Tintype Family Portrait Day

Denver’s Tintype portrait day was a little while ago, and it’s never late to share a little bit of this marvelous experience. It’s an anual event organized by the Colorado Photographic Arts Center to give people the chance of having their portrait taken in the old fashion way. I had the privilege of been invited to the Arts Student’s League beautiful building, as part of the three collodion photographers making wet plate collodion portraits, to share with community this marvelous alchemist process.

A painting classroom converted into collodion processing lab for three photographers

Jacqueline Webster, Dennis Russell and myself shared one of the painting class rooms converted into an effervescent collodion processing lab, with people avid for getting into the world of hand made photography. It was, no doubt a great experience working side by side with these two fellow artists and a lovely, super friendly group of sitters.

Very grateful with an excellent group of sitters

It was a very long day, exhausting and rewarding, and the most important, with hope in the near future. Looking that many people coming after these old processes where things are made by hand, one by one, with tools and patience, make me think there’s still a chance for new generations to get in contact with craftsmanship, to understand we can make things by ourselves, with our hands, away from main streams. That may makes us free.

Sisters

It was a real Wet Plate Collodion Family Portrait Day

Our Pinhole Wet Plate Workshop

What a great experience we had during our Pinhole Wet Plate photography workshop last week.
First day we met at a totally renovated 1800’s sheep barn at the Lakewood Heritage Center. We couldn’t have a better room to make our pinhole cameras out of recycled cardboard boxes and set them ready to start shooting next morning. We also had a good conversation about how passion can get lost due to how easy to make are some things nowadays thank to new technologies.
We fueled our passions by putting our hands to work, so we went back to the basics, examining how the camera obscura works and what is needed to make a photograph; a real one, made with light, silver and patience.

We started early next morning setting up our working station at the Semper historic preservation farm in Westminster, a farmhouse built in 1881 which also hosts the Allison community gardens. Great and inspirational spot allowed us to shot some really good pinhole pictures and also rewarded us with some fortunate, happy accidents resulting in wonderful images.

After postponing our third scheduled session due to weather conditions, we enjoyed a splendid autumn day for our final pinhole shots. In the end, what’s important, is we all left with a big smile in our hearts, new experiences in our souls, our fingers stained black with silver, exhausted after washing, finishing and varnishing our plates and of course after packing up the car again with all the equipment to get back. And, the best part, with many pictures made by ourselves using cameras made by ourselves.

Check our website for more info.

Antique Photography Studio.

All images are copyrighted by the artists who made them. All rights reserved ©2014.