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Lab Safety and Workspace Set-Up

Lesson 13 from: Introduction to Alternative Processing in Photography

Daniel Gregory

Lab Safety and Workspace Set-Up

Lesson 13 from: Introduction to Alternative Processing in Photography

Daniel Gregory

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Lesson Info

13. Lab Safety and Workspace Set-Up

Lessons

Class Trailer
1

Class Introduction

03:03
2

Overview of the Alternative Process

03:31
3

Overview of the Digital Negative Process

10:21
4

Working with Black and White Digital: What You Need

09:17
5

Working With Black and White Digital Images: Color Settings

08:33
6

Working with Black and White Digital Images Lightroom

07:01
7

Working With Black and White Digital Images Photoshop

11:57
8

Working With Black and White Digital Images 3rd Party Plug-ins

07:29
9

Avoiding Key Artifacts

20:26
10

Creating the Step Wedge for Curve Corrections

39:00
11

Organizing Your Adobe® Photoshop® Files and Curves

11:20
12

Setting Up the Printer

20:24
13

Lab Safety and Workspace Set-Up

03:49
14

Setting the Maximum Black Time

12:06
15

Getting the Initial Curve Test Numbers

20:04
16

Correcting the Curve

20:37
17

Printing the Curve

06:08
18

Sharing Curves

08:50
19

Caring for the Digital Negative

12:29
20

Intro to Cyanotypes and Safety

07:46
21

Paper and Brush Types

05:08
22

Coating Process and Cyanotype Chemistry

12:17
23

Making the Cyanotype Print

06:41
24

Washing the Cyanotype Print

12:29
25

Creating Cyanotypes Photograms

14:59
26

Toning Cyanotypes and Cleaning Up the Darkroom

18:43
27

Introduction to Van Dyke Printing

04:36
28

Setting Up the Van Dyke Workstation

05:20
29

Van Dyke Paper and Coating

05:10
30

Van Dyke Exposure and Developing

32:30
31

Van Dyke Troubleshooting and Resources

08:26
32

Van Dyke: Split Toning

18:56
33

Van Dyke: Wash Cycle and Drying

04:33
34

Van Dyke: Clean Up Process

03:51
35

Introduction to Platinum / Palladium Printing

14:15
36

Platinum/Palladium Coating Chemistry and Safety

09:58
37

Platinum/Palladium Paper and Coating Options

22:31
38

Platinum/Palladium Exposure and Development

22:31
39

Platinum/Palladium: Equipment and Supplies

16:48
40

Ink Jet Negative Coating and Exposure

15:25
41

Platinum/Palladium Chemistry Options

07:50
42

Ink Jet Negative Development

03:45
43

Platinum/Palladium Waxing Images

08:40
44

Platinum/Palladium Troubleshooting and Resources

27:19
45

Sharing Your Work Digitally

14:49
46

Archivability

10:39
47

Matting and Framing Options

30:22
48

Editions and Signing Options

13:54
49

Alternative Processes: Further Exploration

07:25

Lesson Info

Lab Safety and Workspace Set-Up

Up to this point, I've been talking about all the steps necessary to kind of create a black and white image, how to get our step wedges, which we use for calibrating and creating our tone maps. So now we're actually ready to do the most meat and potato part of the process, and that's actually get our tone mapping curve built. So this is the part that actually allows us to take our digital file, and have the tones get mapped so that they appear properly in our alt processed file. But before we do that actual step, in order for that to happen we actually have to jump in and actually do our alt processing 'cause we have to do a couple of things to make sure that we can get that tone mapping to work properly. The first is we have to get our required printing time. But to do that, we have to set our lab up, because we're gonna actually have to make an alt processed print to determine that. So before we jumped into that, I wanted to talk a little bit about getting your lab space set up, and ...

some things to think about ahead of time, and we'll cover this and you'll see this when we do the cyanotype, the Van Dyke, and the platinum printing. We're gonna do those processes so you'll see the full set up. But one of the things when you're dealing with alt processing, particularly if you've not done it before, is it's, there seems to be a lot of moving parts, there's trays that need to be set up, you have different types of chemistry you're trying to organize. And so one of the things you wanna do is you wanna make sure that your space is clean and organized. You do not want any food or drink present. So there's not a lot of ways to deal with safety in the dark room that's a big issue You can have inhalation issues, which can be mitigated by wearing a mask. You wear gloves to deal with absorption, and wear aprons to keep yourself clean. But the place where I see people make the biggest mistake around their safety is they have food or drink. So even if you're gonna process in your kitchen, because that's the spot you have running water, you want to make sure that you clean the surfaces from food, you put down a drop cloth. You want to make sure that you're putting yourself in a position to have the least contamination as possible. The other thing you wanna do is, you wanna make sure that you have your gloves out. We'll talk about the different types of gloves, when we get to the cyanotype and why you choose that. But you wanna get yourself as organized and set up as possible, before you get going because where you don't wanna be is, having something in the chemistry and then trying to figure out how am I gonna get out of the chemistry, and I don't know where my gloves are and you just start to get a little bit frazzled. So getting all that stuff set up ahead of time is important. The other thing that's important is, if you're processing at home, making sure that if you have pets like I have a cat who if I'm doing something, he is involved in it. No matter what it is, he's involved in it. So if I was gonna process in the house, I'd have to make sure he was locked up in another room, or he was outside in his catio for the day or whatever he was doing, he would need to be distracted, because you don't want to have people get involved in that or children, for some of the processes if you wanna be safe, The cyanotype process is great because we're gonna start with that one, it's the most benign of pretty much any process so that one's relatively safe but we want to make sure that your lab is set up. The other piece is you wanna make sure that you have a well ventilated area. A piece I do see people have is, some of the processes, they have a little reaction to the chemistry, but a well ventilated area often times fixes that. So as you're getting set up, those are the kind of things you want to start to consider in getting that lab set up, you want to be, have everything ahead of time, have all the things you need. In the bonus material, I have a handout. In the handout is a list of everything you need at the various stages. In the kit Bostick and Sullivan has, their instructions have a list of everything you need, so you'll know what you need ahead of time, but you just want to get everything prepped up and set up as soon as possible. It just makes it a lot easier and a lot smoother.

Class Materials

Bonus Materials with Purchase

Alternative Processing Handout.pdf
Grayscale Percentage to RGB Values.pdf
MSDS Saftey Datasheets.zip
Bostick Discount Code.pdf
Matt Cutting Cheat Sheet.xlsx
Step Wedge Creation Spreadsheet.xlsx
Alternative Process Actions.zip
11stepwedge.psd
21stepwedge.psd
50stepwedge.psd

Ratings and Reviews

Diordna
 

For a long time, I have read, studied and tried alternative processing, mainly Platinum/Palladium printing. I want to create longest lasting prints and may be share the info at Creative Live. But this presentation saved me many a hours. A few minutes into the lecture, I purchased the class and as the class progressed, I was extremely glad. Thank you Creative Live, thank you Daniel Gregory.

SFX
 

Excellent class on Alt Process and fantastic bonus materials included with purchase!!! I have extensive digital printing and darkroom experience but haven't done much alt-process to date. This is perfect timing for me as I have several personal projects that I would like to re-visit using some of these techniques. Thank you Daniel!!!

James H Johnson
 

I have been making platinum/palladium prints for about 1 year. This is the 3rd workshop that I have attended. The first two were one on one. Daniel has done a fantastic job of covering the material and explained the process it detail and easy to understand. This course is fantastic and highly recommend it.

Student Work

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