Thursday, May 1, 2014

Ethereal Garden Photography: Cyanotype and Infrared

If you spend a lot of time and effort creating a beautiful garden, it's important to photograph, draw, or paint it, too! Digital photography is a wonderful hobby and less intensive/expensive than painting. I like to do both. Two processes I used back in the last epoch with real film and manual cameras were infrared and cyanotype. It's almost impossible to do either anymore outside of maybe NYC or LA; there is little film left, and only a handful of labs do the processing. If you can't set up your own lab, you can learn how to make these types of photographs digitally. Here are some of mine:
Ringling Gardens, cyanotype, MR, 2014
Cyanotypes were developed in the mid-1800s. It's a cheap and simple monochrome process that nevertheless gives an ethereal, days-gone-by look to garden photographs.

Infrared gives a hypercharged, yet delicate look to black and white photographs. I love its effect in garden photography:
Ringling Gardens, MR, 2014
This is the grave of Mable Ringling in Sarasota, Florida. The infrared really lends an otherworldy beauty to the images.
If you enjoy garden photography, which processes do you favor?

2 comments:

  1. That is nice! Something to try for sure. I hope you are well, been some time since my last visit, due to well being a dad! LOL!

    Wonderful to see you still creating some wonderful posts. LT

    ReplyDelete
  2. How wonderful to hear from you, LT! I'm sure you are having the adventure of your life as a dad, and I'm sure your little one is benefitting immensely!

    ReplyDelete