I am done with negatives - a new begin on cyanotypes and more

*please move to different forum if you think this is not appropriate for the Alternative processes... I am in doubt.

After reading Koraks "Whither Hybridia" post I have picked up on the long idea I had in investigating using a printer to print directly cyanotypes.
The basic idea was to fill a toner with for example FAC and then print on paper. After some discussion and thinking, I decided to take an old HP printer-fax. I had some old cartridges completely dried that I would fill with FAC. The first tries were not a succes, no ink on the paper. Finally I found that there was just not yet enough liquid in the cartridge.
For now I have just been using the copier part for example with some dried leaves on the glass.
this method can print direct the image with FAC on the paper. I then expose with UV, and develop with brushing on Kferri. Of course the possibilities are unlimited.
Let me share my first example, here some leaves on the glass, pressing the copy button to print in FAC expose for 10 minutes UV and develop with Kferri, then 10 minute toning with Haritaki.
the HP 901 cartridge - here filled with 10ml dest water, 2gr FAC 2ml of denatured alcohol, about 10ml water there after. (this is ongoing experiment)

Process
- use copier-printer to print FAC on paper (bypassing the digital negative)
- expose to UV
- develop with Kferri
- for this one toning with Haritaki



Just as a warning, this is experimental, so only use on printers and cartridges you can spare

A friend of mine has a limited-edition book of "weeds of California" ( yes, I know it sounds sort of weird! ). The book was made from 1:1 size mounted prints of the plants -sometimes including roots- on scanner glass, and the prints were high resolution, glossy color, and beautiful. There is a real art to placing the plants on the glass or on a photogram or lumen print. This is a neat idea.

That’s really cool, @NedL Back in the olden days plant and flower samples were dried and mounted to heavy paper treated with a preservative. I still have my collection from the 1970’s. Arranging the specimens is, indeed, an art. I’d love to see your friend’s portfolio!

Jan de Jong said:

*please move to different forum if you think this is not appropriate for the Alternative processes... I am in doubt.

After reading Koraks "Whither Hybridia" post I have picked up on the long idea I had in investigating using a printer to print directly cyanotypes.
The basic idea was to fill a toner with for example FAC and then print on paper. After some discussion and thinking, I decided to take an old HP printer-fax. I had some old cartridges completely dried that I would fill with FAC. The first tries were not a succes, no ink on the paper. Finally I found that there was just not yet enough liquid in the cartridge.
For now I have just been using the copier part for example with some dried leaves on the glass.
this method can print direct the image with FAC on the paper. I then expose with UV, and develop with brushing on Kferri. Of course the possibilities are unlimited.
Let me share my first example, here some leaves on the glass, pressing the copy button to print in FAC expose for 10 minutes UV and develop with Kferri, then 10 minute toning with Haritaki.
the HP 901 cartridge - here filled with 10ml dest water, 2gr FAC 2ml of denatured alcohol, about 10ml water there after. (this is ongoing experiment)

Process
- use copier-printer to print FAC on paper (bypassing the digital negative)
- expose to UV
- develop with Kferri
- for this one toning with Haritaki


View attachment 401157
Just as a warning, this is experimental, so only use on printers and cartridges you can spare

Click to expand...

What an interesting concept!

I have an old printer lying around with cartridges that could be refilled with many things - heck maybe even a kallitype printer...
Digital negs have always been the tricky part for me, especially having to find suitable quality media here in Australia.

I need to think on this a bit.

Probably the biggest problem will be lining up a bunch of stuff to print .. You would need to do a quite a few prints in one session to avoid wasting sensitiser.
And possibly problems finding paper that will work with the process as well as with the print head.

@Jan de Jong WOW!!! We went back & forth last night a bit bouncing ideas (really, the idea is yours, let that be clear) and you immediately went ahead and your your hands (inkjet nozzles) dirty. I'm blown away by the result, to be honest. If this is one of your first tries, I wonder if there's anything left to improve upon! I would have expected some problems with streaking, bleeding etc. What you seem to have got is a perfectly defined print, and I'm sure that you could easily linearize the process if you so desired.

gbroadbridge said:

Probably the biggest problem will be lining up a bunch of stuff to print .. You would need to do a quite a few prints in one session to avoid wasting sensitiser.

Click to expand...

That's a valid point from a practical perspective. Maybe something like an EcoTank series printer would be a solution for this. I have an old 3880 (which I'm not going to sacrifice for these experiments as I'm having too much fun making regular color prints, LOL) that uses refillable cartridges. Something like that could also work.

Jan also pitched a very interesting idea in the comments on the blog he linked to about printing onto something like x-ray film so you get an inkjet-printed silver gelatin negative. While that may sound totally bonkers at first glance, it's actually a brilliant idea as you could fairly easily make a negative that has high blocking power and that exploits a pos/neg approach, which will actually play on the strengths of the inkjet printer. One of the key problems when inkjet printing negatives for alt. process printing in the regular way is that you end up with a troublesome transition in the high densities (which will become the low densities and the whites on the final print). If you turn that around and make the black inkjet printed parts also become the dense parts in the silver gelatin negative, things start to work a whole lot better all of a sudden. I've tried that with an internegative route and the result was pretty convincing when using the inkjet as a quasi-halftone screen machine. Jan's idea could simplify this process dramatically. It might even be possible to use something like imagesetter film.

This is great....well done, Jan.

I had this idea quite some time ago and I even set aside a cheap old hp printer for this purpose whose cartridges were easy to refill and played around to see if I can print some food dye first and eventually perhaps silver nitrate or salt and make salt print. Experimented with the food dye a bit and if I remember, there was too much clogging in the cartridge and I gave up on it. Then I stopped pursuing it (on philosophical grounds!) because I figured it would be so much close to actual inkjet printing, it would have been barely alternative processing any more. Might as well do the inkjet printing then.

koraks said:

Jan also pitched a very interesting idea in the comments on the blog he linked to about printing onto something like x-ray film so you get an inkjet-printed silver gelatin negative. While that may sound totally bonkers at first glance, it's actually a brilliant idea as you could fairly easily make a negative that has high blocking power and that exploits a pos/neg approach, which will actually play on the strengths of the inkjet printer. One of the key problems when inkjet printing negatives for alt. process printing in the regular way is that you end up with a troublesome transition in the high densities (which will become the low densities and the whites on the final print). If you turn that around and make the black inkjet printed parts also become the dense parts in the silver gelatin negative, things start to work a whole lot better all of a sudden. I've tried that with an internegative route and the result was pretty convincing when using the inkjet as a quasi-halftone screen machine. Jan's idea could simplify this process dramatically. It might even be possible to use something like imagesetter film.

Click to expand...

Later I had somewhat similar idea - instead of using an x-ray film, print on the sensitized paper a suitable water soluble but UV dense ink (perhaps red or yellow in a dye inkjet printer) as a one time negative (like DTP for photogravure.) Do a blanket exposure and the dye then comes out during developing, washing. Never tried that either.

:Niranjan.

nmp said:

I had this idea quite some time ago and I even set aside a cheap old hp printer for this purpose whose cartridges were easy to refill and played around to see if I can print some food dye first and eventually perhaps silver nitrate or salt and make salt print. Experimented with the food dye a bit and if I remember, there was too much clogging in the cartridge and I gave up on it. Then I stopped pursuing it (on philosophical grounds!) because I figured it would be so much close to actual inkjet printing, it would have been barely alternative processing any more. Might as well do the inkjet printing then.

Click to expand...

Similar thoughts and ideas. Always was thinking more (since the 80ties ) of adding an LED or laser to the print head for exposing photo paper modulating to expose paper etc.
Left the idea because it would be probably not having the resolution of an enlarger.
Been thinking in line of using inkjet printer for printing over RA4 paper to make a color mask then developing which would rinse the dye off leaving whatever printed chemically.
Reading Koraks post as link in my first message gives a run through of a lot of ideas, dlp etc. That led to the thought again to why not print the cyanotype emulsion in the print head.
The full FAC + Kferri will probably not print for more than a day, what about corrosion clogging etc.
So first started with FAC only, not knowing if that will work at all. - So it works. It sprays ink like on a normal print, very fine dots. ( the alcohol probably helps great for absorbing it quick also)

Similar thought - why do it, why not just use ink... well this will result in a cyanotype not an inkjet print. It can be manipulated, toned etc. That thought basically convinced me to push on.

Processes to consider printing with only FAC
- print on blank paper - uv expose - develop with kferri
- print on blank paper - add silver nitrate coating - UV expose develop (Vandyke)
- print on paper with coating fo Kferri

Process with only a salt solution - Salt print..
Process with only Thio in the cartridge - print on film or photo paper..
Process with developer - print on xray or photo paper

So in view of printhead it is best to take the process from a component that will work and turn the rest round that. That avoids having the silver in the cartridge but just Salt or FAC.

It is just adding a new way to do these applications, not replacing the traditional craft or process. It seems relative simple, and is very reproducible.

Paper - yes same considerations as with the traditional way, the paper needs to allow for the wet treatment.

I will add later some detailed images to show the inkjet spray, which is equal to what you see with a loupe on normal inkjet btw.


cheers
Jan.

Jan de Jong said:

So in view of printhead it is best to take the process from a component that will work and turn the rest round that.

Click to expand...

Smart, I like that!

I'd love to see the additional inkjet pattern illustration.