Eventually, you come to a point in a project where you want to start considering the final print. I’m getting close. I still have a lot of work to do, but the 100+ negatives I’ve made tell me that I’m dialed in and ready to consider the final prints. I will add a caveat before I write what I’m about to write. Things change. This is where I feel like I am today, almost a year after I started (September 2021). I’m 95% confident that next year you’ll see a body of work made in this printing process for the final body of work.
I’m working with some old printing techniques, still figuring them out, and I feel that I’m close to having them where I want for the color, the texture, and the permanency. I’m real close.
I printed and (slightly) palladium-toned this image today. I call it “Three Aspens & Three Flowers”. A really nice wet collodion negative. It embodies a lot of what I’m trying to do with these images. It fits the narrative well. It’s loaded with metaphor and it’s beautiful. The old-school Kallitype process that I’m using really adds a lot to the image. I find the prints from the process unique in their quality, color, and richness.
