Blogging for Saturn: Baby's First Budget!

Parchment Cyanotype, Framed

Heya, Spiders! I know, I'm still late. I'm just really bad at writing during the days and now that I have a social life, I keep doing things on Thursday and Friday nights. It's a real issue... except for the part where I'm out, having fun with friends. So. Not a huge issue, really. Thor might be getting a bit miffed, though.

Today I'm blogging for Saturn, because he's the Roman God of (among other things) wealth and fortune. Why? Well, Spiders, I'm happy to tell you that I've gotten my first grant. The Art & Science Council of Mecklenburg County offered a grant for artists to participate in a Community Supported Arts program. I was selected as one of nine artists to be featured this year. I'll be making 50 small pieces of handmade art, to be distributed to the people who buy shares of the program.

For me, that means making 50 of my cyanotypes on parchment, wood and bone. In all honesty, I'm extremely unlikely to include any bones in the grant program. I'm only getting a budget of about $40 per piece; the bones are just worth too much to me. They're hard to make and the materials are a bit scarce. I'd rather use them myself. So, instead, I'll be making prints on wood and parchment for the grant program. My offerings will be a combination of the wearable art that I've been experimenting with, and the normal parchment prints that I've been doing for some time.

My biggest challenge is going to be the framing and packaging. I've got to keep my costs low, and my time fairly limited on each object individually. The type of display I used for my show in Asheville, seen above, is too labor intensive and costly as far as materials go. I'll need a simpler way to present the parchment prints. The wearable art will probably stick fairly close to the early test models, like the ones featured in the last two weeks. The material and time cost on that is pretty low.

Obviously there's going to be some research into how best to package everything, where to get the best value frames, how to assemble everything, what adhesives to use... but that's actually kinda fun for me. I'm excited, because if I can get this all down, then future work will be that much easier to make!

All of this is pretty amazing. It means I'm getting paid to continue with my experiments. I have a budget! I'm actually being paid to make art. Honestly, that doesn't happen very often for me. I'm very, very excited. You can rest assured that as I move forward with the grant, I'll be posting updates on the work made for it and what I learn during the process.

Blogging for the Baron: Paper Jewels

Tracing out sizes for parchment cyanotype blanks

I've been out of it, Spiders. Since Christmas, I have entirely lost track of time. My dog became increasingly ill after some surgery and had to be put to sleep to keep him comfortable. I came down with one of the nastiest colds I ever remember, right about the same time. This cough syrup is messing me up worse than I figured. I even missed the Folded Paper Project for the first time. Basically, I've just been all kinds of messed up.

Still, there has been some progress. I've completed two more of my cyanotype parchment jewelry pieces: a ring and a pendant.

For this week's update, I'm going to go through the process step-by-step. It'll be fun! Trust me!

The first step is the "negative" which, in this case, is made by sticking a small leaf onto a piece of clear packing tape. I use the tape because it works great for when I'm dealing with bones (which are anything but flat) or felt, or anything else that doesn't lend itself to simple contact-printing under glass. When dealing with very small leaves and plants, it's also handy to keep them in place and keep track of them. It lets me arrange roots, small leaflets and even multiple tiny leaves easily as well. So, stick all your plant material onto the packing tape. For longer shelf life of your negatives, you can double-layer the tape, stick-to-stick, so that they're 'sealed'. I don't do this, because I'm alright discarding the negatives after a few uses. I'd rather find new material than keep using the same leaves over and over. Still, it's an option. If you don't seal the tape-negative somehow, it will accumulate dust, debris and gunk.

Next, stick or place your tape-negative onto your coated parchment. I've discussed the actual process of coating in some detail, so I won't go into it here. You could, in theory, use another sturdy material to make similar pieces. Heavy paper, or even stiff cloth could be glued down and covered with a protective layer. I use the parchment because, well, it's kind of my thing, ya know, Spiders? Dead stuff, necrography, etc. This last bit is very important: do not trim down the material yet. You want to leave extra space around the final border of your print so that you can trim it to fit exactly into whatever object you're going to be placing it in. Parchment and paper both deform and shrink a bit when soaked, so be mindful. Do all your trimming and sizing at the end.

Once you've got the tape-negative in place on your material, place it in a frame. I actually have a nice itty-bitty 4x5 contact frame that I'm using for this, but you can use any of the jury-rigged contact frames that I've demonstrated before, or just a picture frame. Whatever works! Then leave the frame out in sunlight for a complete exposure. I'm extremely lax with this. Due to the weak sunlight in the winter months, I tend to set my exposures out the night before and collect them in the afternoon. That gives them a good 6 or 8 hours of exposure. When you're just doing photograms, its almost impossible to over-expose. If you were trying to print image negatives (which is an option!) then you'd want to go with a shorter, more controlled exposure.

Cyanotype Parchment Pendant

After the exposure is done, just remove the tape-negative and coated material from the frame. Unstick the tape negative, if necessary, and drop your prints in the wash. For me, considering the size, I don't really wash the prints. I let them soak in a Dixie cup full of water for a few hours. They're done within 2-3 hours, tops.

The nice thing about these prints being so small is that it's fairly feasible to speed up the drying process for them with a hair dryer. Keeping them from flying all across the room while doing so? That's a bit harder. I stick 'em in place with a push-pin driven through one corner (which will get cut off anyway). At this point, you're really done with the photography portion of the exercise.

Cyanotype Parchment Ring

Now all you need to do is trim off the excess material, getting down to a size that fits exactly into your setting. Of all the steps, I find this the most annoying, especially for rounded shapes. It drives me nuts, but some of y'all may have really awesome ideas for cutting down on the annoyance. Lemme know if you do! I recommend using paper templates to ensure you don't over-trim your finished prints. That's sad when it happens, because you can't un-snip a cut print.

I recommend a silicone epoxy like E6000 for glueing parchment to metal, but if you decided to go with paper, cloth or some other material, use whatever bonds best. E6000 is pretty great overall, but it can be quite messy, fume-y and a little toxic. Use with care.

That's really it. You just make your tiny cyanotype, cut it to fit the jewelry object, glue it in place, and you're done. You can go further, with things like fixing a glass bezel in place as a protective layer, or pouring resin on top to seal things up, but I'm just starting experiments with that. They're totally optional. Parchment is a very sturdy material, and the cyanotype process is extremely archival. Items made this way, even without a protective coating, should last for decades.

Have fun, my Spiders!

Blogging for Balthazar: Cyanotypes go Metal!

First Cyanotype Parchment Ring

It's a bit after Christmas, so let's celebrate with a new blog post! Yes, I took some time off for the holiday, and I just haven't really been mentally up to blogging. My dog's still not doing well after his surgery, and the holidays have been a bit hectic even aside from that. Plus, I think my family may have infected me with another bloody plague. I'm certainly coughing more than I should be.

Anyway, I know you're way more interested in photographic insanity than my biographical drama, Spiders. Let's get down to it.

Troy, one of the awesome guys who runs the Flaming Chicken Studio here in town, decided to put together a last-minute Holiday Art Sale. It went really well, despite the late date and some other events happening on the same day. In getting ready for it, I was working on some more of my attempts at making cyanotypes into practical art. The latest version of this has been cyanotype jewelry. Now, making my small cyanotype bones into jewelry has still proved too difficult for me to manage. I lack the equipment and skills to efficiently build bases, settings and findings. I was able to find another way, however.

Tracing paper templates to make the parchment blanks

I combined a ready-made, adjustable ring base with one of my cyanotype parchment prints. Using a bit of E6000 silicone epoxy, I just attached a tiny print onto the ring base, creating a wearable cyanotype. The process could use some improvements, like some kind of protection against scratching the print itself, but it works on a basic level.

After that success, I've gotten the supplies for further experiments. One of the biggest challenges is simply cutting the right size piece of parchment. It shrinks and expands slightly during the washing and drying of the print, so getting the cut parchment to fit exactly into a ring or pendant isn't easy. I'm hoping for some good results with this batch!

Paper blanks ready for coating!

Even better? This research may actually fund itself. If it goes well, I might even start using my Etsy store! Wouldn't that be crazy?

I don't know if I'll try to expose all of these, but I do want to get started right away. In the dead of winter, I don't have a lot of choices for floral samples. I might even print out some very small negatives on transparency or vellum paper and see if I can do some cyanotype jewelry with photographs instead of photograms. Wouldn't that be novel, Spiders? Actually using a camera?

Blogging for Freya: The Little Things

Poinsettia leaf under the microscope stand

It's been an exhausting week, Spiders. My dog had emergency surgery and his recovery is not going well. I found out that I didn't get a job I was really hoping to have for next semester. I'm still waiting to hear back about a grant for 2015, and I haven't heard anything from the admissions people at one of the graduate programs I want to apply for in the fall. It's just not been a great time lately.

But, I have still been working. For my birthday, my family helped me put together a microscope platform for my cell phone. It's a cool little project that I found on IFLS. The original video and instructions are available on Instructables. There are some limitations, and it certainly cost more than $10. It was about $30, total, though some of that was because I had to use alternate parts, and needed some springs to help stabilize the specimen stage. Still, $10 isn't a good estimate for this project.

Keep in mind that I'm saying it was $30 to build a microscope for my cell phone. That's pretty nifty. Yes, you can buy cheap digital microscopes for about $40, and there is actually a purpose-designed cell phone attachment for $15. This set up is fairly customizable, and you can add or substitute lenses for different effects. So, I'm fairly pleased with the concept. The results.. eh.

The platform, with slides.

A big issue with high magnification, using any format at all, is focal distance and focal length. The subject needs to be right up next to the lens to be seen, and your depth of field is practically two dimensional. We're talking way under a millimeter for this set up. I can focus on the top of a cube of loose salt, but not the entire cube. Yeah, I can't get a whole grain of salt in focus. It's too big. So that is a consideration, certainly.

The lens I used, stolen from a $2 laser pointer, is a bit smaller than the lens of my cell phone, meaning I only have a limited field of view. The edges of the laser-lens is visible in the cell phone images, causing extreme vignetting. Maybe the center 30% of the final photo is in focus. Zooming in at all causes severe distortion and pixellation. You can see that in the photo of the text from a US quarter, over on my Instagram. I've been tagging all the photos with this rig as #cellphonemicroscope.

It is theoretically possible to stack lenses for greater magnification, which actually allows plant cells to become visible. I haven't tried that myself, but all the issues with depth of field, vignetting and focus would be doubled along with the magnification. I really doubt the final result is worth the trouble, but I may experiment with it later.

Generally, I think this was a fun project, and I do enjoy playing around with it. I'm glad my family helped me put the stand together, and it made for a great birthday present. The image results aren't anything to write home about, at least not yet. It's certainly worth exploration, though.

Blogging for Thor: Aggregated Datas

Hello, Spiders! I'm feeling much better, and even doing some more anthotype printing. It's slow going, given the weather and lack of sunlight, but I'll manage. I scanned a small crop (4 prints) and I'm labelling and sorting the information now. I may post some results later this weekend.

In other news, a huge survey of alternative process photographers was completed, compiled and released recently. It has some very interesting information! Check it out Over Here. That post is in English, but the rest of the blog is in Dutch, which I do not speak. Still, it's nice to see another active alt. process blog!

The biggest point of interest to me regarding the survey is the split on the issue of what is and what is not "alternative" photography. For me, silver gelatin and color film processing (as base processes, not modified by something like mordançage) are not alternative. They're traditional photography. Digital is digital, film is film and alternative is "other". It's a clumsy, messy grouping, but hey, it mostly works. Artists aren't very good at deciding what to call things anyway.

Even more than the simple debate about film being alternative or not, is the divide on what else is alternative. Judging by the reported statistics, there is a not-insignificant number of self-identified alternative process photographers who do not consider historical photographic processes to be alternative. If they're not alternative... what is??

Some very enlightening, and very confusing, data awaits.

Blogging for Thanks: Sick Again.

I'm sick again, dagnambit. Sorry, Spiders, I don't have anything this week, except a burning desire to banish all this stupid plague that keeps pestering me. Happy Thanksgiving, I guess.

Blogging for Thor: A Reddy Success!

Success! First true-red Anthotype

Despite the weather, recent plagues and other negative influences, I've printed my first anthotypes in two years. Yeah, Spiders, it's been a long time since I printed any anthotypes myself. I've taught workshops on them, and given demos, written articles, but not actually done any printing.

Anthotypes take up contact frames for quite a while, and for the last two years I've been busy with lumen printing, cyanotyping and other techniques. Anthotypes just haven't really been on my mind.

I'm not sure what changed, but I think it was my visit to UNCC last semester, where one of the students decided to investigate the interaction of turmeric and soda ash. That sparked my interest, got me investigating on my own, and really put me back on track.

It's paid off. I finally have a red dye, which I've been crowing about quite a lot recently. More than that, it's a stable, easy to make, easy to apply, fast-acting dye that shows strong contrast. Everything I could ask for! Well, alright, it is a bit dusty, leaving behind a fair amount of solidified pigment when it dries, but I think altering the concentration of alcohol in the solution can fix that problem.

So, there you have it, Spiders. Two years, and my first anthotype is a stunning success. In red! It did take 12 days, but this is fall, so that's not un-expected. Low UV index and lots of clouds. No heat, either. Heat speeds things up quite a bit.

Pure Pokeberry dye

I also had three other prints exposing at the same time. A dried oak leaf on pure pokeberry juice, which turned out great (below), and two other prints made on red cabbage dye. I had whipped up a batch of the blue and green red cabbage dyes, getting an indigo instead of a blue this time, and decided to use some of them. Unfortunately, the red cabbage prints did not work out. They show almost no fading at all, despite the same 12-day exposure as the other two prints. I'm guessing there simply wasn't enough UV light to break down the red cabbage pigments. Those always were a bit slow, compared to raw berry dyes or turmeric/sandalwood which is what the red dye is mostly based on. Unfortunate, but unavoidable given the time of year.

When spring and summer roll around, I plan on getting back into anthotypes on a serious level. We'll have to see if I actually stick to that. I'm also very interested in working more with liquid lumen prints and chromo-lumens, but at the moment I'm focusing on my cyanotype bone prints and wearable art.