I did it. I made a rookie mistake. I coated the wrong side of the watercolour paper. I'll hold my hands up - I just didn't pay attention to what I was doing. But why does this matter? In the images below, you can see the prints before I washed them, with beautiful definition in the scattered petals. But where are the prints after I washed them? It all washed off. The smooth side of the paper didn't properly absorb the chemistry, so it all just... washed away.
At least you can see my setup and how the paper looks before and during exposure.
I thought I'd try again, this time experimenting with exposure levels for my UV lamp. I set up two prints - one with three feathers, and one with a digital negative printed onto acetate, and exposed them both for 30 minutes. The feather print turned out noticeably darker than the photo print - I wonder if this is partially because the light had to pass through the perspex and negative instead of shining onto the paper itself, or perhaps I didn't place them evenly under the lamp and the first print had more of a direct beam from the bulb. It could also simply be that the negative I printed was too dark. I'd have to try this again to be sure. Still, the feather print is overexposed (the first feather has been almost completely lost!) and would probably have been ready after about 20 minutes. The photo print is underexposed and would have benefited from more time under the lamp.
Inspired by Wu Chi-Tsung's collages, I thought I'd try some abstract cyanotypes myself. Instead of crumpling the paper, however, I sprayed them with water while they were exposing - I knew that the chemistry would wash off in water and wanted to see what would happen if I let the water do what it wanted.
The first print was created by placing the paper flat on the floor and spraying it with some water. The water essentially stayed where it was, leaching spots of the chemistry away. Next, I did the same thing but with the paper leaning up against a wall. I sprayed the top of the sheet and let the water trickle down. This created some interesting patterns - the top reminds me a little of a misty waterfall. Finally, I repeated this but with the addition of some blue oil-based ink. It's not incredible, but it was fun to do, at least!
As I had some spare photo paper left, I coated some sheets and tried some simple cyanolumens. I don't know what I did wrong, but I'm not happy with these at all. I'm not sure whether it was a problem with the paper, or whether I simply didn't expose them for long enough. I adore Jo Stephen's cyanolumens and would love to create something just as spectacular - this isn't it. I will keep trying until I get there!
Something I feel did go well, however, were my wet cyanotypes on watercolour paper (the correct side, this time). After placing the flowers onto the sheets, I sprinkled some turmeric around the flower heads, carefully spooned soap bubbles on top, and sprayed the entire thing with vinegar. On the second one, I also added some skeleton leaves and cling film. I put the perspex on top and left it to expose for about 2 hours.
The middle image here is a photo of the second print before washing. I think sometimes it's worth keeping a record of the colours pre-wash, as they can be quite striking. To the right is a photo of the washed print, and below is a scan. You can see how my scanner doesn't really do the colours justice, which is a shame. On the far left is the first print - the turmeric has produced a vibrant halo around the flower head, and despite the scan losing a lot of the vibrancy of the prints, I quite like this particular scan's more muted gold and the subtle texture in the flower head.
Still not fully content, I set up some more wet cyanotypes, this time exposing for 6 hours. I couldn't fit both under the perspex at the same time, but I had already prepared them, so I sacrificed a portion of the feather print - afterwards I set up just the one (see further below). Again, you can see the stark difference between photos of the prints and the scanned versions.
My favourite image from my entire cyanotype adventure has to be this one - I tried the same thing as above but with just one sheet under the perspex, and fully coated from edge to edge. This has lemon juice, turmeric, and bubbles and was left for about 6 hours. I am thrilled with the outcome!
Finally, I thought I'd have a brief try at toning a cyanotype. Using a digital negative, I printed this image of my horse twice - the first one is beautifully exposed (my scanner has made it look a little paler than it really is, however) and I love the odd brush strokes on the right hand side. The second cyanotype started out the same way, but the toning process darkened it a bit too much for my liking.
I started by soaking the second print in water to fully saturate the paper, and then bleached it in a sodium carbonate solution (1tsp sodium carbonate and 1l of water). This is where I made a mistake - I didn't bleach it for long enough. I saw the image starting to fade and worried that I had left it there for too long, but I feel I was a bit over-cautious. After removing it from the bleach bath, I rinsed it under water and put it face-down into a tea toner. For that, I used a handful of tea bags, made a few very strong cups of tea, and poured them into a small tub of cool water. It's not very precise, but I thought I'd just chuck in some tea and see what came of it. I left the print to tone for about an hour before rinsing it well.
Aside from the toned print being a little too dark and losing some of the definition, I'm quite happy with it. Not bad for a first go, at least. The paper has been stained by the tea a little, but I quite like the vintage feel it brings to the photo. It's also a slightly more natural colour for a horse than the bright blue!
Have you tried out some cyanotypes? How did it all go? Share your masterpieces in the comments below, I'm excited to see what people have created!
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