemed to enjoy the process but as far as making it a regular offering it just didn't take off like we'd hoped. It was a challenging up-sell in that we didn't have a studio to work out of at the time and most of her bookings were done by brides looking at images online to determine which photographer to use. And, even if they saw a Pt/Pd print in person, I don't think it would have swayed many more to spend the extra money. We were selling it as an "heirloom" print thinking that here in New Orleans it would appeal to the feelings of tradition and family.
Having said that, I think the idea is viable IF you are a great salesman to people who have enough disposable income to afford such a fine print. I think it would work best as an additional offering to an already viable portrait studio. Or if you are an already famous celebrity photographer.
Good luck!
I thank everyone for the encouragement. I will be offering the PTPD as an option to their portrait sessions. Lets hope they will order and enjoy the special art they are.
I don't want to give away specific details about some else's secret to keeping a portrait studio successfully going in this day and age in a high rent area, but I will hint that they leased a spot right next door to a famous restaurant and offer ONLY real film images and black and white silver gelatin darkroom prints. Not famous or fantastic work by any means, but a solid and consistent niche which evidently fills a need. Maybe people are different here on the West Coast with its long history of photographic appreciation. But it's also the part of the world more damn digitized than anywhere else. We've chatted a few times, and it's highly probably that some of her portrait clients make their living in digital imaging, and now consider that their boring day job. There are thousands of them around here. They want an alternative in terms of what they hang on their own walls.
Might as well go for it; and good luck!
Michael, this is a beautiful plate.
I can't keep noticing how even your development is. Are you using sugar ?
Would you care to share with us your developer/development technique ?
(might be worth starting a new thread for this)
Best regards from the Alps
Andreas
Andreas, Thanks. Well, that one worked out remarkably well, which is not always the case, to be honest…ha. To me (and I’m not the most methodical or technical person…), some of it depends on the state of my chemicals at any given point, and since I shoot a lot, I do at times just mix a new silver bath if I have an important session coming up (and/or my other baths are in various stages of maintenance, etc.). I may have done so for this, although I can’t recall for sure. But it was likely relatively new in any case.
But for developer here I just used Bostick and Sullivan’s standard wet plate developer, which for some reason I dilute at 2 1/2 to 1 (I liked that when I experimented with different dilutions when I was starting out (with their kit) and I’ve just stuck with it). It contains potassium nitrate, which is supposed to add a touch of brightness to the whites, and also acts as a restrainer. So my development times are usually between thirty and thirty-five seconds, sometimes a little quicker, occasionally (but less often) a touch longer.
Beyond that I don’t actually know what’s in their formula, but I’m sure they would let you know if you inquired. Dana there has always been incredibly generous with his time and knowledge, and really helped me a lot in my early days (when I basically taught myself, with help from kind people like him and Brian Cuyler of UV Photographics). I have also mixed my own developer, but typically don’t actually notice that much difference in the final result. That is more of a standard formula with a development time of fifteen seconds or so. But I do feel that the longer time allows a little more margin for error (lessening the risk of overdeveloping, say).
I count as I go, as I want to feel I am within my normal range, but I’m also watching for the eyes to come up (obviously at least with a portrait), so in the end I’d call it developing by inspection more so than (simply) by time.
I have never used a helper tray. I just hold the plate (from below) at an angle (pointing down to my left, with the developer to the upper/right side) and sort of swoosh it across the top (the short side), so it immediately flows down and across the top (maybe the top 20% or so of the plate), then move whatever I’m using to pour down the length, still angling the plate down/away a little so the developer covers the rest of the plate as quickly as possible (I’m sure you and almost everyone would be aware of trying to cover the plate quickly, but I’m just trying to mention everything). Once it’s covered (and again, maybe this is something everyone knows…but you don’t want to lose silver by dumping developer off the plate as you go…), I try to keep the rest of the developer on the plate while agitating very gently, so it sort of continues to roll over the entire plate in various directions in very gentle waves. I do lose some developer over the sides with my initial pour, but it’s so quick that I figure there isn’t really much silver in it at that point anyway.
Having said all that, I did sort of develop (no pun intended) my own ways of doing things, and can’t vouch for them always being what everyone else would consider ideal. But they tend to work for me. As for the rest of that plate, if it adds anything to know, for collodion I used either UVP3 or X from UV Photographics (and can’t recommend their collodion highly enough..) and KCN to fix. Anyway, I hope some of that has helped, and not been too long.
Lastly, I have been through the Alps many times (though long ago now), on trains, band tour buses, even once as a mechanic in the Tour de France back in 1985. What a stunningly beautiful (and varied) place. I’d love to see some of what you may have shot there.
Well, that was an iPhone pic of it in the tray, so that could of course be playing a role. But it was indeed a pretty bright plate, or certainly as far as mine go. You can see a scanned version adjusted to the sort of brightness I shoot for in general (which is how I think a given plate would look when viewed in pretty optimal/direct light) on my IG, which is moderntintype.photo.
But two factors that might be at work: These days I tend to use KCN to fix, which can produce slightly brighter highlights (though that is probably opening up a can of worms…). And I also use developer with potassium nitrate (which I just went over above), which can give brighter whites.
But yes, tintypes to me are more silvers and grays, and naturally tend to have have something more muted about them than a print on paper. And people reproduce them digitally in all sorts of ways. I try not to make mine overly bright when I post them, but I also want them to look at their best, and have been told that that is basically when they are being viewed in sunlight. The way it was explained to me was that the highlights are made of silver on the surface of the plate (rather than suspended in an emulsion), and that the metal scatters the light — hence the need for good/direct light when viewing them. Hope that might help a little… But yes, it’s a pretty constant battle for me to get them as bright as possible without overdoing it.
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