Photography Workshop - Fields and Frames

We began looking into Cameras, Artist and Processes moving from the historic to the experimental. I found the cameras and some of the process very interesting since I had never come across them before. Here is what I liked and learnt:

Wet Plate Collodion

(Photographed by Daniel Samanns)

This was one of the earliest photographic techniques which came to light in 1851. These images were captured as a negative onto the glass or metal plate where the exposure chemicals had been spread. They had to be developed while they were still wet so as soon as they had been captured they would be developed. This led a lot of photographers who used and are still suing this process to have mini portable darkrooms in there cars etc so that they could complete this whole process. These types of images give you a very smooth creamy finish which you wouldn't see on digital processes. I just like how authentic the outcome is.

John Coffer - He was a profesional photography in the 70's but began to get very interested in the Wet Plate Collodion technique and decided to start a project where by he travelled to certain places in an historically authentic way (hose and carriage) and would use all the old fashioned kit to create his own Wet Plate Collodion images. However after doing this project he continued to live and work in this very historic way. Here is an image of his work...

and here is a self portrait he took...

I really like the way he lives so authentically in order to capture photos which look over 100 years old when in actual fact they have been produced in the last 20 years or so.

Daguerreotype

(Photographed by Nicholas Shepard)

This was the original photographic practice which was developed in 1839. The image was captured on a sheet of metallic silver or copper which had firstly been polished to make it as smooth and shiny as possible. Then it had chemicals put onto which would then make the image expose onto it. The chemicals cause quite a health and safety issue because of how harsh they are which is part of the reason it isn't practiced very much anymore. Again I like how textured these images come out and its amazing to see the development of photography.

Chuck Close - Close is a hyper realists painter however he also uses this Daguerreotype process to capture amazing portraits of people...

This is a self portrait he made of himself and what I really like is how he has made it n a black background so our focus is just on this very detailed image of the face.

Jerry Spagnoli - He is also a Daguerreotype photographer and use to take pictures of portraits and  landscape as well. He just so happened to capture an Daguerreotype of 9/11...

 This is shocking that he captured this and especially using this process. However this almost cements this tragedy in history which it obviously has been.

Camera Builders:

Wayne Martin Belger - 'Untouchable Camera'

This camera is surrounded by HIV positive blood in all this industrial casing. This is why it is also more of an art statement about HIV. The blood flows over the plate of the camera which gives an eery red filter to the photos he captured with it and they end up looking like this:

This example is a very radicle example of people who have built camera however there are many simpler ways people have done this too such as making multiple else cameras, cardboard box obscures (what were building today), lego cameras etc. We also got to look at a camera mode by Peter Renn out of an old computer scanner attached to a box with a magnifying glass on the front. This is what it looked like:

I found it really fascinating how you could take some household objects and adapt them to make your own unique camera. I love the style this scanner captured the images in with a very unique rough quality. Because the scanner works across we were able to get the model to flip his head so that we needed up with two sides of his face. I love how many different possibilities there are from cameras like this.

We then had a chance to experiment in making our own basic cameras obscurers out of boxes and lenses etc. I have done this before in a workshop but it was nice to revisit it with a much wider knowledge of experimental photography now. Here is what we built:

I then attached my phone to the lid of the box and was able to capture photos with it. Here is what I captured:

This workshop has been really enjoyable especially being able to play with such a variety of cameras.