Wet Plate Collodion

Wet Plate Collodion

         Wet Plate Collodion was new process that changed photography forever because the images looked more realistic than Louis Daguerre, inventor of the daguerreotype, which was the process at the time. Frederick Scott Archer inventor of the wet collodion process was a chemist from England who wrote and published a paper called, The Chemist, (March, 1851) that shared his idea to the world and was a main stable for photography for twenty years.

            One of the most famous photographers to use this type in America was Mathew Brady who used this process with his staff of three hundred to capture images during the civil war. This also changed the use of photography because it was more about journalistic approach to capture the mood what was happen at the time.

            This wet-plate process used a sticky liquid known as collodian that was treated to make it light sensitive. It was used to fix a negative image to a glass plate, and then the developed and dried plate allowed the photographer to then make an unlimited number of positive prints from it. It also allowed for the first time the ability of making enlarged prints. As this collodian process became more popular, the use of the daguerreotype began to fizzle out. (John T. Marck article 1043)

            This process is still being used today by a number of photographers who hold workshops to create abstract works or timeless portraits that give a vintage look to the photograph. The cameras are collective items and being sold on EBay or Amazon which gives a new sets of value to this process and fun to talk about these timeless process that can get a sense of a different time when the process was lot slower and not instant than digital.

            I would like to invest in learning this process myself and purchase a camera to create wonderful unique portraits and landscapes that I can enjoy and appreciate a slower time and be engrossed by our way of life from the past.

                                             Sources

http://www.aboutfamouspeople.com/article1043.html

Famous people By John T. Marck /  Mathew Brady and Photography During the Civil War

                                            Other Links

http://www.samackenna.co.uk/fsa/FSArcher.html

http://britishphotohistory.ning.com/profiles/blogs/wet-plate-collodion

http://www.alternativephotography.com/wp/processes/wetplate/the-wetplate-collodion-process

http://www.robertszabo.com/bio.html

http://www.johncoffer.com/

http://www.aboutfamouspeople.com/article1043.html

http://history1800s.about.com/od/1800sglossary/g/Wet-Plate-Method-Of-Photography.htm

http://www.davidbornfriend.com/

http://jennysampson.blogspot.com/

http://www.contrastique.com/

http://www.ianruhter.com/