Commercial cyanotype papers

Fast14riot · Jun 6, 2013

I found stuffed in a drawer a pack of commercial cyanotype papers, the ones sold at craft stores and such as "sun print" paper. Anyone here ever try this stuff? Does it work just as well as the home made stuff? I think I might play around with some basic object printing today to try it out before I go to making my own.

Never fiddled with it before, should be fun though!

-Xander

cliveh · Jun 6, 2013

Good luck, but they tend to go out of date quite quickly and you may find they don't work.

Fast14riot · Jun 6, 2013

Thanx for the tip. I believe they are from this year, likely something my son got for Christmas. Just been forgotten about.

-Xander

removed account4 · Jun 6, 2013

why don't you email them
http://www.sunprints.org/
and see what the lifespan is.

its super cheap to make yourself
as long as you have the chemistry.

Fast14riot · Jun 6, 2013

They seem to be working, though I don't know what happened with the blue spotting on the one...

Going to use up this pack to get a feel for the process and hopefully start making my own!

-Xander

Klainmeister · Jun 6, 2013

The blue comes with oxidizing, so try some hydrogen peroxide and see if the whole thing becomes dark blue.

m1tch · Jun 6, 2013

Just drop a small bit of bleach in the water for 'developing' this will fully oxidise the prints, or you could just wait and allow them to oxidise naturally.

Not seen straight razors for quite a while!

winger · Jun 6, 2013

They usually work better with "stuff" than with negatives, but they're fun.

ann · Jun 6, 2013

In the past we have used the "commerical version" (at least for a one day workshop) with great success.

http://www.blueprintsonfabric.com/

This is their link.

m1tch · Jun 6, 2013

Having started making Cyanotypes about a week ago its really addictive, for very little money you can get quite a bit of solution and it goes a long way!

Fast14riot · Jun 6, 2013

I used citric acid in my development, but I also found it interesting that the clear acrylic I used for a cover actually made the two plant pics seem a little lighter.

I'm guessing I unknowingly had some citic acid on my hands when developing the print and caused the excess oxidation in those areas.

M1tch, those are two of my daily shavers actually! I also make my own and restore them. I need to figure out how to get a good quality print from taller objects. I going to grab a UV bulb on my way home tonight and try using a snoot on the fixture to columnate the light a bit more for a straight on exposure and eliminate the shadows.

Good fun, using this process! I will try some contrasty negatives as well.

-Xander

Mainecoonmaniac · Jun 6, 2013

The emulsion is actually pretty easy to make and low in toxicity. It's potassium ferricyanide and ammonium ferric citrate. Here's a great website for alt processes. http://www.alternativephotography.com/wp/processes/cyanotype/cyanotype-classic-process

It's also pretty cheap to make too.

Fast14riot · Jun 7, 2013

Just did my first print of a oiled paper positive using the info m1tch provided in his thread. This one is a bit over exposed at 13 minutes in sunlight. I lost a bunch of mid tones. The paper positive is a very low resolution laser print, which doesn't seem to matter much on this scene. I'm going to try 9 minutes on the next one.

Oh, the prints I did yesterday did oxidize fully and the blue spotting went away. I can see how this gets addictive! Great fun!

-Xander

Fast14riot · Jun 7, 2013

I shortened my exposure time to 7 minutes ad got much better mid tones. I wish it was a higher resolution print for this one, but it looks ok I think.

-Xander

Commercial cyanotype papers

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