Gum bichromate
Popular during the 1850s, gum bichromate printing involved coating paper with gum arabic containing chemicals and colored pigment. When a negative was exposed onto this paper, parts of the coating would harden and, during development, the softer material would wash out. The photographer could brush and manipulate the wet print, and repeat the process using other pigments. It was only at the turn of the century that gum bichromate was revived, alongside other processes such as oil and bromoil printing, which enabled photographers to work in a more painterly style. Leading PictorialistsRobert Demachy and Constant Puyo, for exampledid not regard straight photographs as art, and retouched their photographs to emulate painting, manipulating the gum and adding pastels and other material. This approach was controversialnaturalist photographer Emerson attacked Demachy as "the great and original gum-splodger." The technique was soon to fall out of favor until enthusiasts rediscovered it in the 1970s.
To simulate a gum process print means imitating what Stieglitz described as its "unphotographic" method. The prints can lack photographic detail and are often a hybrid of painting and photography, like Impressionistic photographs. Sometimes brush strokes are visible. Demachy used pastels to add highlights, and many other artistic effects were applied. Image color varied widely from neutral to Clarence White's chalky reds, while Steichen's famous image of New York's Flatiron building has almost natural, pale colors. Art paper is particularly suitable for this style of picture.
Railway preservation societies are a great source of photographic subjects when you want to simulate old processes.
Make the picture black and white with a Channel Mixer adjustment layer. Tick Monochrome and adjust the sliders until you like the black-and-white rendition. Add a new layer to the image and change its blending mode to Overlay or Soft Light. Now, by painting the layer with a soft brush, you can have the effect of dodging or burning, while preserving the original data. Paint black to darken the sky and grass verges, and use pale gray to brighten the train and other details. Next, identify the features you want to retouch. Some gum process images were completely transformed, but more often they remained a combination of photograph and brushwork. Duplicate the original image layer by dragging the background layer onto the New Layer icon. Now, working on that layer, use the Marquee tool to make a rough selection around the train and sky. Temporarily enter Quick Mask mode by pressing Q, then click Filter > Blur > Gaussian Blur to soften the edges of the selection. The Angled Strokes filter under Filter > Brush Strokes can provide a pleasing illusion of movement, while its Sharpness setting lets you produce more painterly results. Here I experimented with the Direction Balance until it matched the track's angle, and increased the impression of speed by changing the Stroke Length. Using the same technique as in step 3, select the other important retouching areas individually and vary the filters you apply. Try those in the Artistic or Brush Strokes group, or use Filter > Blur > Motion Blur. To convey the impression of movement, I deliberately blurred the track ahead of the train. It may not seem wholly realistic, but Demachy used a similar effect in a well-known picture of a speeding car. Tone the picture by adding a Hue/Saturation adjustment layer and clicking Colorize. My tone was restrained, matching a Demachy print, but you could use much more vivid colors. Finally, add a texture. One method is to scan a piece of art paper, and then drag the scanned image onto the main image. Experiment with the paper's blending mode-Darken worked best in this instance, as the lighter areas of the paper are hidden while the darker fibers remain visible.
Gum bichromate prints could be extensively retouched while wet, and brushed to give an Impressionistic effect. This picture's purple-red color matches some that I've seen, but artists of the time used many other pigment colors. |
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