I’ve posted this one before, but this is a better reproduction, so I thought I’d post it again:

These next two are from color paper, fixed in regular black and white photo paper developer. Next round, I’m going to give blix fix a shot:

The rest are all from enlarging lith film and measure 16″ x 20″:

I’ve been doing a lot of Lumens on film. Most of them have been on enlarging lith film, and as soon as I can get some half decent digital reproductions of them I’ll get them up here. I’ve also done some on color print paper, which, again, when I get them digitized, I’ll get them posted.

One big benefit to doing these Lumens, is that people are giving me lots of old paper and film to use. A little while ago I was given some color slide film and some flashed black and white print film, all 4×5. I used a few sheets to create a couple Lumens, and the results were pretty exciting:

This is one of the Lumens made from the black and white print film, scanned, and tonally inverted. I really liked what the scanning software thought the tones “should” be, so I left it that way. I thought the luminance, the blues, and the greens and pinks in the stems were all really quite lovely.

These two are from the same “negative.” The top one is sort of close to what the negative looks like, and the bottom one has been tonally inverted.

What is fun about bringing these into the computer, is that a whole new world opens up to me, where things become even more expressive and lyrical. You do lose the tactile qualities, of the “parent print,” which leaves me with mixed feelings. But at the same time, I now have the option to print enormously large.

These next three are from color slide film, and have not been in any chemical bath at all; they’ve had the plants removed, and been allowed to dry, and then placed in a black bag to prevent further exposure until I decide how I want to process them, whether it be in black and white fixer, or color print film fixer, or color slide film fixer. The first one is my favorite.

A satellite photograph from Google Maps can be found here (the vantage point at which the photograph was taken is the small open area a little ways to the south east of the reservoir). This is in the north east part of the island of La Palma, where I served for six months. One of the members took us on a big tour of the whole island on a P-Day, and this was one of the stops (if you zoom out so the entire island is visible, there is a highway labeled LP-1, which is the one we traveled, and it took the entire day from 7 am to 7 pm).

I’ve been wanting to return to the Canary Islands ever since I left them (which was eight years ago), and this week I found, on Facebook, one of my best friends ever from La Palma, as well as my companion/very good friend I was with the majority of my stay on the island. In all the times I’ve moved in the past eight years, I’ve lost the addresses to these two and many other friends, so it was very exciting to come back into contact with them.

Now I’m brainstorming ideas for photographic projects, new, or old, I could carry out in the Canary Islands (maybe La Palma specifically—it was my most favorite of the three islands I was on). I’d like to apply for grants and/or scholarships to maybe fund a summer long (or longer) trip there. Do any readers out there have any suggestions where I could find places that award grants etc…? I’d really appreciate any leads.

It was also really fun to spend some time with Craig and photograph with a photographer whom I highly respect.

Here are a few photographs from the day:

Craig photographing old grain storage

Inlet to Glendale Reservoir

Glendale Reservoir

Craig photographing Finder Reservoir

Power Lines at Finder Reservoir

Foster Reservoir

Ever since I saw Jerry Burchfields Lumen prints four years ago, I’ve been following that same vein all along. I’ve never been truly satisfied with that, as it wasn’t truly my work. I might as well have been Burchfields’ apprentice. So I’ve been trying to find some way to spin the process in my own way. Add to that the pressure (it’s positive pressure) of coming up with a project for my thesis, and that desire to make my own Lumens has been even greater.

My friends Darren, Jon, and Scott have all given me suggestions; some I’ve tried, other’s I haven’t simply out of laziness. Two of the ideas one or the other of us had come up with during the past couple years were to use color paper, instead of the black and white that I have been using, and to try using film.

Until now, the largest pieces of film I’ve had were 5″x7″, and it’s very difficult creating decent compositions on something that small. I also never had access to color paper. Now that I’m in grad school, people have given me lots of new papers to try, including color paper, and 20″x24″ enlarging film.

Monday I decided to give them both a shot, and was very excited with the results to say the least (please forgive the imperfections; they’re just very crude, quick digital captures):

Film:

Kodak Supra II Color Paper:

I was thrilled with the results from both new media, but after seeing how transparent the film print went, I began to wonder at how they would be presented, if that was the direction I took. As the two prints were hanging to dry, the film was in front of the paper, and it hit me: combine the two. Here is what I got:

Film Overlaid on the Supra Print:

All this happened at about 7:00 p.m. or a little later, and until 12:00 a.m. my mind was still reeling from the excitement of just how beautiful each were separately, but how much more so when paired together.

I think the thing that excited me the most was the fact that this combination helped remove the strong reference to “plant.” They took on a fossilized character, as if a pre-historic squid, while attacking some other pre-historic, deep sea creature were instantly fossilized.

The Lumen process is serendipitous, unpredictable and liberating. Some plants record their leaves’ vein structure on the photographic paper with great detail and exactness, while others wither very rapidly from the solar heat, leaving ghosts of themselves on the paper as they die. I have learned what colors will be produced by certain exposure times, but something new happens every time—a new color is produced, chlorophyll from the plant is pressed into the paper—and is never again replicated. The ever-surprising nature of this process is what draws me so intensely to it. I escape the exact, precise nature of working with the conventional camera. Choosing plants to create these prints, I find my place in Nature, and the plants’ place in art.

The Lumen process is serendipitous, unpredictable and liberating. I never know exactly what the results will be—some plants record their leaves’ vein structure on the photographic paper with great detail and exactness, while others wither very rapidly from the solar heat, leaving “ghosted” images of themselves on the paper as they shrink. Through experience, I’ve learned roughly what colors will be produced by certain exposure times, but something new happens every time—a new color is produced, chlorophyll from the plant is pressed into the paper—and is never again replicated. The ever-surprising nature of this process is what draws me so intensely to it. I am allowed to put off the very exact, precise nature of working with the mechanical camera, and completely let go. By going out and collecting plants to create these prints, I am able to find my place in Nature, and discover the plants’ place in art.

Today we went over our revisions/edits and clarified them even more. Unfortunately I left my print out of my statement that has all my edit marks on it in my darkroom. I’ll post that revision tomorrow. Please feel free to edit and comment about this revision in the meantime.

An Artistic Study of Southeast Idaho’s Aquatic Vegetation

One of my first experiences in photography that I remember is of making photograms, where various objects such as plants, fabrics, pencils, paper, hands, are placed directly on photographic paper, which is then exposed to light. After development, areas where the objects were blocking the transmission of light are left white, or turn varying shades of grey, depending on how translucent the object is, and areas void of any object become black.

The Lumen printing process expands on the principle of the photogram, but skips the development step. Plants and other organic materials are placed on black and white photographic paper, then left to be exposed under sunlight. The sun’s intense UV light and solar heat react with the paper and plant, and the chemical make up of the plant and paper all combine to produce various colors (development after the exposure would eliminate these colors and render everything in black and white and various shades of grey); papers from different manufacturers react differently from one to the next, and varying exposure lengths affect the vibrancy of the colors produced.

It is a very serendipitous, unpredictable and liberating process. One never knows exactly what the results will be—some plants record their leave’s vein structure on the paper with great detail and exactness, while others wither very rapidly from the solar heat, leaving a “ghosted” image of itself on the paper as it shrinks. Through experience, one gets to know very roughly what colors will be produced by certain exposure times, but there is always something that had never happened previously—a new color is produced, chlorophyl from the plant is pressed into the paper—and is never again replicated. The ever surprising nature of this process is what draws me so intensely to it. I am allowed to put off the very exact, precise nature of working with the mechanical camera, and completely let go, and I find great joy and relaxation in that.