Wetplate Photography in the 21st Century
Fred
Keliy
Phalaenopsis Orchid in Black Painted Vase
Quail Eggs
Flowers on Ledge of Eric's Fence
Tamara Leaning Against a Tree
Jessica
Self-Portrait with Boa
Eric's Shed, East Hampton
Portrait of Karen by Keliy Anderson-Staley
Phalaenopsis Orchids in Tall Glass Beaker
Here are a few of my wetplate collodion photographs (quarter plate, full plate and mammoth plates) from the workshops I've taken in the past 2 years at "The Center for Alternative Photography" in New York City and in East Hampton, NY.
What an amazing feeling to be so hands-on again in a darkroom with tin and glass plates of all sizes brewing in silver nitrate baths, with eagerly awaiting students.
What an intense process it is: the wet-plate process is no misnomer, it can be no longer than whole minutes from start to finish.
From the coating of collodion on the glass or tin plates, to the adhesion of silver nitrate molecules to collodion creating the wet emulsion on which the image will be exposed, to 25-second exposures of attentive and braced-models, to the development and fixing of the wet plates in darkroom trays immediately after exposure…
The rush! I cannot wait until the next class begins.