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| Untitled ambrotype. |
This is my first ambrotype of the past 4 months and my 5th attempt at this process.
Ambrotype vs alumitype.
If you've watched the video from the J.Paul Getty Museum on wet-plate collodion, you have followed the different phases of the production of an ambrotype, or wet-plate collodion photograph on a piece of glass.
When I very started experimenting with collodion, my first 4 attempts were done on glass. And all things considered the first results were not too bad. However they were so many new things I needed to master that when I discovered you could use aluminum I was more than happy to get pre-cut aluminum plates protected by a plastic film. This eliminated all the steps needed for the preparation of a glass piece and allowed me to concentrate on the crucial steps of the collodion process (from pouring the collodion, to finding the proper exposure, to develop and fix the image).
As a result most, if not all, the photos you've seen so far in this project are alumitypes. Such as this one:
I am expecting that most of the pictures to come will also be done on aluminum, however once in a while you might see an ambrotype pop up.
There is a magic to them that is wonderful: depending on the background it is placed in front of, an ambrotype might appear as a negative image or a positive image.
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| The photos don't do it justice, but give you an idea of the effect. |
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