What is an Alchemist?

Blog / Video / Wet Plate Collodion

In popular thinking an Alchemist is someone who believes they can turn lead into silver or gold. Yes, there were Alchemists in the olden days who tried to transmute metals. But a more fundamental concept of Alchemy involves the conversion of simple elemental forms in nature to more complex, and more valuable, forms; an Alchemist is one who converts elementals into higher forms. So what does this have to do with the wet plate process? At its most basic wet plate converts random bits of silver into organized, recognizable and beautiful (we hope) images. An Alchemist takes a fleeting moment…

Tiny Little Tintype Memories

Blog / Tintype / Video

Part of the fun of creating wet plate images is you can play around with just about any size and format you like. This year I have been making a lot of really small tintypes. They run 2-3 inches on a side. The small plates are a real challenge, especially pouring the collodion without drenching your hand! Here is a little video of some of my favorite little tintype memories so far this year, Enjoy! If you enjoyed seeing my tiny tintypes why not have your own made? Contact Me for availability and pricing for a wet plate collodion portrait…

Raindrop on a Blade of Grass

Blog / Portrait / Tintype / Wet Plate Collodion

Like a raindrop on a blade of grassShe appears,Reflecting the world around her, Not just the present, butThe Future, andThe Past. Like a raindrop on a blade of grassHere for a moment, and thenDisappears.Where did she come from andWhere did she go?Out of thin air and back again..And like the rain,Just a matter of time, andShe will be back again. A 6in x 8in wet plate collodion photograph on aluminum. Featuring Claire Voyant. Clare Voyant is a published alt model and model coach. She is based in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Check out her FaceBook Clarevoyantcreative for more information and booking. Check…

Spring Open Access Day 2026

Blog

In preparation for Open Access Day here are a few semi-interesting tidbits: We are doing tintypes for several reasons including the joy of working with so many talented and creative models! We will also use the images for our social and portfolio to help attract customers. Select images could be published or offered for sale. My associate Brittany will be helping with the sessions and will try and capture some digital images BTS etc. We will be doing 6x8 inch photos on aluminum all day. If I have time I will try and make some glass plates too! It take…

First Tintype with New Cooke Lens

Blog / Video / Vintage Lens

"New" lenses in the wet plate collodion world always mean "new to me" and not new new! I recently found a lens that was recovered from a barn. It is a Cooke 8in Anastigmat lens. I pulled it apart and did a good cleaning. It had a little fungus inside but the glass had not gotten pitted yet. I 3D printed a lens board and tried it out on my Primer 12x12 camera. I made a video of the fixing step of the first tintype... Here is a still image of that plate. It turned out really nice! Just for…

3D Printing a Round Wet Plate Holder

Blog

Large format cameras for wet plate collodion are all handmade and custom. Typically a wet plate photographer will have a camera that can be fitted with various backs to create different sizes of photographs. For example, we use a Primer camera that has a maximum size of 12x12 inches. We have made various "inserts" that allow us to make smaller wet plate images - 8x10, 10x12, 5x6 and 4x5 are our most used. We recently 3D printed a holder for 6 inch round images. We will cut glass to 6 inch circles - at least that is the plan! Here…

Awesome Little Immortalized Memory

Blog / Portrait / Tintype

The life of a Victorian style photographer is not always easy. Each image requires so much gear and chemicals and preparation and time that you often wonder is it worth the trouble? With almost no effort I could just take a cell phone picture... But then a client comment reinforces everything you are doing and the world feels like Spring again. Last Fall we had the joy of creating Halloween tintypes with a group of models in Germantown / Milwaukee. The irrepressible Claire posed for the 8x10 plate below. It was near the end of the day and the sun…

Portraits Between Tintypes

Blog / Portrait

It is much slower taking a tintype portrait than most other forms of photography. This is because each image is hand made - and that takes some time! If we are making a tintype we must first clean the plate, then coat it with collodion and then place it in a silver bath to sensitize. It takes 3 to 5 minutes to properly sensitize a tintype in the silver nitrate solution. Then the excess silver is removed and the plate put into the holder for the camera. Finally we are ready to actually expose the portrait. Then we have to…

Vintage Amber Wisconsin Model

Blog / Portrait

Just fooling around between tintype portraits. The joy of tintype portraits is the relaxed pace due to the preparation and finishing time. So we often use that time to have some digital photo fun. Here are just some fun portraits with Wisconsin model Amber. Check out her FaceBook for more pics and booking information AM Model Following are more awesome photo sessions with Amber Back to our Blog https://sunandsilver.photo/somewhere/ https://jalanlee.com/portrait-photography/waterfall-tintypes-portraits-with-amber/ https://jalanlee.com/modeling/romance-with-amber/

Classic Portraits – Classic Lens

Blog / Portrait / Vintage Lens

The love of Victorian photography is, in part, a love of the character and rendering of classic lenses. We have a variety of vintage (antique) lenses that we use. This set of portraits was taken with our Voigtlander Nokton 40mm lens. The Nokton is an interesting lens in that it is manufactured right now but uses the vintage formula and glass. It is fully manual aperture and focus and mounts directly on our Canon R5 modern mirrorless camera. Wisconsin model KD Jae came to our Menasha studio for a set of Tintype portraits. Between tintypes we also had some fun…

Mobile Darkroom Build – Part 1

Blog / Tutorial / Video

One of the many challenges to Victorian Photography methods is you need a nearby darkroom to do wet plate images. The term "wet plate" is descriptive in that the plate has to be exposed and developed before the collodion coating dries. This requires a darkroom because the plate is light sensitive. In the 1800's photographers carried around a dark box on their carts for work away from their studios. The dark box is still used by many today. I decided to build a darkroom on a trailer. I use it both as a darkroom and as a lab & work…

Silver Collodion Fix

Blog / Video / Wet Plate Collodion

The magical moment for wet plate photography has to be the fixing step! Fixing is the final step in the developing process and is where the unreacted silver is removed from the collodion. As the silver washed out the final image is revealed. This video shows the fix of a silver collodion print (which is basically a tintype copy of an existing photo or negative). We speeded up the middle part just a little bit. https://youtube.com/shorts/uAwpiG5br1E?si=ttRiiVFnSD8wdGY_ You can see more of our videos on our YouTube channel @sunandsilverphoto Back to our Blog Page