Brief Wet Collodion Adventure - Some Tintypes of the Southern US

   Not long ago, I embarked upon a quick trip to some parts of the country I haven't explored yet, and, naturally, I carried a wet plate setup with me to see what sights inspire me to make some tintypes.  This trip was actually mainly concentrated on daguerreotypes, both historic and modern, but in this post I'll stick solely to collodion, with an additional historical treat at the end.  

  My objective was to explore a little bit of the gulf coast, and visit Baton Rouge, New Orleans, Biloxi, and Mobile, along with a few National Parks that can be found in Texas on the way back home.  The first plates on this journey were made right after I crossed the mighty Mississippi, in Baton Rouge.  I stopped for a bit of a hike along the river, and noticed the overabundance of white, sun-bleached shells that lined the shoreline in all directions.  After finding a shady place to park, as it was about 90F at the time, I first decided to make a plate featuring both the shells and the vast bridge I just crossed.  A 90mm Nikkor lens was used to achieve this with satisfactory, to me, results.  For the second plate, an 8in 1857 C. C. Harrison Petzval was used in order to throw the focus off a bit, and emphasize some of the blades of grass on the hill alongside rivers edge. 

  In Alabama I was rather fond of Bienville square in the middle of Mobile, and the fountain again called for the use of my trusty 90mm.  I decided to challenge myself exposure-wise, and placed the sun directly behind the second top pool, pointing the lens right toward it, so my subject is entirely backlit.  After developing the first plate, which was executed at f11 with 20sec exposure, I was overjoyed to not only find detail in the black ironworks, but also to see clear separation between the sky and the water on very top of the fountain.  For my second tintype on that location I chose to once again go to the Harrison Petzval to focus on the cross, erected there in 1909 by the Alabama Chapter of the National Society of Colonial Dames. 

  After that it was back to New Orleans.  I found the hustle and bustle of Bourbon Street to be too overwhelming at night, filled with cacophony and inebriation, but in the daytime it was rather nice, and so I set up on the corner of Bourbon and Orleans streets to make a few more tintypes.  As the light was fading, a group of travelers showed up, and kindly posed for my last tintype at that location. 

  In Houston, I stopped by the San Jacinto Museum.  Located on historic battlefield where Texas gained it's independence from Mexico, it has an impressive 567.31ft obelisk, which wasn't easy to make look interesting and different in a single frame, but I did try my best to do that. The wind really did do a number on the chemistry in this plate.  Generally I would have tossed this plate and made another attempt, but somehow, unlike in most cases with dirty plates, I think the artifacts work with the subject here rather than against it. 

  While washing the above plate, I noticed that through the trees surrounding museum grounds, I could see an enormous flame of a gas mining facility, and thought to myself that I just might be able to make it within a shot range of it right at sunset, which would let me capture some of the clouds as well as accentuate the flame, and maybe even retain a bit of detail in the post-industrial landscape that gas mining places afford in droves. I used a 400mm Tele-Fujinon for these images, and at f11 these exposures were 10 and 50sec, as the post-sunset light was fading fast, and I wanted the second image to be a bit brighter than the first.

  During the night, I made it all the way to the entrance of Big Bend National Park, which borders Mexico along the Rio Grand.  There's some great wilderness and geography there, and it's definitely worth visiting, especially with more time on one's hands to spend there.   At the first location I only made one tintype, using a Schneider 150mm lens, before taking a dip in the river and cooling off.  This was the hottest day of my travels, and my car thermometer showed all the way up to 98F when I got back in after washing this plate and wrapping up the dark box and chemistry.

  Instead of calling it quits due to heat, I decided to drive about a bit more, wait for the air two drop at least a couple of degrees, and made it to the second Rio Grand overlook, where I could once again capture two countries at once in my compositions.  Finding a nice bluff that offered ample perspective, I chose the 210mm Fujinon for the view down the river, before switching to 400mm Tele-Fujinon for the upstream view.  I think while the compositions of the last two plates here are indeed very similar, I did make the second plate for a very specific reason.  The viewer may be pleasantly surprised to find one small addition within the last frame, an addition that occurred naturally, and which is a relative rarity to be captured in tintype format.

  I apologize to the viewers for the slight mismanaging of the color balance of the above tintype copies.  For some reason my copy camera (i.e. my iPhone) decided to play tricks on me this time.  Regardless though, I am happy with my little wet plate haul from this trip, and with being able to add another three states to my having visited list, now only Alaska and 4 southeastern-most states remain unexplored. 

  I'll leave you all with a call to action.  No, not the usual "support us on Patreon" stuff we're all used, to, although if someone wished to purchase one or more of the above tintypes, they are indeed for sale (with prices ranging from $250 to $400), but with a strong suggestion to go to Austin as soon as possible.   Why Austin, you may ask?  Well, because there, within the walls of Harry Ransom Center, you can find the very first photograph ever taken, and be in it's overpowering presence.   I say overpowering, because after having seen it in so many history books, having learned about the ling and frustrating path the led Niepce toward his fist successes, which he dubbed Heliograph, it is truly marvelous to be able to stand just a foot away from the actual plate that gave him the first surviving semblance of chemical image.  By golly what a treat, go and see it as soon as possible.  The installation that surrounds it is rather robust, but I don't know how much longer this seminal work will remain on public display.  The metal plate is larger than you would imagine, and the image itself is nearly impossible to see, save for when it's lit just right, and even then only on parts and at varied angles.  Due to that, there are many variations of the image online, because most all images you'll see online or in print have been heavily altered view editing in order to make the image make sense, and when I just googled it, the overzealous AI answer for first image ever was even artificially colored for some baffling reason.  No, go stand next to that plate yourself, and you'll see what I mean - the precursor to so much great art is waiting to be seen by you live!

  As always, happy shooting and until next adventures,

Anton