Re: Unknown Process

Hi,

Liam - I got the same email. It made me wonder about the workshop - the
lecturer must have been a bit short on detail for a student not to know the
names of the processes demonstrated!

A strange email, I thought.

Regards,
Neil.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Liam Lawless" <liam.lawless@blueyonder.co.uk>
To: <alt-photo-process-l@sask.usask.ca>
Sent: Thursday, August 19, 2004 3:14 AM
Subject: Unknown Process

> Hi All,
>
> I recently had a question from someone who'd attended a workshop on what
he
> called "alternative photography", wanting to identify the process and
> chemistry they'd used. I don't know. His description follows, followed
by
> his reply to my request for more details. Any ideas, anyone?
>
>
> Thanks,
>
> Liam
>
>
> > Description of the quiz I have to solve, colour photography:
> >
> > Sheets have already been exposed (they contain the latent image and are
> > steel white). The purpose is to developp them.
> > We work with a very few daylight. The room must be dark but
> > not completely. No artificial lighting is needed.
> >
> > 1. Sheets are sucessively imbibed with two products:
> > The first one is brown liquid with a medium smell, I think often used in
> > photography.
> > Sheets are imbebed with this frist product, in the darkroom, the prints
> > become black (like dirty or bad photocopies).
> > The second product used is transparent like water but is very odorous
> > (when you smell it, it is very aggressive). That looks like ammonia very
> > concentrated and I was told it could be a stop bath.
> >
> > According to you, what are these two products?
> >
> > I made the two first steps and now I cannot remove the dirty black veil
> > on the sheets. How could I do?
> >
> > I saw a demonstration during the said workshop, this is how it was done
to
> > remove the black veil:
> >
> > 2. In order to clean this black veil, a powder of green-blue colour
> > is used (sometimes, it is a translucent clear blue gel ... like
shampoo!).
> > The dry sheets are put into this powder and have to stay some hours,
still
> > in dark.
> > When withdrawn, this powder has changed colour and is now brown clear
(as
> > if it had absorbed the first brown product used), after some days, it is
> > white powder.
> >
> > Another way of processing the same step is that this powder is directly
> > mixed into water (water becomes clear blue).
> >
> > When this powder is introduced into water and mixed: water becomes light
> > blue. Prints are now introduced in this bath and have to stay some 2 to
5
> > minutes, agitated moderately. When withdrawn, prints have now their
> > visible image, covered with a slight blue-grey veil.
> >
> > My aim is to understand this process.
> >
> > According to your experience, what could be this blue-green powder or
blue
> > gel product? A bleach, a fixer, a developper, which one, which kind ?
> >
> > 3. We end using either a transparent liquid (but sometimes it is
crystals
> > like brown sugar which is melted to water and becomes the transparent
> > liquid, sometimes, it is a very light yellowish-orange powder : if you
try
> > to preserve this powder, it becomes like melt and is no more a powder
but
> > makes small blots). When put on the wet sheets, immediately, they become
> > clear pictures with all details and colours. Then, we dry. Pictures are
> > ready.
> >
> > According to your experience, what could be this last product?
> >
> > I really need to identify and find the chemical and commercial names of
> > THE TWO LAST products and I would be sincerely grateful to you if you
> > could help me. If you may identify which is this process, and in case of
> > availibility, I would order the stuff from a company or a retailer.
>
>
> And then:
>
> > I will try there to give you some more indications on the process I am
> > talking about :
> >
> > - actually, it seems to be a duplication process based on photography.
The
> > personn who made this workshop used already made colour pictures. These
> > colour pictures are put in contact with their correspondantly same
exposed
> > latent pictures (they are white but he told us that they were already
> > sensitised and he avoided direct light during work). The aim was to
> > duplicate the first visible image onto the white sheet containing the
same
> > image at a latent stage.
> > - he worked with the described products and only aluminium foil to wrap
a
> > group of sheets made of : one visible colour picture, one latent colour
> > picture.
> > - no tray, not tank are used.
> > - then the two first products are poured successively onto this group of
> > sheets : both become as I said "dirty black" (the initial one, and the
> > white one). Then, he made pressure on it some minutes and the aluminium
> > pack is closed. Still in dark.
> > - then, still in dark, sheets are withdrawn from the aluminium pack. He
> > used the blue-green powder with water in order to have a light blue bath
> > (under either its powder form or gel form), and when washed with this
> > product, both sheets become covered of a light blue veil but at this
> > stage, image is visible whithout having its final colours.
> > - then, with natural lighting or artificial indoor lighting, is used the
> > last product (brown crystals like brown sugar which immediatly melts in
> > contact with water - highly soluble, or it is light yellowish fine
powder
> > - very soluble too and fizzling with water or with the remaining light
> > blue veil ? or the possible form of it is a transparent solution), in
> > contact with this last product, immediatly, both sheets take their final
> > colours and the copy is the same as the initial one.
> > - it seems right a matter of contact : you have to wait some minutes
with
> > sheets under pressure before to use the two last products. Maybe contact
> > printing ?
>
>
>
>
Received on Thu Aug 19 02:13:45 2004