Dunnerdale

First thing to say is that the shadows aren't quite this blocked in the print but my old flatbed won't scan shadows properly!

I came across this lone tree amongst the rocks on my way up the Walna Scar track from Dunnerdale in the Lake District. The light was wonderful for black and white being diffuse, cloudy but with a luminous layer near the horizon. I immediately knew that I'd want to expose the print through a soft filter (level 0).

I tried printing this using Ilford Cooltone developer and dodging and burning but couldn't get a natural look to the print so I decided to use very dilute lith and then tone in selenium to get the salmon coloured split tone you see here. The dilution meant a 30 minute development time but it meant that I only had to dodge the mid-ground boulders.