Table Of ContentNew Dimensions in
Photo Processes
Fifth Edition
New Dimensions in Photo Processes invites • Create imagery in and out of the tradi-
artists in all visual media to discover contem- tional darkroom and digital studio.
porary approaches to historical techniques. • Relocate photo imagery and make prints
Painters, printmakers, and photographers from real objects, photocopies, and pic-
alike will find value in this practical book, as tures from magazines and newspapers, as
these processes require little to no knowledge well as from your digital files and black
of photography, digital means, or chemistry. and white negatives.
• Alter black and white photographs, smart
Easy to use in a studio or lab, this edition
phone images, and digital prints.
highlights innovative work by internationally
respected artists, such as Robert Rauschenberg,
Laura Blacklow teaches at the School of
Chuck Close, Mike and Doug Starn, and
the (Boston) Museum of Fine Arts at Tufts
Emmet Gowin.
University. A professional artist for over 40
In addition to including new sun-printing
years, she has received numerous grants
techniques, such as salted paper and lumen
and awards; her manipulated photographs
printing, this book has been updated through-
are in the collection of the Addison Gallery
out, from pinhole camera and digital methods
of American Art, Harvard University’s Fogg
of making color separations and contact
Museum, Chicago’s Museum of Contemporary
negatives to making water color pigments
Art, and Polaroid’s International Collection.
photo-sensitive and more.
Her work has also appeared in Christina
With step-by-step instructions and clear Z. Anderson's Gum Printing and Other
safety precautions, New Dimensions in Photo Amazing Contact Printing Processes (2017),
Processes will teach you how to: Robert Hirsch's Exploring Color Photography
(2015), and Robert Hirsch's Light and Lens:
• Reproduce original photographic art,
Photography in the Digital Age (2012).
collages, and drawings on paper, fabric,
metal, and other unusual surfaces.
• Safely mix chemicals and apply antique
light-sensitive emulsions by hand.
New Dimensions in
Photo Processes
A Step-by-Step Manual for
Alternative Techniques
Fifth Edition
Laura Blacklow
Fifth edition published 2018
by Routledge
711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017
and by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
© 2018 Taylor & Francis
The right of Laura Blacklow to be identified as the author of this work
has been asserted by her in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the
Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced
or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means,
now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording,
or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in
writing from the publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks
or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and
explanation without intent to infringe.
Fourth edition published by Focal Press 2007
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
A catalog record for this book has been requested
ISBN: 978-1-138-63282-0 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-1-138-63283-7 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-1-315-20801-5 (ebk)
Typeset in Slimbach and Helvetica
by Keystroke, Neville Lodge, Tettenhall, Wolverhampton
Contents
Acknowledgments ix
Introduction xi
PART I LIGHT-INSENSITIVE METHODS 1
Chapter 1 Transfers, Lifts, and DIY Printmaking 3
Solvent Transfers 4
Inkjet Transfers 9
Muscle Rub Transfers, by Dorothy Imagire 12
Heat Transfers, by Kathy Halamka 15
Polymer Transfers, by Peter Madden 16
Impossible Project Image Lifts 19
Magazine and Copier Lifts 24
Lazertran™ Inkjet Lifts, by Dorothy Imagire 28
Paper Photo-Lithography, by Christine Tinsley 31
Gelatin Prints, by Peter Madden 35
Chapter 2 Hand Coloring 41
Water-Based Method 44
Oil-Based Method 48
Chalk-Based Method 54
Chapter 3 Toning, by Elaine O’Neil and Laura Blacklow 59
Safety 60
Method Overview 62
Materials 62
Tips 70
Toning the Entire Print 72
Split Toning 72
Selective Toning 73
Tip 74
vi Contents
PART II PREPARATION FOR LIGHT-SENSITIVE METHODS 75
Chapter 4 Creating the Photo-Printmaking Studio 77
The Light Box 78
The Contact Printing Frame 78
The Exposure Unit 81
Materials and Procedures, Including Paper and Sizing 85
Chapter 5 Generating Imagery: Analogue Methods 99
With a Darkroom 100
Without A Darkroom 100
Making Photograms 100
Pinhole Photography, by Jesseca Ferguson and Walter Crump 110
Chapter 6 Making Negatives: Digital Method, by Joseph Moccia and
Laura Blacklow 121
Part I: Capturing and Scanning Images 122
Part II: Making a Digital Negative 133
Part III: How to Use the Digital Negative to Make a Print 146
PART III LIGHT-SENSITIVE METHODS 151
Chapter 7 Cyanotypes 153
Safety 154
Method Overview 155
Materials 155
Making One of the Stock Solutions 159
Making the Other Stock Solution 159
Making a Cyanotype 160
Tips for Making a Cyanotype 162
Cyanotype on Fabric 166
Toning Cyanotypes 168
Chapter 8 Van Dyke Brown Prints 171
Safety 172
Method Overview 173
Materials 173
Making the Solution 179
Making a Brown Print 180
Tips 182
Tips for Brown Printing on Fabric 185
Contents vii
Chapter 9 Salted Paper Prints, by France Scully Osterman 189
Safety 189
Method Overview 190
Materials 190
Making a Salt Print 191
Chapter 10 Gum Bichromate Prints 201
Safety 202
Method Overview 204
Materials 204
Making the Bichromate Solution 210
Making a Gum Print 211
Tips for Making a Gum Print 213
Making a Full-Color Gum Print 214
Chapter 11 Casein Pigment Prints 221
Safety 221
Method Overview 222
Materials 222
Making the Bichromate Solution 225
Tips for Making the Bichromate Solution 226
Making the Casein Print 226
Tips for Making the Casein Print 228
Chapter 12 Platinum and Palladium Prints 231
Safety 232
Method Overview 233
Materials 234
Tips 240
Mixing the Stock Sensitizers 241
Making a Platinum/Palladium Print 243
Tips 246
Chapter 13 Bromoil Prints, by Gene Laughter 251
Safety 251
Method Overview 252
Materials 252
Guidelines for Bromoil Printing 254
viii Contents
Tips 258
Brush Actions for Inking 261
Print Finishing and Enhancement 263
Tips 263
Chapter 14 Enlargement Emulsions and Tintypes 267
Safety 268
Method Overview 268
Materials 268
Making a Print with Enlargement Emulsion 273
Tips 275
Contemporary Tintypes, by Lana Z Caplan 280
Materials 280
Making a Contemporary Tintype 281
Tips 282
Chapter 15 Contemporary Daguerreotypes (Becquerel Process),
by Laura Blacklow, with assistance from Tyler Treadwell 285
Safety 287
Method Overview 288
Materials 288
Tips 292
Making a Contemporary Daguerreotype 293
Tips 295
Chapter 16 Visual Hybrids 299
Layered Imagery, by Juliana Swatko 299
Chromoskedasic Painting, by Birgit Blyth and Laura Blacklow 306
Lumen Printings, by Joseph Moccia 308
Annotated Bibliography 313
Supply Sources 329
Equivalent Imperial and Metric Measurements 341
Glossary 343
Index 349
Acknowledgments
The writing of this book was undertaken 1 and Camera-less Photography), and his
almost by accident over 30 years ago, when interest in historical processes, I am not sure
we were a small community who were hand- I would have written this fifth edition. It was
making photographic prints. While I was Joe’s idea to do it, and his loyal and patient
freelancing as an illustrator, I showed my port- efforts in taking most of the step-by-step pho-
folio of altered photo images to Lista Duren, tos, as well as creating the lumen section,
an editor at Curtin and London Publishing helping update the bibliography and sup-
Company. Ms. Duren brought the portfolio to ply sources, and collaborating on the greatly
Dennis Curtin, who, on the spot, asked me enlarged Making Negatives: Digital Method
to write a book about the techniques rep- (Chapter 6) kept me going.
resented. Curtin and London subsequently
New chapters and techniques have been
ceased publishing photography books, and so
added to this edition by artists whom I respect
Focal Press picked up the manuscript.
and who volunteered to write from years of
I wish to acknowledge the work of the staffs experience, such as France Scully Osterman’s
at Curtin and London and Focal Press, as instructions on Salt Prints (Chapter 9); the
well as the essential contribution of Virginia expanded techniques in Transfers, Lifts, and
Holmes, who helped research and write the DIY Printmaking (Chapter 1) offered by Peter
first draft decades ago. The current team at Madden on gelatin printing and Polymer
Taylor and Francis have been patient and medium transfers, and from former Museum
responsive to me. Every day, I was reminded School graduate student Christine Tinsley on
of how fortunate I am to teach at the School of Photo-Lithography. The previous editions,
the Museum of Fine Arts at Tufts University; which have been the bases for this fifth edi-
Photo Department Technician Chris Maliga tion, were enriched by Gene Laughter, who
practically gave me a private room with wrote the thorough Bromoil Prints (Chapter
scanner, computer, and WiFi; colleagues in 13) and was a delightful collaborator, even
the Department never complained about the under pressure. I was fortunate that Gene
gelatin (for printing, explained on page 35) could secure the photographic expertise
in our shared refrigerator or the space that of Wayne Firth, who took the step-by-step
my belongings occupied in our office; and the illustrations for that chapter and was the
stock room always had a good camera and proofreader for this edition, now that Gene
tripod for the step-by-step photos, which were is, very sadly, no longer with us. I appreciate
taken in the “non silver and mural printing” being educated to chromoskedasic paint-
room. As a matter of fact, had it not been for ing (in Chapter 16, Visual Hybrids) by Birgit
the luck of meeting Joseph Moccia when he Blyth, who, fortunately, did not make up that
first came to the SMFA as a grad student, his word and updated the information for this
enthusiasm and knowledge during repeated fifth edition. Ever loyal friend and inspired art-
semesters as teaching assistant (Digital Photo ist, Elaine O’Neil, joined forces in organizing
