What is Silver Collodion Printing?
There are basically two products of Victorian Photography – the photograph and the any prints made from the photograph. A tintype is a one of a kind image – prints are not made from tintypes. However, Ambrotypes on glass can be printed and reproduced as many times as the Alchemist has time and money for. Silver collodion printing is one of the Victorian era printing processes we use.
The basic process of producing a silver collodion print is:
- A full sized negative is prepared – We use Ambrotype negatives and also digital negatives made from film and other images
- The image carrier plate (glass, metal or paper) is coated with a special emulsion of silver chloride in collodion. All preparation and processing is done under safe light in the darkroom
- The silver collodion emulsion is allowed to dry and cure for 10 minutes or so
- The dry plate is aligned with the negative in a contact printing frame
- The frame is place in sunlight for 10 to 60 minutes to expose the image
- Back in the darkroom the plate is washed to remove excess silver and “fixed” with hypo to make the silver image light fast
- Often the plate is toned with gold to alter the color and make the silver more archival
- The plate is washed to remove any residual chemicals and dried
- The plate is varnished to protect the image
The print can be backed in several ways to give depth and tone. Gold backing will produce an Orotone (our favorite). White will make a Pearltone and silver a Silvertone.
A note on naming conventions: Modern Photographers and Inventors are often “geeky” people. Victorian era photographers were much the same. They named their inventions either after themselves or after the chemicals or procedure used. So “wet plate collodion” is collodion based and the picture must be taken while the chemicals are still wet. What we call “Silver Collodion” is also know by other names such as collodiochloride printing or printing out paper printing.
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