From: Clay (wcharmon@wt.net)
Date: 07/28/03-11:22:30 AM Z
FYI
(c) Associated Press 2003
Leading French paleo-curator Janko Youssef announced today that the earliest
known date of the so-called "New Gum" process has now been moved back
approximately 31,000 years. Spectrographic analysis of cave paintings at
Lascaux has determined that these are actually the earliest known examples
of gum-dichromate printing. X-ray diffraction results confirm the presence
of trace amounts of ammonium dichromate, gum arabic, and an unidentified
brown organic pigment. Art historians have generally credited Mongo Ponton
with the first use of the gum-dichromate technique, but will now have to
assign credit to a Cro-Magnon man named Wug (no last name recorded).
Researchers expressed amazement that not only was this the earliest known
example of this process, but tangential evidence such as image clarity,
gradation and quality seems to indicate that Wug used the dry dichromate
technique, with another organic material containing human DNA material
apparently used as a heat-releasable adhesive in the gum coating. It is
still not known how Wug was able to develop the gum layer due to its
position on the cave wall, but a general consensus seems to be emerging that
it involved Wug and some of his friends using a spraying technique with hot
water development (most agree that the water temperature was approximately
98.6 degrees F.) A representative image is located here:
http://colophon.com/gallery/minsky/caves.htm
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Is Stuart Melvin a member of this list? If so, please elaborate on your
process.
I find this "top secret, wait and see at APIS" hype really annoying. It's
very frustrating to read second hand reports heaping praise upon this guy's
(Melvin) work with no details, no published reports, etc.... Does this guy
really exist? Why the silence? If I, an overworked car salesman in rural
Wyoming with precious little spare time, can post countless contributions to
the alt-photo list, why can't this so-called gum guru write a single word?
>From what I've read of Stuart Melvin (View Camera magazine a few years ago)
he hasn't done anything that hasn't been done a hundred years ago. So
what's new? Let's hear it!
I regret not attending APIS. I would have loved to have been there, but I
had to work.
Best regards,
Dave in Big Wonderful Wyoming
> Also just for clarity's sake, Stuart doesn't claim to have invented the
> dry dichromate technique. It was also in some of the old literature,
> from what he (Stuart) says. None of the things he is doing is new, in
> and of itself, but I believe, (and I'm putting words in his mouth) that
> he just wanted to show us his combination of procedures that he has
> found to be pretty bomb-proof.( if such a state of grace exists in gum!)
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