Help! No positive in Daguerreotype

[ZacPatsalides]

Hi I’m using the Becquerel process, I originally started out doing in camera dags but the exposure times were too long for the portrait I wanted to do. So I decided to use contact printing. So I made a digital positive, channeled out the reds on Photoshop and did a 8 second exposure at EV 8.5. All of what I have learnt is from Jonathan Danforth, including exposure times of the contact printing. The image appeared withing the first 5 minutes of development and I may of got a bit excited and had a look at it under room light. Is the reason I have no positive is because it’s solarized or over exposed. P.s I know it’s not fuming etc because I have made a in camera Dag with a positive.

P.p.s any advice of preventing the marks that are appearing?

Many thanks to anyone that could help

-Zac Patsalides

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[jgmotamedi]

It is very over exposed and probably fogged. Cut down time by 3 stops, don’t peek, and try again.

The scratches are probably from contact with the positive/negative. This is an inherent risk with making contact prints. See if you can move the plate and “negative” together in a way that they only contact each other once.

I don’t know what this means: “I know it’s not fuming etc because I have made a in camera Dag with a positive.” Fuming has effects regardless of how you expose.

[Bakody]

Hi,
I think it’s grey because you checked it in room light (and maybe fogged, but we will see if next time you won’t check it…)
Marks: Did you clean the plate during polishing with any liquid (maybe still some left)? or did you polished it well enough after you got it back from silver plater?
You can make an in camera copy about it as well if you print out the photo on paper and just take the photo about it.

http://daginhun.blogspot.com/
 http://www.facebook.com/DagerrotipiaDaguerreotype

[ZacPatsalides]

Thanks for your help, next time I’ll contain my excitement and not check it.

The silver platers polish it to mirror finish for me. Do you think I need to polish again before fuming?

 

Thanks

Zac Patsalides

[Bakody]

Don’t let the silver plater to polish your plate!! You wont know what did he do with it. You need to do that. I think he used some kind of liquid and and it’s still on the surface. Or next time polish it much more longer.

http://daginhun.blogspot.com/
 http://www.facebook.com/DagerrotipiaDaguerreotype

[ZacPatsalides]

Happy days, after a couple more tries I got a pretty good one, in my eyes anyway. Not sure why it’s blue though, any thoughts?

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[Bakody]

Hi,

It look much better and it will be a good topic.
1) Polishing: I can see some oblique/cross lines. Polish it a little bit softer material. I think they weren’t created at the last polishing. I think you already know it: if the image will be a vertical image, the last polishing direction should be vertical as well.
2) I can see some water marks on it. Wash it much longer! At the beginning you can wash it in running water/ under tap water and you won’t waste much distilled water. But at then end put your plates in distilled water. Keep moving it, change the water on it. For the last washing I use hot distilled water, because I dry the back of the plate with hairdryer (from the white parts to the blacks). You will see how quickly will be dry. If you are not quick enough you can still get some marks during drying. Just need to practise.
3) BLUE is NOT the NATURAL color of Becquerel daguerreotypes! If you read this on this forum or in other homepages, it is not true!!! You can get black and white b-dags!
First of all your plate is underdeveloped. You need to leave it under the red film (foil)/ruby light for much longer. For example I’m using 2x500w halogen lamps. The distance between the 1000w and the plate is about 25cm. You will need to cool your plate during development, because if it will be too hot it will be grey. With this setup I need about 3hours of development under red films/ruby light.
If you are using longer and longer development times and you still get blue tone on your dag it means, your red films (foil)/ruby light not red enough, still some other wavelengths can go thru. This is the most common problem, mistake. I figured out, you just simply need to use more layers of red films (foil). For example I need to use 6 layers of red films to get black and white images, but maybe you are using different red films then I so maybe you will need different number of red films.
Good luck!

http://daginhun.blogspot.com/
 http://www.facebook.com/DagerrotipiaDaguerreotype

[ZacPatsalides]

Thanks for the feedback!

1) yeah that was a school boy error on my part, but you live and you learn.

2) I will try the hot water technique. I’m also going to invest in a more powerful hairdryer, the one I’m using at the moment is the schools and it’s a bit beat up.

3) I did buy a 500w halogen flood light but I’ve been using the sun to develop. The latest image was developed for 3 hours at 13 EV but there were passing clouds so I can’t be sure of the actual amount of light it received.

I’m using one layer of amberlith film, so I’ll triple up on that and hopefully it’ll channel out the blue. Although I must say I do quite like them haha.

Thank you! Will post the next result when it’s done.

 

Zac

[Bakody]

My hairdryer is not strong as well and I blow just the back of the plate with it.
Sun development is fine too. Try more development time and maybe more then 3 red films. Sometimes I can see others try maximum with 2 layers of red film and they get blue images, so 3 will be the same…
I will be waiting for the next post…

http://daginhun.blogspot.com/
 http://www.facebook.com/DagerrotipiaDaguerreotype

[ZacPatsalides]

Sorry I haven’t posted my progress, been busy with other things. I think my latest ones are just too over exposed. They look much better in real life compared to these images though.

[ZacPatsalides]

Can’t seem to upload picture at the moment, will be sure to later.

[ZacPatsalides]

here they are

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