Über Wet Plate Collodion Images: Barcelona Spain

Posted on November 4th, 2009 in Europe

You wouldn’t be exaggerating if you said that the fun never ends in Barcelona.

Not only is it a wonderful city to wander around in, you can also make über Wet Plate Collodion images here – if you know the right people: Atelieretaguardia Studio.

Tuesday morning we set up and prepared make some ULF (Ultra or Über Large Format) clear glass positive Collodion images – 16” x 20” or 40cm x 50cm. It takes a lot of people, money and time to do this. It’s not small task. We had six people working together to produce some fine large Ambrotype portraits. The silver bath was 6 liters – that’s almost 600 Euros ($900 USD) alone! It takes special equipment, too. Large silver bath tank/holder, trays, bottles, everything must be big, including the camera and lens.

These were made with a German 16×20 camera. We used a 700mm f/8 Hermagis, stopped down to f/16. The first plate (watch the video below), was exposed for 20 seconds and it was spot on! On the other plates, we maxed out bellows and moved the camera as close to the sitter as possible. The images almost filled the plate. The images we made later in the morning, when the UV was blazing, had exposures as short as 10 seconds! All four images are beautiful in their own right and are very special to the entire Collodion team.

It’s extremely enjoyable making these plates. This is only my second time doing this, but this trip has inspired a new project for me when I return to the United States. Yes, you could say a project dealing with Über photographs – even super Über photographs.