Cyanotype Tinting or making a white ground yellow

Last year, I spent some time experimenting with tinting the cyanotype base from the normal white, to shades of yellow or other pastel colors. This was something I thought about trying over the years but never went through with it. I bought a watercolor tube paint set, and then tried to apply a lite yellow tint all across the surface of a test print. The idea is to get some other colors involved with the white and the blues to make something interesting. Blue plus yellow makes some shades of green. The highlights being yellow could also look good in landscapes because the sun is yellow. Just take a look through your K2 yellow filter at a cyanotype and you'll see what I mean. Note my finger filter across the top of the cyanotype, that would make a nice flesh colored wash that looks like a cuprotype or ferroblend.

Here's example of the idea, although not a great one.



Take this cyanotype.



...and wash over it with a transparent water color or dye, and this is what you should get. This is a faked version using a K2 filter over my phone lens with color balance in manual mode and adjusted to 3200. I could not find the examples I played with last year, but they didn't look very good anyway. I didn't know watercolors weren't all transparent. The tube colors I got left little flecks of yellow lieing on top of the blue, not a good look. I got some food coloring, which is a die that's not very stable but easy to try. It also didn't very good for the same reason. On Amazon, there are a few products with the brand name "Dr. Bonner's" transparent water colors, but they use dies, not pigments.

I may trot down to Michael's, the big chain art store nearby and see what they have. Does anyone have any experience doing this? Any suggestions for transpaent colors for this? I watch a few videos on Youtube on transparent watercolors, but am confused a bit. They talk about a color appearing behind the others, and that is what I am looking for. This would look at if the paper were a pastel yellow before printing. Other pastel colors like orange or yellow green may also look good. Anything but blue. Already full up on the blue. Coloring could be selctive by leaving the sky blue, etc.

Advantages of this are:
1.Giving a more sunlit look to woodland landscapes.
2. Getting some greens by mixing yellow and blue.
3. Neutralizing the deep blue tones.
4. May give some UV and blue light protection for the print even though Mike Ware says all colors fade cyanotypes when he studied that.
5. I jokingly call these greeniotypes.

Thanks for sharing your tinting technique. If I understood correctly, the addition of colour is not imagewise but as an overall stain. That's not necessarily undesirable and as your examples demonstrate, it has a certain appeal of its own like Cyanotype prints on toned watercolour paper. Have you considered gum over cyanotype as an alternative as it gives more control on imagewise addition of colour? i've seen some excellent works by @Debanjan done this way and if I am not wrong one can get the effect of a toned cyanotype to a complete tricolour print with the gum over cyanotype approach. Very flexible.

Alan Townsend said:

I didn't know watercolors weren't all transparent. The tube colors I got left little flecks of yellow lieing on top of the blue, not a good look.

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Alan Townsend said:

Any suggestions for transpaent colors for this?

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Watercolors are generally pigment-based. As you said, pigments vary in terms of their transparency. In general, the yellow pigments used for watercolors today are only semi-transparent, making them ill-suited for a wash that is overlayed on a cyanotype. One obvious solution would be to color the paper before printing the cyanotype, so that the Prussian blue pigment of the cyanotype comes on top of the yellow pigment. This may not work perfectly with watercolor paints, but if you use gouache paints instead, you should be able to follow this order of work.

The yellow flecks you describe are not related to the transparency of the pigment, btw. This sounds simply like insufficient mixing of the watercolor paint with water. Watercolor paints are essentially pigment dispersions with some additional fillers added to them (you can DIY pretty decent watercolors with dry pigment, honey and gum arabic). If you dilute these, especially on a somewhat larger scale as you may have been doing, the best approach is to first add a small amount of water to the water color paste (assuming you're using tubes) and then work that in until it's perfectly homogeneous. Then continue to add water in small amounts to make your wash.

Dyes as opposed to pigments will be easier to work with if you want to make a wash you can dip the paper in. I don't know about brands popular in the US, but around here, 'Ecoline' by Talens has always been a popular choice for art classes at schools etc. These are water-based watercolors (so solutions of dyes) that generally come in little dropper pipette bottles. Since it's already a solution (as opposed to a dispersion), you can just add water until you obtain the intensity you want.
I expect the light-fastness to be significantly reduced compared to pigment-based watercolors, but they might be easier to work with. One downside is that you need to apply the colored wash after making the print, since the dye will in principle (or at least to a large extent) remain water-soluble. Hence, if you were to first dye the paper and then make the print, the dye would mostly wash out of the paper during printing.

Alan Townsend said:

a color appearing behind the others, and that is what I am looking for.

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This will never be entirely possible with a cyanotype. The problem here is that the Prussian blue itself is a semi-transparent pigment, so whatever color is next to it/underneath it, will always show through and thus mix with the blue of the cyanotype. FYI, Prussian blue is (used to be) a common blue pigment used also in paints; it's also known as PB27 (pigment blue #27): https://handprint.com/HP/WCL/waterb.html#PB27

several ways of toning the finished print should work.


i can think of black tea,polisulfite toner or in s strong solution of black salt.

RalphLambrecht said:

polisulfite toner or in s strong solution of black salt.

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For a cyanotype? You've tried this? Polysulfide is strongly alkaline; it will bleach back the Prussian blue image. It may also stain the paper slightly. I don't know how the sulfide might fuethnore interact with the reduced cyan image.

Are you sure you weren't thinking of a regular silver gelatin print?

koraks said:

Watercolors are generally pigment-based. As you said, pigments vary in terms of their transparency. In general, the yellow pigments used for watercolors today are only semi-transparent, making them ill-suited for a wash that is overlayed on a cyanotype. One obvious solution would be to color the paper before printing the cyanotype, so that the Prussian blue pigment of the cyanotype comes on top of the yellow pigment. This may not work perfectly with watercolor paints, but if you use gouache paints instead, you should be able to follow this order of work.

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Thanks for your detailed response. I would think any means of coloring the paper before exposing would change the absorbance of the paper, and interfere with the sensitizer, which is also yellow to yellow green. This would work for carbon prints, where some color could be added to the matte scrylic media used to prime the paper. Maybe a dye could be used, but is clearly not light stable.

koraks said:

The yellow flecks you describe are not related to the transparency of the pigment, btw. This sounds simply like insufficient mixing of the watercolor paint with water. Watercolor paints are essentially pigment dispersions with some additional fillers added to them (you can DIY pretty decent watercolors with dry pigment, honey and gum arabic). If you dilute these, especially on a somewhat larger scale as you may have been doing, the best approach is to first add a small amount of water to the water color paste (assuming you're using tubes) and then work that in until it's perfectly homogeneous. Then continue to add water in small amounts to make your wash.

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Yes, pretty much what I was doing with the watercolors I had that were not transparent. I also had similar problems with food coloring, which is clearly a dye. In areas with high density of prussian blue, the yellow appears to be laying on the surface which changes the reflections and looks weird. Maybe with dye, the print can be rinsed in water, or with a water laden brush that may remove that wihout affecting the paper color. Food color, like a dye, does not wash off easily I have read.

koraks said:

Dyes as opposed to pigments will be easier to work with if you want to make a wash you can dip the paper in. I don't know about brands popular in the US, but around here, 'Ecoline' by Talens has always been a popular choice for art classes at schools etc. These are water-based watercolors (so solutions of dyes) that generally come in little dropper pipette bottles. Since it's already a solution (as opposed to a dispersion), you can just add water until you obtain the intensity you want.

Ecoline | Official website

Bring your artwork to life with Ecoline's liquid watercolours. Since 1930, Ecoline has been known for its bright, vibrant colours.

www.royaltalens.com

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I looked on Amazon again and now they have:

"Dr. Ph. Martin's Hydrus Fine Art Watercolor (25H) Watercolor Bottle, 1.0 oz, Hansa Yellow Medium, 1 Bottle"​

This about $13 for the one ounce 30ml dropper bottle. Very concentrated. They have many shades of yellow, also very confusing. They also have colors that are clearly dyes for tinting photos and cartoons that they say are not stable. Their product line looks similar to the one you referemce.

koraks said:

I expect the light-fastness to be significantly reduced compared to pigment-based watercolors, but they might be easier to work with. One downside is that you need to apply the colored wash after making the print, since the dye will in principle (or at least to a large extent) remain water-soluble.

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I would prefer to color after I have the print.

koraks said:

Hence, if you were to first dye the paper and then make the print, the dye would mostly wash out of the paper during printing.

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Not good.

koraks said:

This will never be entirely possible with a cyanotype. The problem here is that the prussian blue itself is a semi-transparent pigment, so whatever color is next to it/underneath it, will always show through and thus mix with the blue of the cyanotype.

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I want the colors to mix together. I would prefer if the tint were behind the blue so as to not change the surface from the original matte. If the tint was on top that could work, but the surface of the print would then be sealed by some coating and be shiny on the surface. Maybe OK to have gum arabic, gelatin, or some clear varnish with transparent pigments that may work well.

koraks said:

FYI, Prussian blue is (used to be) a common blue pigment used also in paints; it's also known as PB27 (pigment blue #27): https://handprint.com/HP/WCL/waterb.html#PB27

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Thanks again for the art info which I am lacking in.

How about starting with a colored paper?

Legion Stonehenge comes in a number of warm colors (although not yellow) and works well for cyanotype, see: https://www.acuitypapers.com/Stonehenge-Paper-p/119-0060.htm

Fabriano Murillo (very heavy), Vice Versa (medium weight) and Tiziano (fairly light) come in lots of colors including yellow, see: https://www.acuitypapers.com/Fabriano-Murillo-p/113-0350.htm, https://www.acuitypapers.com/Fabriano-Vice-Versa-p/106-0191.htm and https://www.acuitypapers.com/Fabriano-Tiziano-p/120-1140.htm I have not tried any of these papers with cyanotype but they might work.

Alan Townsend said:

I would think any means of coloring the paper before exposing would change the absorbance of the paper, and interfere with the sensitizer, which is also yellow to yellow green.

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Absorbance can mean two things here: (1) the way the paper accepts the water-borne sensitizer or (2) the selective interaction with different wavelengths of light.
As to (1), I agree; it's generally the case that if paper has already been wet (e.g. due to dying or painting), it will exhibit subtle or sometimes significant differences in how it takes the sensitizer compared to paper that's taken fresh from the pack.
As to (2), I don't expect this to make much of a difference at all. Firstly, the sensitizer sits for the most part on the paper surface. What happens underneath is of lesser importance. There may be some reflection of light back into the sensitizer, but since it's so exposed already, I expect this to be of limited effect. Secondly, as you noted, the sensitizer is a similar color to the dye or pigment you intend to use. Hence, the difference in reflectance can be expected to be minimal as well. Note that the process is only UV-sensitive, so subtle differences in visible hue do not necessarily have any meaning.

Alan Townsend said:

Their product line looks similar to the one you referemce.

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Maybe at a quick glance, but the product page very clearly indicates that this is a pigment-based product:

The Ecoline product I linked to is dye-based.

If you also get the flecks you described earlier with dye-based colors, the problem is likely in the paper itself. Which papers did you try?

Alan Townsend said:

I would prefer to color after I have the print.

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Alan Townsend said:

I would prefer if the tint were behind the blue so as to not change the surface from the original matte.

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That's an inherently conflicting requirement.