Re: "serum of milk"
Whey can be purchased in powdered form. One of its uses is for
protein shakes, so I'd guess a health food store would be a good
place to look.
kt
On Jun 24, 2008, at 2:53 PM, Don Sweet wrote:
Serum of milk (Physiol. Chem.), the whey, or fluid portion of milk,
remaining after removal of the casein and fat. Webster's Revised
Unabridged
Dictionary, � 1996, 1998 MICRA, Inc.
Don Sweet
----- Original Message -----
From: "Judy Seigel" <jseigel@panix.com>
To: <alt-photo-process-l@usask.ca>
Sent: Wednesday, June 25, 2008 9:15 AM
Subject: "serum of milk"
I'm sure I'm not the only one doing something REALLY dumb today,
tho I
hope I'm the only one in this house... The story begins about 10
years ago
when I bought all the Photo Miniatures whatisname at The Garage
(25 St or
like that) had at the time...
So they went on my shelf as life took over & I never even arranged
them
in order (from about 1884 to 1925, one a month). Whatever
possessed me
yesterday I am not obliged to know, but I began going through them
(maybe
because the type is so tiny and I need new glasses desperately, so
it put
me to sleep without controlled substances). In any event, I made
several
little discoveries, such as that the Lesbian bar around the
corner, named
Henrietta Hudson, is the namesake of an actual Henrietta Hudson, a
photographer who advertised several times in the back pages...
tho, Lisa,
owner of the bar, tells me she actually named the bar for the Hudson
river, 3 blocks west, but of course wanted copies of the ads anyway.
Then I got in a bit deeper... finding "making enlargements on
plain paper
for crayon finishing," used for making "portrait enlargements" in
large
(commercial) quantities. I know that crayon finishing is
retouching with
any of various kinds of chalk, the closest we have today might be
conte
crayon (which comes in sepia and black that I know of, and which,
among
other "chalk", I have).
BUT the instructions are the kind those old books are full of --
telling
you something obvious is perfect detail, but leaving out something
that
"everybody knows" except anyone born after women got the vote, or
let's
say, for our friends in other lands (women got the vote in
Switzerland, if
memory serves, sometime in the last 20 minutes -- they sure didn't
have it
in Canton Basel when I lived there in 1965 -- (tho that may be
another
story for another day!!!)
ANYWAY, you start this process with a coat of "serum of milk",
preferably
on Saxe or Steinbach paper. I think I've seen those papers mentioned
recently, so if not available, the equivalent probably is... but
"serum of
milk?" I googled it, and got a bunch of beauty treatments (as if
I needed
any) and ways to analyse blood serum, et al. Tho by tootling around I
pretty much established that it's "whey", as in "curds and... "
which I
probably could figure out how to achieve, as I've done it by
accident when
making cottage cheese. This, the Photo Miniature explains, "should be
prepared according to the directions given in the method for making
enlargements upon fabrics."
Oh. Is there anything discoverable in this or any of the other
PMs on
that topic? Of course not. Everybody knows that already !!!
Tho an alternate possibility seems to be "a thinned casein." Both
being
organic material that probably enhances photo action.
I added "old photo process" to the search term and did get to the old
chemistry books that Google has digitized -- which were
interesting, but
further from my goal,,,, since they dwelt mainly on collodion,
which no
matter how thrilling and beloved in OUR time frame, I am not, not,
I swear
NOT, going to do. This section has its own maddening nature, as it
REPEATEDLY wants to add each of these old treasures (chemistry
books) to
my "library," but refrains from telling me what they cost. (I've
heard
hair-raising stories about that.) However, I saw that Tom
Persinger and f
295 have been there already: he's a goldmine of information... so he
probably knows that already.
I didn't actully mean to go on like this... my question to the
list is
does anyone know how to make whey... ("serum of milk") tho I thought
perhaps some context would eliminate detours.
The method, btw, is first you "salt the paper" with the serum of milk
prepared according to the directions given in the method for making
enlargements upon fabrics (not yet vouchsafed), then add k iodide,
& k
bromide, -- or alternatively, first the serum of milk, then am.
bromide &
magnesium chloride. Filter thru absorbent cotton, and put in a
tray, then
you do one of those tricks holding diagonal corners of the paper,
lowering
carefully etc. Hang to dry.
The sensitizing formula is pretty much stuff we know -- and
exposure is
via "enlarging camera." Then the developer: I happen to have
gallic acid
& (I'm pretty sure) lead acetate... but I forget what
protosulphate of
iron is... I may think better of this whole operation before long,
but
meanwhile, just asking, in case anyone knows how you do "serum of
milk."
PS: There have been so far (& I'm only about 1/3 of the way thru the
stack) MANY sections on kallitype, probably new at that time. It
doesn't
need serum of milk either... I realize there may be a reason why
kallitype
remains & serum of milk is "obsolete"...
TIA,
Judy
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