Wet plate workshop, 11.11.12, Julia Dean Photographic Workshops, Hollywood, CA

Here are some images from a recent collodion workshop, held at Julia Dean Photographic Workshops in Hollywood, CA on Saturday and Sunday November 10th-11th.
I also am available for tutoring one on one or in small groups at my studio near Downtown Los Angeles.

 

NEXT WORKSHOP in Los Angeles:

http://www.ssreg.com/juliadean/classes/classes.asp?courseid=11527&catid=3309

MAY 2013 Travel Workshop in Yosemite National Park:

http://juliadean.com/yosemite-collodion/

Cyanotypes lab at Translight Photography/CMG

Monday Oct 15 was a lab day for my History of Photography Class (At New York Film Academy it's called "Ways of Seeing"). We went to the Brewery, the largest Artist's Colony in LA and maybe even the world, to do some Cyanotype Printing. At CMG Photography, a rental lab formerly known as Translight Color, we set up the darkroom and got busy makng prints. Cyanotypes are a simple Iron and water based photographic process invented by Sir John Herschel in 1842. The tones are rendered in beautiful shades of Prussian Blue, and they are simple and easy to make.

Upcoming workshops in Yosemite National Park and Hollywood!

For those interested in learning the Wet Plate Collodion Process, I have two upcoming workshops:
First, in October, a travel workshop at Yosemite National Park in California. We will be walking in the footsteps of the masters! The workshop is for those interested in exploring an antique technology in a place of stunning beauty. Participants of various skill levels are welcome. We will be using half plate ( a little bigger than 4 x 5" ) and 8 x 10" cameras to document places like Half-Dome, Bridal Veil and Glacier Point. Processing will be done on-site in darkroom tents. We will be making tintypes (images on aluminum, actually), ambrotypes (images on glass) as well as glass negatives. This is a messy, smelly, slow process, but the results are very unique and gratifying.
 The itinerary is somewhat flexible, but plan on long days.  The workshop is offered through the Julia Dean Photo Workshops in Hollywood. For more information, please visit the link below.

http://www.ssreg.com/juliadean/classes/classes.asp?courseid=22516&catid=1802

For those interested in individual, one on one tutoring at my studio, please contact me at:
info@allanbarnes.com.

Living by Lynne, the socially conscious gallery at 1627  Montana Ave, has agreed to host the “Overprotected in Santa Monica” project this weekend, just in time for the Montana walk!!

We are meeting at the gallery tonight at 6:30 for anyone who wants to help  glue, hang, and eat  of course!! We are also in need of volunteers to be at the Gallery over the weekend, for anyone who wants to  talk the talk and discuss the cause! The event is from 10-6 on Saturday and Sunday. 

The artworks are 3 feet wide by 4.5 feet tall. They will also be exhibited at Cafe Bolivar later this summer.

Info will be posted here. 

World Wet Plate Day, May 5th 2012

May 5th, 2012: World Wet Plate Collodion Day was also day one of the 15th* Allan Barnes Wet Plate Collodion Workshop! An amazing crop of pictures was the result! Thanks to our amazing assistants Semantha Norris and S.J. Dunbar as well as the Julia Dean Photography Workshops! 
*approximate number. Note: last two pictures were made on day two!
More info on World Wet Plate Day: http://www.wetplateday.org
(World Wet Collodion Day honors the life and work  of Frederick Scott Archer, the British Artist who patented the Wet Plate Collodion Process in 1851. It was the first of many leaps forward in technology that made photography faster, cheaper and easier). 

•                                  Cesar and his 8x10 glass plate of course assistant S.J. Dunbar.

heating the plates for varnishing (above).

              The craggy face of the Maestro, as photographed on 8x10 glass plate by S.J. Dunbar

8 x10 black glass ambrotype by Jennifer Reeser

Enhancing pictures with text or narration....

Pictures are great, but sometimes words or narration can greatly enhance the meaning of pictures.  Consider the humorous parody of anti drug campaigns... Another example is the picture Lena S. did for the "Buy Nothing Day" Assignment: 

Now consider this series from the New York Times called "One in a Million" that features voice narration. While the pictures themselves are strong, the voice narration gives us the feeling of being in the room with the subjects....evidence that we live in a time when the merging of technologies makes life  and visual communication more interesting.

http://www.nytimes.com/packages/html/nyregion/1-in-8-million/index.html?scp=1-spot&sq=one%20in%208%20million&st=cse

More about Portfolios

This year with our portfolio, Photo ll will be producing promo cards. It can be a single card or double sided, or it can be a little folding mini-folio.  Here's some examples:

The top one is 7" tall and 23.75" wide. It has five folding panels, but you could also make one with three panels. To do this, you make one initial document on photoshop, then expand the canvas size to the desired overall size, then copy and paste additional images into the document. Don't forget to match your images in size and resolution, in other words, if your first image is 300 ppi  5x7", make sure that the other images match.

Our resident Photoshop Giant, Jasmine A. did this. How did she do it? Only her and Jojo know.

JOJO's Travels

Finally, we are getting pictures of Jojo and his amazing travels. Jojo has an interesting history that will be fully revealed later. Jojo is an itinerant plastic man that has been mailed around the country from one artist to another. His travels are documented on flickr, and one day, we will be able to see them all...Jojo is a for credit assignment, so if you have not made photos of Jojo yet, please get busy. Here's Tati M's,  Jojo was being menaced by an elbow but we saved him by using the crop tool! Remember that Jojo is small, so get close!  Above Tati's pictures is Clare's road trip photo of Jojo visting some interesting roadside architecture, above that, Tori's picture of Jojo's new FWC (friends with convertibles)

A message from Stieglitz...

Stieglitz, also known as the History Building Possum, is a little cranky, due to recent events. Stieglitz finds it more difficult to access his favorite places, especially the box marked "photo supplies" that he likes to use for naps under the History Building.

There's mold, construction, finals and other unexpected and unexplained situations. The darkroom is closed until further notice too.


Stieglitz understands that others may be cranky too, but requests everybody to keep making art, because it nourishes the soul.

Recreating an iconic photograph

To recreate an iconic photograph, first you need to decide what photograph that you would like to recreate.
Please keep it simple and safe: You could even make a reproduction of a famous painting as Nazgol G. did last year...We really like these recreations of Rosie The Riveter from WW II, and at least one of us has experience in playing Rosie. This is due Feb. 1st, and should be mounted or matted on board.

If you have not yet made a picture of Jojo, or done a community service project, there are slightly more than four months to go before the year is up...It might be a good idea to have all these little projects cleared so that your final months can be spent on the most important project of all: The Final Portfolio!

Large Format Again!

For those of us who like the amazing detail that large format gives us, it's time for one more 4x5 assignment! During the next few weeks, we will be working on a tilt/shift/ architecture assignment. This is to familiarize us with the tilts and swings that a large format camera is capable of! Tilting or swinging the back or front of the 4x5 camera straightens the lines of a building or structure, while making the same picture with a 35mm camera usually results in distorted lines (The building appears to tilt backward or forward).
This is actually a two part assignment, as you will be turning in two completed, mounted pictures.
One picture will be of a building or structure, and will use the tilts and/or shifts to straighten out the lines in the building/structure.

The second photograph can be of anything, and will simply use the tilt/shift function to DISTORT your subject.  It may be fun to make a closeup picture of something for this.

It is best to work in pairs for this assignment, as toting a giant camera and tripod around campus is a bit of work. (Also, it is important to have a person "spotting" to make sure passers by don't trip over those tripod legs.) As always, it is recommended that you load two sheets of film in a film holder and make at least two pictures.

There is a book in the Photo ll bin that details how tilt and shift work, and there will be a demo, but here are some helpful links as well:

http://www.toyoview.com/LargeFrmtTech/lgformat.html

http://www.rogerandfrances.com/subscription/camera%20movements.html

Update: As of 1.18, the darkroom is closed which makes it hard to process sheet film, so this assignment is on hold until later in the year.