Alternative Processes

Posted by Jesus Trujillo in Photography

Photography senior Richard Sweeting sets up a 4×5 camera that will be used to make tintypes. Photo by Jesus Trujillo.

This week, Jackalope Magazine found Richard Sweeting, a senior Photography major, working on the Wet Plate collodion process. The process was created in 1851 and involves coating a piece of sheet metal with light sensitive materials, and exposing the sheet through a medium format camera. This process results in a direct positive image right out of camera. Sweeting has been photographing for the past four weeks using this technique, and is ready to move on to the final method being taught in the class. For this process, he will have to turn in four plates for Chris Nail’s Alternative Processes class. He has found that every shoot is different, which makes him feel as though there is a new learning curve every time. “Wet plate is really difficult it has a lot of variables, but it can be very rewarding,” he says.