Quiet & Contemplation

I have not posted very much since the clouds and rain rolled into Southern California as I have been experimenting a lot with solar printing and Cyanotype printing. For me at the moment, cloudy days exclude the ability to do some ‘quality’ solar printing.

For the Cyanotype printing, I had hoped to avoid the need to acidify my wash-out water in my cyanotype development process. When we finally had a hazy sunny day, I was able to make a solar cyanatoype print, which I was underwhelmed by the results. About the same time I obtained a copy of Christina Anderson’s Cyanotype how-to book and noted her strong recommendation to acidify the wash-out water otherwise the print will look flat and the darks will be a bit washed out. bingo. Got my attention.

Since my printing was on hold, I have been re-examining my recent seascapes; seaweed compositions, urban seascapes, surf-riders, etc and found myself drilling down to a more minimalistic series of seascapes, such as this photograph above. This is a photograph that I am also seriously considering for cyanotype printing, which will be a study of middle blues, versus the grays above.

I just find this composition very contemplative, in part created on a foggy day that allowed the horizon to soften and become more ambiguous. I am just not sure entirely why, but I find this photograph to be very visually intriguing.As the title to this article states, for me this is a quiet and contemplative photograph, which seems to work in an odd way. I find my self studying all of the slight tonal changes and it certaintly does not incorporate a ‘decisive moment’. LoL

I suspect that I will continue to experiment with the tonal range, especially when I start printing this as a cyanotype.

Meanwhile, I am chasing down the components to create an acidic wash-out water for Cyanotype printing and currently waiting on the delivery of the pH test strip papers. Current goal is to have pH 5 water to develop my Cyanotype prints in. More about that later…

Cheers & make every day an Earth Day

Doug

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 The Flow of Light Brushes the Shadow, an artist book from Singular Images Press, Fall 2022 release, $60.00 (CA sales tax for those residing in the USA) plus shipping expenses. Message me douglas.stockdale.artist@gmail.com or singularimagespress@gmail for shipping details and PayPal invoice.

Note: The Artist Special Edition (book + extra print) is Sold Out. 

Book workshop:

Southeast Center for Photography (SEC4P): Creative PhotoBook workshop, (Sold Out) a virtual event on Zoom; February 25, 26 & March 4 & 5th 2023; from 10am – 1 pm, EST (3 hour session each day, with a week between the weekend sessions to work your book-dummy).