Photographic papers are divided into two types: developing out papers and printing out papers.
Lumen Print Set-ups: silver gelatin paper exposed to full sunlight. Scissors, tape, and clear plastic wrap to hold objects onto the paper.Film changing bag or large thick black plastic bags to protect exposed prints from further exposure to sunlight.Bright sunlight or strong UV source light.Contact print frame, contact proofer, picture frame, or sheets of plexiglass.Objects and materials to place on top of the silver gelatin papers (translucent and organic materials add depth and visual interest to a lumen print).Any black and white or color photographic paper.To make a lumen print you will need the following materials: Being able to move from the darkroom and into the bright sunlight is the most exciting aspect of lumen printmaking. Instead of using an enlarger, the lumen printmaking process takes silver gelatin paper out of the darkroom and into the bright sunlight to produce camera-less photographic images. Lumen prints are made by taking sheets of unexposed black-and-white or color photographic paper and placing objects or negatives on top of the paper in the same manner as making a camera-less photogram. Silver gelatin photographic papers are conventionally used in a darkroom under safelight conditions. Lumen prints begin with silver gelatin photographic papers, the traditional photographic paper used in the making of black and white prints since the late 1870s. If this exhibition is a gauge, perhaps alternative should be the new standard.Lumen printmaking is one of the most fascinating camera-less photographic processes.
Happily, this exhibition attracted a talented group of practitioners who – though embracing chemical avenues long associated with p hotography‘s early days -fused new subject matter and processes to express prints both beautiful and thoughtful. Of the work submitted, Juror, Dan Burkholder said, “There is a temptation to equate alternative process photography with small, brownish prints of unsmiling subjects staring blankly into the camera lens.
8/winners-of- alternative-processes- competition-2018/ . I submitted some of my work from the class to the National Alternative Processes Competition in September and one of my pieces, Bleeding Hearts and Fiddleheads, was selected as a winner among the nearly 800 entries, and is on exhibit at Soho Photogallery from Nov.7 – 25 in New York City. There are many variables that can influence the outcome: humidity, light intensity, lengths of exposure and of course the chemical composition of the photographic paper. Part of the magic of the lumen printing process is to let the medium have its own say in how the final image works. Using several different black and white photographic papers resulted in dramatically different color qualities of the lumen printing process. My arrangements are reflective of my passion for plants and the spectacular details plant structures exhibit. Here expired black and white photographic paper comes to life from an interaction with the sun and natural objects creating colorful impressions of objects. One of the processes, the lumen printing process, was a natural extension of my research on the flora of Alaska.
It started out with pinhole cameras, and moved on to lumens, cyanotypes, VanDyke Brown prints, just to name a few of the alternative processes. It turned out to be a fantastic opportunity and allowed me to experiment with lots of alternative processes of making handmade photographs.
The ad showed a picture of a fiddle head that peaked my interest, and I enrolled in the class. Finding another outlet for my passion of plants and photography has been easy to come by, when I came across an ad for a summer course in making handmade photographs (ART/COJO 492), taught by Jason Lazarus at the University of Alaska Fairbanks.