Collodion Over/Under Development?

Eric in Vegas · Dec 9, 2023

I took my first tintypes today and my images all seem to come out dark (this image has also been varnished). I kept increasing exposure so I don't believe underexposure is the cause but the sun may have been outpacing my exposure adjustments. Could this be an under or over development issue?

Also, most of my images had a slight bit of fog but not over the entire image but rather like foggy artifacts. Interestingly enough, when I was cleaning some of my plates to reuse them, I found that these artifacts wiped away with a wet finger. I wouldn't think this would be good for the emulsion...has anyone encountered this, and if so, any ideas on how to prevent this?

koraks · Dec 10, 2023

Eric in Vegas said:
Could this be an under or over development issue?

Certainly not overdevelopment. I assume you've tried developing longer to see if it helped any?

How long do you let the plate sit in the silver bath? If extending exposure and development don't give more density, the problem is probably that you just don't have enough silver halide to work with on the plate.

If this is a new silver bath, have you already ripened it by letting one or two plates sit in it for half an hour or so? A newly mixed silver bath will produce weak plates. The silver bath accumulates halides (bromide, iodide); effectively these halides are 'leached' from the plate. A sacrificial initial plate is usually left in the silver bath for a while so that the silver bath reaches an equilibrium.

Eric in Vegas said:
Also, most of my images had a slight bit of fog but not over the entire image but rather like foggy artifacts.

What kind of shapes? Wisps, like very thin clouds, or distinct shapes/patterns?
Fog can have several causes. Chemical contamination is one; this is usually related to suboptimal plate cleaning. Especially leftover whitening (calcium carbonate) will trigger fog. Often happens along the edges of the plate, where they resulting artefacts are called oysters.
When I had fogging issues in my collodion (years ago), I dropped the pH of the silver bath by adding a little nitric acid to it. This made for slower plates, but the shadows cleaned up very nicely indeed.

Eric in Vegas · Dec 10, 2023

koraks said:
Certainly not overdevelopment. I assume you've tried developing longer to see if it helped any?

How long do you let the plate sit in the silver bath? If extending exposure and development don't give more density, the problem is probably that you just don't have enough silver halide to work with on the plate.

If this is a new silver bath, have you already ripened it by letting one or two plates sit in it for half an hour or so? A newly mixed silver bath will produce weak plates. The silver bath accumulates halides (bromide, iodide); effectively these halides are 'leached' from the plate. A sacrificial initial plate is usually left in the silver bath for a while so that the silver bath reaches an equilibrium.

What kind of shapes? Wisps, like very thin clouds, or distinct shapes/patterns?
Fog can have several causes. Chemical contamination is one; this is usually related to suboptimal plate cleaning. Especially leftover whitening (calcium carbonate) will trigger fog. Often happens along the edges of the plate, where they resulting artefacts are called oysters.
When I had fogging issues in my collodion (years ago), I dropped the pH of the silver bath by adding a little nitric acid to it. This made for slower plates, but the shadows cleaned up very nicely indeed.

Thank you for the feedback. Knowing I'm not over developed removes one big variable. I'm using a "pre-iodized" silver bath from UVphotographics so I was going under the assumption it was good to go?

While lying in bed last night, I realized that I did my exposure test strip wrong and I think that may have thrown my exposure baseline off for the day. Based on my miscalculation, I think I may have been underexposed by as much as 2 stops. I'm going to try again today with much longer exposures.

The fog is like wisps in sort of circular shapes. I felt like they might have matched the way I was applying the developer, but not sure. I watched some videos on developing last night and am going to try a different approach on that today as well.

koraks · Dec 10, 2023

You're welcome; hope it helps in any way.

I'd assume for now the silver bath is OK given what you say about it being pre-seasoned.

Your plate is most definitely not overexposed and arguably it leans towards underexposure. By how much is more of an aesthatic than a technical question, in my view. I would have expected that with this amount of exposure, you would get usable density for an ambrotype. But by all means try significantly more exposure and see what it does.

As to developer pouring patterns and the wisps/circular shapes: yes, there could very well be a relation. Maybe if you manage to get an example picture up, it would be easier to recognize the effect.

Btw, I found with collodion that a controlled lighting setup of a couple of strobes helped me to understand what I was doing. I'm not sure if you have any studio strobes (the old-fashioned ones; LED won't work here), but if so, give it a try. With less powerful units, you can add exposure by just giving multiple 'pops' on a static scene. I always did my still lifes that way, often giving 16 or so pops with two strobes to get the desired exposure.

Eric in Vegas · Dec 10, 2023

koraks said:
You're welcome; hope it helps in any way.

I'd assume for now the silver bath is OK given what you say about it being pre-seasoned.

Your plate is most definitely not overexposed and arguably it leans towards underexposure. By how much is more of an aesthatic than a technical question, in my view. I would have expected that with this amount of exposure, you would get usable density for an ambrotype. But by all means try significantly more exposure and see what it does.

As to developer pouring patterns and the wisps/circular shapes: yes, there could very well be a relation. Maybe if you manage to get an example picture up, it would be easier to recognize the effect.

Btw, I found with collodion that a controlled lighting setup of a couple of strobes helped me to understand what I was doing. I'm not sure if you have any studio strobes (the old-fashioned ones; LED won't work here), but if so, give it a try. With less powerful units, you can add exposure by just giving multiple 'pops' on a static scene. I always did my still lifes that way, often giving 16 or so pops with two strobes to get the desired exposure.

Today I adjusted my exposure and saw a huge difference...I think running a bit overexposed now but at least moving in the right direction. I adjusted how I was applying my developer and the little "wispy" cloudy areas disappeared. I'm not sure if that was it, but I was applying in a circular motion and I felt like the cloudy areas were kind of mirroring the motion of my developer application? Now I try to quickly apply from one edge and cascade it across.

My collodion pouring technique is sorely lacking and my development needs work but I'm finally getting some brighter images.

Eric in Vegas · Dec 10, 2023

koraks said:
You're welcome; hope it helps in any way.

I'd assume for now the silver bath is OK given what you say about it being pre-seasoned.

Your plate is most definitely not overexposed and arguably it leans towards underexposure. By how much is more of an aesthatic than a technical question, in my view. I would have expected that with this amount of exposure, you would get usable density for an ambrotype. But by all means try significantly more exposure and see what it does.

As to developer pouring patterns and the wisps/circular shapes: yes, there could very well be a relation. Maybe if you manage to get an example picture up, it would be easier to recognize the effect.

Btw, I found with collodion that a controlled lighting setup of a couple of strobes helped me to understand what I was doing. I'm not sure if you have any studio strobes (the old-fashioned ones; LED won't work here), but if so, give it a try. With less powerful units, you can add exposure by just giving multiple 'pops' on a static scene. I always did my still lifes that way, often giving 16 or so pops with two strobes to get the desired exposure.

This is where I'm at now (varnish applied). Any advice/tips would certainly be appreciated. Thanks!

awty · Dec 10, 2023

Nice work, keep practicing, you'll get better over time with pouring the collodion, developing, exposing, managing the silver bath etc. etc.
Ive just started with what must be my sixth lot of chemistry and Im still making mistakes.
If it were easy everyone would be doing it.

Eric in Vegas · Dec 10, 2023

awty said:
Nice work, keep practicing, you'll get better over time with pouring the collodion, developing, exposing, managing the silver bath etc. etc.
Ive just started with what must be my sixth lot of chemistry and Im still making mistakes.
If it were easy everyone would be doing it.

Thanks. It’s certainly an interesting and enjoyable process.

koraks · Dec 11, 2023

Eric in Vegas said:
I adjusted how I was applying my developer and the little "wispy" cloudy areas disappeared.

Yes, developer mechanics make a massive difference. I ended up moving to tray development, which allowed me to flood the entire plate with developer more or less instantly. Not saying that this is a better approach - just that there is a lot of room for experimentation.

Eric in Vegas said:
This is where I'm at now (varnish applied). Any advice/tips would certainly be appreciated.

Looks good! Feel free to pour on a little more of the collodion when pouring the plate. I see you've got some gaps and empty space along the edges; these tend to go away if you use a little more collodion. If you're careful, you can get pretty much all of the excess back into the bottle, so it doesn't hurt to pour out a little more initially.

Eric in Vegas · Dec 11, 2023

koraks said:
Yes, developer mechanics make a massive difference. I ended up moving to tray development, which allowed me to flood the entire plate with developer more or less instantly. Not saying that this is a better approach - just that there is a lot of room for experimentation.

Looks good! Feel free to pour on a little more of the collodion when pouring the plate. I see you've got some gaps and empty space along the edges; these tend to go away if you use a little more collodion. If you're careful, you can get pretty much all of the excess back into the bottle, so it doesn't hurt to pour out a little more initially.

Thanks koraks. I'm working on pouring more collodion. I struggle in general with photography chemicals...try so hard to conserve them that I end up wasting rather than saving

koraks · Dec 11, 2023

Eric in Vegas said:
try so hard to conserve them that I end up wasting rather than saving

The step of understanding this is more than half way towards a solution!

awty · Dec 11, 2023

Out doors is the hardest to master.
Temperature, humidity and Uv light are all variables that have a huge impact.
In a studio you can control that a lot better.
Pouring chemistry gets easier with practice.
Maintaining your silver bath is essential, there is no skipping on the aspects.
Stick to it for a few years and you will learn better how to problem solve.

alexgard · May 2, 2024

The easiest way to rule out over/under development is to do a test step plate first and every time. You will save yourself a lot of hassle doing this.

Plate certainly looks under developed.
Keep your development time the same and adjust exposures accordingly. I stick to around 16 sec dev time unless I'm trying to pull contrast.

Be aggressive with the pour. Cover the plate and shake the hell out of it. Potassium nitrate in the dev can help a little with brightness.

koraks · May 3, 2024

@alexgard holy cow, you're alive! Welcome aboard - are you still doing wet plate?

alexgard · May 3, 2024

yes sir, back in business. Been busy with other things.
I crashed my van/mobile darkroom a couple of years ago and some other things have come up since then, but I have a new vehicle and just getting back into it.

koraks said:
@alexgard holy cow, you're alive! Welcome aboard - are you still doing wet plate?

koraks · May 3, 2024

Ah, beautiful; glad to hear you regained your footing - and that you found us all here!

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