Some time late last year (OK, Christmas), I got a present called “Sun-Print Paper”. This stuff is basically sold as a “toy” to parents who probably want their kids to get off their console, get out the house, and take in some Sunshine or else, son. But I digress. As lovers of alternative photography and lo-fi imagery, I figure there might be some Holgablog readers out there who find this stuff right up their street.
According to Wikipedia, sun-print paper is made using a Potassium dichromate solution, so now you know. If you’re mildly chemical-minded, you can have a go at making it yourself. But otherwise, if you’re lazy or busy like me, then have a look round for “Tobar” paper.
The instructions say to a) place interesting and exciting objects on top of the paper, and b) expose to direct Sunlight for 1-2 minutes, before c) dunking in water for a couple of minutes. This I tried, with limited success (click any image to view larger):
Hmm.
It was time to work out how this stuff worked. Calling on AUTHENTIC darkroom techniques, I ran some stripped exposure tests, giving each strip 30 seconds more than the last. At least this proved the paper worked:
Stripped exposures
So what have we learned today? 1. Exposure times aren’t exact. 2. Don’t move anything once the exposure is under way. In fact, what I resort to now is to set everything up under a blanket to keep as much Sun off as possible. Once everything’s in place, I whip the blanket away and start the stopwatch.
A few more tests later and I’m starting to get the hang of this. The mash-up of solid shadow, penumbra, and transparent refractions holds a certain mysticism – is this the photographic equivalent of Plato’s Cave? Curves stretch outwards. Flowers bloom like explosions. Each object leaves its own trace, from paper cut-outs to enlarged negatives, to kitchen glasses and bits of food.
Success 1
Success 2
Success 3
There’s also a wonderful sense of texture in the finished item – the soaking and drying process leaves the paper more rigid, and crinkled. A small stack of results starts to resemble the rescued leaves of some ageing book – refreshing, after the virtual two-dimension-ness of browsing photos on screen.
After a while, one can start to look beyond the basics. This is, essentially, a much more tactile, hands-on form of “slow photography”, so interaction is everywhere. Some trials of scrunching up the paper before use, and laying objects across the crumbled surface yielded some encouraging results.
Pressed flowers and rice
Crumpled knitting needles
Crumpled, tea stained
Other things I want to try include curling the paper, origami techniques, maybe even burning through it. I love the idea of an image not just as a negative, or a digital copy, but as a thing in itself – a unique object that only reveals itself fully though touch and smell, as well as sight. Might have to order myself a new pack.
More Links:
Anna Atkins’ Cyanotypes: the first lady photographer?
“Cyanotypes” Flickr group
“Sun printing” Flickr group
Comments
Ive been trying this same paper out recently too:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/tobymarsh/sets/72157624155954893/
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I used to love this stuff when I was a kid; this makes me want to get into it again. I thought of it recently again when I saw someone doing basically the same thing–long sun exposures–with color darkroom paper, which I didn’t even know was possible. The internet keeps showing me cool photographic techniques you don’t even need a camera for. Thanks!
That stuff is great! I see Toby above has printed a photo onto acetate first and then used that with the sun paper, that’s a good idea too
Hi, yeah I found that printing out a negative image on acetate gives you the best size of source to work with. I tried 135 mono negs but they were too small. I’ve tried some negs from my 120 from my Holga and my Zeiss Ikon. Those worked ok, but I didn’t have the ‘right’ images for it. You need something with strong contrast and not too much graduation in the grey tone.
cool that you brought this up here
I’ve been eager to try this with a pinhole camera. shutter times would be looong 
Couldn’t find anything under “Tobar”, but I found a few by Tedco
http://www.amazon.com/gp/search/ref=a9_sc_1?rh=i:aps,k:sunprint+paper
I LOVE cyanotypes! I’ll warn you the Tedco “Sun Art” paper is a lot more picky and takes longer to expose than the Sunprint Kit paper from the Lawrence Hall of Science. Also, the “Sun Art” can be a bit weird when you’re dousing it to develop your image. While it’s good if you want to do layers, or want to do multiple affects and have to go out in the sun to do it, I still love the sturdier and faster Sunprint Kit papers. The color is also a darker blue on them. Just my $0.02, hope everybody has a TON of fun with these!
Just m
Similar results with wider options for modification can be reached by using regular photographic paper (although it might be too sensitive for use in direct sun light, haven’t tried that). The results are called “chemigrams” and were invented by Pierre Cordier.
Here’s a link to his website. Very interesting.
http://www.pierrecordier.com/en/travaux.html
I’ve also experimented with the technique myself:
http://whathisname.deviantart.com/gallery/#/duw3ej
Lovely images!
Like some other posters, I’ve used blueprint paper to make contact prints from negatives on acetate, though I need to revisit the process to nail it properly.
Examples on my flickr…
http://www.flickr.com/photos/sirluke1/4511619706/in/set-72157594584635250/
Thanks for the comments, everyone. Always amazed by the knowledge and results that you blog readers have to share
…uh, that is “that you have and that you share”. Not “feel like you must share”. Oop.
Love the images! I did cyanotypes and van dykes in school (from large negatives) and always wanted to give it another try. How cool to use actual objects!