My Chosen Process

I have looked at all of the processes and decided I would like to try the salt print one. I have chosen this as it was the original printing process used and it helped to form the foundation of modern day printing with silver.


Here are a set of instructions I am going to follow...






Images of instructions found at http://www.freestylephoto.biz/pdf/product_pdfs/fotospeed/Fotospeed_SaltPrintig.pdf on 11.02.2016)



I had no problems with ordering the kit, however I did encounter a big problem when it came to finding the ammonia. It didn't state in the instructions the strength the ammonia needed to be. I couldn't find anything anywhere online that told me this vital piece of information. I ended up buying a household ammonia from a shop which had a percentage of 5% ammonia and gave that a try.

I followed the instructions as perfectly as I could and did 4 trial images. In the darkroom I soaked the paper, painted it with the silver mixture 2, allowing to dry in between all of those and then it came time to try it out. I knew it would take a long time to expose these using the sun as it was not a very bright day so I asked if I could use the light machine in the college instead which has a UV light within it. I set the negatives and the paper up in the machine then proceeded to work it as I had been shown by the tutor. You have a suction within the machine to help hold everything in place which is an important part to make sure the negative/paper doesn't move.

I set the machine to 169 light units and pressed start. It seemed to take a lifetime and I began to wonder if I had set the timer too long or short. When the timer had done, I tuned the machine off, waited for it to release the suction holding everything in place and opened it up to remove my prints. below is a picture of the machine I used...



I was rather impressed with the outcome from the trail run. I then went back down into the darkroom and started the whole process again with 8 more pieces of paper. The images from those didn't seem to work as well as the initial ones but I got a few which I am very impressed with.

A few of the images have been cut down to size and put into a book as my finals. I have also used images from the double exposures, cyanotype and albumen.

I am very pleased with my images and feel I have done the best I can to produce the images I have in the short amount of time I had to do it in.

Images to follow once presented in the book.