The Process

The ghost plants are back in the woods!  These are some of the strangest and most intriguing plants I've come across.  

For those of you who might not know...these plants do not have any chlorophyll and do not require any sunlight. They live off the fungi in the soil....both crazy cool...and kind of creepy.

They are also called corpse plants...and you can see why.

They have a funny texture...

and a little surprise inside.

Now....the rest of this post is for those of you who are interested in the process as I experiment with cyanotypes. I'm still learning...I'm only a few days in. I'll share more as I go along.

The first thing I do when I make a print is get everything ready and have a basic plan. The chemicals are activated by sunlight/natural light...even inside the house. But they are not activated by light bulbs so I work in my bathroom where there are no windows. 

Each time I print I mix only a teaspoon each of solution A and B....and I've been surprised how many prints I could make. The chemicals are safe to touch...although I have almost no contact with them. I have worn gloves....but not all the time.

The supplies are pretty simple: the two solutions, a measuring device (I'm using a teaspoon), a cup to mix them in and a foam brush. Then of course I need something to print...and something to print on. I'm using grasses and weeds from the neighborhood and 140 lb watercolor paper.

I also used a piece of glass, backer board or cardboard and clips.

I've been collecting plants in the evening on my after dinner walks....

...and pressing them in a book overnight to get them flat. 

Working in the bathroom....I paint a layer of the solution on the paper. It goes on a light yellow color so you can see that you have coverage. I've seen videos where people let this dry completely....just a little bit...or not at all. I am trying it all different ways and I am getting decent results each time.

My paper is on a piece of cardboard. Next I lay out my plants....and cover the piece with glass and clip it down so the plants have good contact.  

I have learned if there are gaps between the plants and the paper...the color is not as crisp. But I actually like that effect sometimes.

Then I take it out into the direct sun for as little as 3 minutes and as many as 10. I will experiment with longer. 

It starts to activate and change to a green color immediately.... 

....turning darker and darker.

I let this one go for 3 to 4 minutes....took it inside to take apart...and rinsed it off in the sink until the chemicals were removed.  It looks a little funny until you rinse it.

This is before I rinsed.

I just swished it around in the sink and ran water over it. The yellow disappeared and the blue changed right before my eyes. It takes 24 hours for it to fully oxidize and get to the final color but I could speed it up with a squirt of peroxide in a final rinse. 

These were two of my very first prints from a few days ago.

The top one is the one I showed the steps above...and I remember now that I spritzed some diluted vinegar on it before I took it outside to add some texture and color variation. (saw that in a video) The bottom one is just plants and the sun...for maybe a bit longer....but still not more than 10 minutes.

Do you see the white spots on the right of the top one?  That's where the clothespins were. Lesson learned! 

Closeups of both.

Here's my first little project...just a simple card form pieces of these first prints.

I do want prints that have different shades and variations in the blues and some with textures....so I'm trying different techniques. More experiments to share tomorrow.

I did learn that I should wait until it turns this bronze color if I want darker blue. But that hasn't always been necessarily true in my experimenting....but I don't mind a surprise in the end. It's going to do what it's going to do. (just like a gelli print) This print has no added texture...just the grass and the sun for about 8 minutes on watercolor paper.

I think the smudges are my fingerprints or variation in the saturation of the solution. Lesson learned: it's better not to touch the surface until the solution is completely rinsed off.