Digital Alternative Process

Wet Plate Collodion

Wet-collodion process is an early photographic technique invented by Englishman Frederick Scott Archer in 1851. Collodion process requires the photographic material to be coated, sensitized, exposed and developed within fifteen minutes. It requires a portable darkroom for use in the field. Collodion is normally used in its wet form, but it can also be used in humid or dry form.

The process involves a lot of manual steps: 

1. cut the glass or metal plate

2. wipe egg-white along its edges

3. coat it evenly with a syrupy substance called collodion

4. make it light-sensitive by dunking it in silver nitrate for a few minutes

5. load the wet plate carefully into a “dark slide” which is inserted into the camera

6. take the picture

7. develop it (which is rather like processing a black-and-white print)

8. finally, the image goes into a water bath to be washed

9. when the plate is dry, coat the image with lavender oil.

Examples: