Van Dyke

The Van Dyke Brown method of making photographs has been around since the early days of photographic printing, and was based on the first iron-silver process, the argentotype, invented in 1842 by Sir John Herschel. it was one of those methods that just kind of "found itself" as one could say.

I was not able to witness the creation of these miracle photographs, but here is how it is done.

1. Prepare a solution (1) of 33 milliliters Distilled water and 9 grams Ferric Ammonium Citrate in its own container.
2. Prepare a solution (2) of 33 milliliters Distilled water and 1.5 grams Tartaric Acid in its own container.
3. Prepare a solution (3) of 33 milliliters Distilled water and 3.8 grams Silver Nitrate in its own container.
4. Combine solutions 1 and 2 in a Beaker.


5. With a GLASS ROD slowly stir in solution 3. After stirred, put the solution in a brown bottle and let it age at least a few days.



6. Coat your paper in the solution and let it dry. Note that the paper is highly light-sensitive, and should be protected from UV radiation.

7. place a negative on top of your coated and ready paper, sandwich glass on top for stability, and expose*
8. Once exposed, you should notice your paper has an image on it, although the density will be deceptive. After looking at it, place it in a light-proof "something" and prepare a mixture of Distilled water and 2% Sodium Thiosulphate solution, prepare it in a photo-tub.


9. Rinse your print under room temperature running water for about 5 minutes, it might be a good idea to do this in several different tubs to make sure all of the iron leaves the paper.
10. Remove your print from the water and fix in the 2% Sodium Thiosulphate solution for 3 minutes.
11. Remove your print from the fixer and rinse in running water for 20 minutes.



12. Let your photograph dry, and you are done! Congratulations for you!


*I'm sure a camera obscura would be satisfactory too, although a longer exposure time would probably be necessary.


Take your paper, of course a rag is better, and

The washing solution is, as Wikipedia puts it, "a weak, alkaline fixer of 5% sodium thiosulfate with a teaspoon of household ammonia per liter. The alkali slows the fixing process and prevents rapid bleaching of the image. Almost immediately, the tones of the image will change to a deep chocolate brown. Keep fixing until the whites appear clear; about 2 minutes, and finish with a second, clean fix if desired for thorough removal of salts that would fade the image. Use a fixer clearing bath of sodium sulfite to help remove residual fixer, and give the print an extended wash fitting the absorbancy of the substrate, around 30-45 minutes for absorbent papers, or 5-10 minutes for gelatin sized tile or glass."




SOME SWEET LINKS!!



The simple way to do it

A Guy who knows his STUFF

Albumen

The albumen process is pretty sweet. More a coating than a specific process, albumen prints use a coating of Albumen (egg whites) and salt to create a nice surface on top of the desired paper, and allowing the one making the paper to place the light-sensitive silver nitrate on top - this produced a much sharper image than the other processes of the time, and also just looked sweet. It allowed for a glossy finish! Eat your heart out cyanotypes.

With the ability to create sharp images, the albumen process became a hit very fast. The paper was sold commercially, or you could make your own - as it is such a simple process. After you decide this is what you wanna do, the next step is to de-yolk about a dozen eggs, and whisk them in a container (shaking works well too) and do so VIOLENTLY until you get a nice foamy goo. I wanted to point out that this is definitely the most physical part of the process: you really have to feel the egg goo as you beast it. But even though this is the most active step to the albumen process, it is NOT the best part! That comes a bit down the road.

This photo was swiped off the internet: It is frothy egg goo.





The process:
First, you have to make your solution:

---I would recommend making all of the different "potions" on the same day, because they need time to get ready for you. Let your materials get some time to get to know you beter, and then the final print (AKA "Money-Shot") will yield much beter results and mean so, so much more.

1. Get a large beaker and combine 15-ml of distilled water with 2 milliliters of 28% acetic acid, and 15-g of ammonium chloride (sodium chloride or de iodized table/sea salt may be used as an alternative). It is also okay to "loosen things up" by adding 2 drops Kodak PhotoFlo, however it is completely optional.

2. The next step is to get together *500ml of egg white (12 eggs) and get it in a large tupperware container with a strong lid.**
Take the beaker of chemicals and mix it into the egg whites, secure the lid tightly, and begin your vigorous onslaught at the mixture's agitation. REMEMBER - These mixed chemicals and goo need to be agitated VIOLENTLY in order to get the mixture to be efficient. You have to really really get the motion going, because the froth that is made from agitation is the enemy - and you want to get that son of a bitch out of his bunker so you can scrape his ass up later.
3. Get your foamy and thick-yet-not-stiff bowl of chemistry and put it in the fridge for a night.
4. When you get to your fridge the next afternoon, remove all of the dirty foam from the top of the container, and filter the remaining liquid through a cheese cloth into your preferred containment vessel.
5. You should now get paper ready for the coating process, and this involves (wait for it) The floating of your paper on top of the albumen mixture. This really means-FOLD THE PAPER INTO LITTLE BOATS! Hell yeah: Start by folding the corners upwards, such as around a frame or make a paper-box, and bow the center of the paper to make a sort of "keel", and preventing air bubbles.
6. Float the paper on top of the mixture and eliminate any air bubbles as they appear.
7. Hang the paper to dry, making sure to rid the surface of those pesky little bubbles. Also make sure that you keep the paper in boat-form, because you will need these smooth-sailing curves later.
8. For a RE-COAT: prepare a solution of 70% isopropyl alcohol with 3% ammonium chloride added, making sure that it is the same temperature of your paper.
9. Submerse the once-coated paper in the solution for 15 seconds, ensuring the albumen will harden, ensuring a proper second coat.
10. "When the alcohol has evaporated (fully – otherwise the second coat won’t stick), float the paper on the surface of the albumen mixture once again following the previously described procedure. The recommended salt concentration corresponds directly with the concentration of salt in the albumen coating. (Since 70% isopropyl alcohol will leech salt from the albumen, the same concentration must exist in both solutions.)" Copied from Alternative Photography
11. The paper should be dried again, and then depending on your desired amount of time the paper should rot, you need to sensitize it.
12. Prepare a mixture of 37.5 grams of silver nitrate with 250 milliliters of distilled water, giving you a 15% solution. Cloudy at first, this will go away, but doesn't matter anyway.-So store the sensitizer in a cool, dark place (fridge) overnight.
13. Take the new sensitizer and get it to room temperature, or however hot your paper is. Get the sensitizing chemical into a nice and wide Pyrex or glass container***
14. Take your single or double-coated albumen boats, and float them on the surface of the sensitizer for about 3 minutes. Make sure to eliminate the evil bubbles- you'll have to figure this out on your own, as every bubble-demon is different. after floating your boat (I recommend listening to This During boating times) take it and hang it to dry in a dark place. I mean it -the paper is light-sensitive now.
15. After it is dry, you are done making your paper! Cut it to your specifications, making sure to remove the flaps of uncoated paper. The coated paper is placed under a photo negative, and then glass to keep it in place. The contraption is then exposed in sunlight.


16. The paper is then rinsed in a solution of water, and then either a toner can be applied, or you can simply soak the print in a non-hardening fixer, and wash in water again for about an hour.

17. Your resulting image will be light brown, maybe a little red or purple-ish. But after you are done here, you will know what your image is like.

So On this whole lab thing, I missed the best part. i didn't make any boats, all i did was expose and wash them. Also, My prints were ruined after i unknowingly destroyed the albumen by drying them on a mirror, as is my norm in the darkroom with regular silver prints.


HERE ARE SOME LINKS!!!!!

A great site to look at some great prints!

How to make an Albumen print from start to finish

* The best method is to crack fresh ones, I was told EggBeaters (or whatever the trademarked product is) do not work so well.
** Perhaps a better mix can be made with a high-power mixing bowl, but why bullshit the historical nature of the process?
*** The Pyrex or Glass container is best, but using an aluminum cake-tray might be easier if you are a poor college student. I might say though, that the unclean metal might react with your chemistry. Who knows right?

Albumen

The albumen process is pretty sweet. More a coating than a specific process, albumen prints use a coating of Albumen (egg whites) and salt to create a nice surface on top of the desired paper, and allowing the one making the paper to place the light-sensitive silver nitrate on top - this produced a much sharper image than the other processes of the time, and also just looked sweet. It allowed for a glossy finish! Eat your heart out cyanotypes.

With the ability to create sharp images, the albumen process became a hit very fast. The paper was sold commercially, or you could make your own - as it is such a simple process. After you decide this is what you wanna do, the next step is to de-yolk about a dozen eggs, and whisk them in a container (shaking works well too) and do so VIOLENTLY until you get a nice foamy goo.
This photo was swiped off the internet: It is frothy egg goo


The process:
First, you have to make your solution:
500ml of egg white (12 eggs): These need to be agitated VIOLENTLY in order to get the mixture to be efficient. Letting the foam settle and the whites age (rot) for a while will give better results.
15-g ammonium chloride or salt
15-ml distilled water
2-ml 28% acetic (glacial) acid
15-g sodium citrate (optional preservative)
2 drops Kodak PhotoFlo (optional)

Paper can be divided with tape, although a slice-and-part technique before taping will

The coated paper is placed under a photo negative, and then glass to keep it in place. The contraption is then exposed in sunlight.


The paper is then rinsed in a solution of water, and then

Cyanotypes and Toning

The cyanotype process was discovered in 1842 by Sir John Herschel, as a means to copy notes and documents - the process resulted in a blue color, and this invention can be credited to the "blue print" that people still use today. While SJH had discovered the cyanotype process, the usage of it for a photographic technique didn't occur until Anna Atkins used the paper for use in photograms, which also dates her as the first female photographer.

Here is Anna Atkins's "algae"



The cyanotype process uses very safe chemicals, and is very interesting as it only uses WATER to fix the image.
With Iron salts being the light-sensitive part here, they just have to be spread on a surface and absorbed. This is kind of lame because impregnated paper always has fuzzy images, but the cyanotype process is boss anyway.

An example mix:
First, 5 grams Ferric ammonium citrate and 100 ml. distilled water are mixed into solution into their own container.
Next, 10 grams Potassium ferricyanide and 100 ml. distilled water are mixed into solution in their own container.
The solutions are mixed thoroughly, and the solution is ready to use as a coating, in our case with a foam brush.
Once coated, the paper is exposed under UV rays (sunlight dummy) and then rinsed in water, rinsing away extra color, but also fixing the chemicals. The finished cyanotype shouldn't be left in direct sunlight, but it is a long-lasting type of print.

The toning that can be done on cyanotype's is very fun: aided by the amount of things you can do to them. In lab: we used tea, coffee, and ammonia to tone our cyanotypes, catching them between the first rinse and the drying stage. Tannic acid, found in tea and coffee, changes the color of the cyanotype to a brown color, and the ammonia really lightens the job. Alternately, hydrogen peroxide or lemon juice will make ta stronger blue. Also, with a solution of salt, ammonia, or clorox, you can bleach the print.

Some toned prints swiped from the web: the left one is regular while the other is toned with tea!


Class Lab
First, the paper is taped around the borders to be even while coating.

Next, the potassium ferricyanide ferric ammonium citrate solution are applied with a foam brush.


The paper is then dried, removed from the tape, and placed under glass with a negative sandwiched in between - and placed in sunlight for exposure. I held the negative and the paper together tightly using a cotton glove to add pressure.


After 20 minutes of sunlight exposure, the paper was removed from the glass and the resulting image appeared.

Next the print is washed in water. In this case, the color almost completely washed off, and my beautiful flower cyanotype became faded and sad. A little splash of hydrogen peroxide aided in recovering some color, but not too well.



After the whole process was over, another identical process was done, the image on the bottom with a different process. The bottom image was the photograph from above, but the top is a cyanotype of the same exposure, however processed in a tea toner and then placed in strong ammonia before being washed in water again, and dried.


Here is a cyanotype I made with a contact sheet of 6x6 film, exposed in much brighter sunlight for 10 minutes. Rinsed in hydrogen peroxide and then water left a yellow color. Or so I believe.

For more info on cyanotypes, click here.

or here.

or here!