Thursday, February 6, 2014

Today's Darkroom Work

It is freezing outside a temp of around -25C, indoors thou, the music is playing and the Dectol is flowing. I am trying some more of the hot developer swabbing thing today. Another glorious full day in the darkroom, here is today's print.

I struggled with this photograph, it's of a blurred hand reaching down to grab a tool in the dump garbage. Getting the hand, tool, contrast and white areas of the garbage right proved quite difficult. Trying to separate everything so it could be seen and not be just one black mushy mess was very hard. I ended up using 2 masks and various contrasts for burning, along with dodging of the hand. This is my fourth attempt, I will put the negative away for now. If I ever print this image larger for a show I will try to dodge the blade of the tool as well. Bleaching might also help with separation in the photograph. This print is 11x14 on Oriental Seagull warm tone paper.