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Wet plate photography was supplanted by technologically better dry-plate methods in the 1880's. Yet there are periodic revivals of interest in the older ways.
by jrapdx3 12y ago
Wet plate photography was supplanted by technologically better dry-plate methods in the 1880's. Yet there are periodic revivals of interest in the older ways. It's fascinating how such "ancient" art techniques never really die.
Of course, when "reborn" the results aren't quite the same. The new wet-plate images bear the stamp of our modern and superior optics and other beneficial present-day technologies. The "hybridization" of old and new creates something novel and can lead to new forms of artistic expression.
Digital photography is ascendant, but film will never completely disappear. Vinyl records still have fans. Acrylic paint is quite new, water-based forms invented just 50 years ago. Chemically far superior to oil paints, yet some painters still prefer oils (in use for 700 years).
Egg tempera goes back a thousand years, casein was used by the ancient Egyptians and fused glass by the Romans. Popularity of these techniques waxes and wanes, but never ceases altogether.
It's healthy to try our hand at our predecessors' crafts. It stimulates creativity, as well highly entertaining and educational. It gives us greater appreciation of what we have now, and stronger connection to our common history.
- aaronbrethorst 12y ago> Digital photography is ascendant, but film will never completely disappear. Medium format film cameras produce better results than anything you can get from a digital camera that costs less than $20,000. Large format film cameras, despite being wildly impractical for most uses, are still unmatched.
- stan_rogers 12y agoDon't be so very sure about that: http://www.luminous-landscape.com/reviews/cameras/iq180_vs_8x10.shtml http://www.luminous-landscape.com/reviews/cameras/iq180_vs_8... Yes, you can get a greater tonal range in a single capture if you're shooting B&W and know your way around the Zone System, but that is the sole remaining real benefit. And unless you're contact printing at the original negative size (and don't mind the inevitable damage to your neg or the quality loss of an interneg), you'd want to have at least a digital intermediate step between negative and print (unless you're turned on by contrast masking, spotting and bleaching under a loupe).
- justincormack 12y ago"technologically better dry-plate methods" - well, some argue just much easier, and claim that the wet plate methods were better matched to the printing technologies of the time (albumen prints).
- jrapdx3 12y ago>... claim that the wet plate methods were better matched to the printing technologies of the time (albumen prints) That could well be, and people would have legitimate esthetic reasons for their preferences. However silver-gelatin dry plates and papers were both on the rise in the 1880's. Arguably, "much easier" is "technologically better", but naturally it doesn't mean better in every possible way...
- stan_rogers 12y agoOne little nit to pick: acrylics and oils are not even close to similar in handling ("open time") or tonal range, which makes acrylics inappropriate for many styles of painting. They're great for thick impasto and brighter colours, but they don't hold up well at all for classical oil-painting styles. (They're a lot like tempera in that respect; chiaroscuro marks the beginning of oils and the diminishing of tempera because the binder doesn't permit non-black pigments to be as dark as oils do.) Alkyds are a little friendlier for quick work, and do have real depth, but they lock up nearly as quickly as acrylics while requiring nearly as much polymerization time as oils before they can be varnished. Believe me, artists would love a medium that has the optical properties and open time of oils (which can be hours to days, depending on the pigment and the use of dryers), but didn't have a tendency to yellow and could be properly finished in under six months. It just doesn't exist yet.