Its been a while!

Its been a while since I have posted on this blog, but I’ve not been slacking – honest!  I think I have only taken three evenings off in the last month.  One of those was last Friday when I was privileged, along with Mina, to be invited to go to Tony Richards studio to meet Shane Balkowitsch, who was over from the USA on business.  About ten of us spent the night drinking and shooting wet plates, each had to both shoot and pose for quarter plate tin types.

By midnight there was five of us left and the decision was made to shoot some 15x12 inch ambrotypes.  I have never worked this big before so was facing the task with some trepidation.  Amazingly all five of us got successful shots and by 2 am we had run out of glass and Shane had an hour to get to the airport.  This was what photography is all about – people meeting and sharing a passion, this is what I want the Engine Room to grow into, a place were people with passion can work, talk and laugh together.

Right back to the real world.  I have just sold my Contax 645 with a leaf 22 wi back on ebay and the young lady who was buying it said she would come over on Sunday so that I could show her how to use it.  The problem was, for the last few weeks I have been filling, sanding, painting and putting up shelves so the place looked like a building site again.  I spent almost the full day on Saturday on my hands and knees with the upholstery brush on the vacuum cleaner scrubbing at the floor.

Since I last posted I have put up shelves in the darkrooms, the hall and the studio.  I have moved my desk, cupboards and bookcases in, plus the A1 printer, with the help of Dave Gee – a hero!  I have put up one set of spot lights ready for displaying work.  I have put a worktop up in the dry darkroom, but this is still a store for tools etc., but will be clearing it shortly.

I now have my laptop and bigger monitor on the desk, and have got my big monitor working at the other.  I now have to get a bracket to mount it between the windows.

The place is starting to feel like home.

A mixed day

I thought that I would be spending time today with a friend, but seeing as she seems to gone 'incomunicado' I decided it was time to get back to working on the studio.  I'm not a plumber, so I had a dripping joint on a water pipe and a leak on a waste pipe, not bad for a photographer when you look at how much plumbing I had done!  I spent the first hour stripping and reassembling the pipes, then paper towels on floor, checked both the water pipes and the waste and no drips.  My pride was misplaced though.  I went down to the car to bring some more equipment up, and as I got back I heard running water!  One of the push fit connectors on the water pipe had come apart, the pressure is pretty high!  Its a good job that I continued the vinyl floor a few inches up the walls.

Plumbing finished, and floor dried, time to tackle the joints in the plasterboard.  By lunch I had done the walls and ceiling in the entrance corridor and the boxed in sections in the studio, so ready to start painting once it has dried.  Next one of the most stupid decisions I have made in a long time.  I loaded up the car with all of the old plasterboard, rubbish and scrap and headed of the the recycling depot.  I cued for about twenty minutes just to get in.  Its great that everything is segregated for recycling, but it takes everyone such a long time to walk between all of the designated containers.

After lunch I removed all of my small tanks from my old darkroom and got them fitted into the Nova sink.  So now I have my Kodak 15 lire wash tank, the medium format tanks (minus 1 lid) and the 10x8 Nova tanks that I use for E6.  All attached to individual taps.

You know you are too tired when - 

1st plate, put plate holder in camera wrong, 

2nd plate, straight into silver without collodion; 

3rd plate; forgot to pull the dark side out; 

4th plate, underexposed; 

5th plate, ok.

Luckily these were all 5x7 glass plates. Finally this 10x12 on trophy plate. I also shot a 10x12 on plain glass with a little more exposure.  The plate is better than it looks here, rubbish phone shot with reflections

A night of Cyanotypes

Saturday is looming and Mina has booked a stall in a local craft fair.  Neither of us have sold at this one before so we don't really know what to expect.  Mina will be selling A3 prints so I didn't want to directly compete with her, don't want to be shown up by her sales.  I have a selection of my Forest Nation prints and some 'happy smiley' landscapes left over from my Welsh sales, plus some greeting cards from Concordia, the joint venture I have with my friend Maya.  Not much to sell really, so I thought I would risk some cyanotypes.

Im not really set up yet in the studio, so it was a case of putting together whatever I could.  The laptop and A2 printer wet on one of the folding tables that I use to sell prints from in Wales.  Sheets of plywood were put across anything that would support them and I put up some washing lines in the darkroom.

Its been a busy night, we have got so much to do before Saturday, but made a big dent in it tonight.  I made 35 whole plate digital negs and got nine of them printed.  I also managed to paint the back of Mina's wet plates from last night.  Even managed to get some odd jobs done round the studio while things were exposing or washing.

Getting Cozy

Mina has booked a stall for us at a local craft fair to sell some of our prints, so we need a clean space to mount them.  This meant that I got to spend most of last night mopping the studio to get rid of the plaster dust that still covers most of the floor.

Tonight I finally got round to putting up the curtains.  The problem with the big windows is that everyone on the canal tow path gets a grandstand view of what ever is happening in the studio, especially when we've got enough lights on for wet plate.  Luckily I salvaged some big blackout curtains from the studio on the campus I used to work on before they demolished it.

I put a couple of safelights up the other night, so tonight I repositioned them and added a third over the small sink.  All ready to start mounting and producing cyanotypes tomorrow night.

Second nights shooting

I postponed painting again tonight. First of all I put up a couple more safe lights in the darkroom. On my own tonight so I decided to shoot 10x12 again to get it out of my system for a bit. First was a test shot on my home made adapter in the plate holder then a full plate. I still managed to overexpose, should have dried the test plate first. The second subject was even worse! The 10x12s have also shown I need to work on my developing technique for bigger plates. Oh well, its still a great way to spend an evening.

Shooting at last

After nearly two months of building, painting and plumbing I had to use the studio for shooting.  Now that the wet darkroom is operational ad the studio is cleared and usable I decided it was time to shoot.  Not wishing to work on my own I only mentioned it to Mina, and I had company.

We both arrived with cameras, Mina with a half plate Kodak and me with my 10x12 and then spent well over an hour preparing chemistry for wet plate, assembling lights and putting up a backdrop.  Mina was the first to shoot, opting for a still life.  We had a few teething problems, like a broken plate and a couple with scrape marks, then finally a good one.  Sounds daft but even tough it wasn't my plate I was so pleased that we had produced the first image in my studio.

My turn and I persuaded Mina to pose for me.  I owe her an apology!  My first plate came out ok but a little underexposed and true to form I managed to photograph an attractive young woman and make her look severe!  My second plate would have been better, but guess what I broke it!

I had a great night shooting with someone I enjoy working with and producing the first images from the studio.

Not the best p[late I have ever produced, but still a memorable one (sorry Mina!)

More paint and some curtain rails

More paint and some curtain rails. 

All the money that the rails cost and there are no curtain hooks!!! I then swept the floor which is why the pics look so foggy.

Tomorrow, when the dust has settled I just have to hang the curtains and the backdrop and we are ready to play.