Van Dyke

                                                       Print #1: This 100% rag paper print is a first attempt a the van dyke process. This print was under exposed and you can tell be cause it doesn't have the true van dyke brown for its dark areas. Unfortunately these prints were made on a pretty overcast and almost rainy day. However, there is a sharpness to the image that I can tell is dieing to come out through better contrast aka longer exposure. These prints sat outside in direct light for 30 minutes.

                                                 Print #2: This print is exactly the same as the other in terms of process. Once again, not bad contrast, pretty sharp image as its pretty clear whats going on but the true Van Dyke brown is no where to be found. I assume the correct exposure under the same conditions could have been 40 to 50 minutes.

History: This process was invented by John Herschel in 1842. They were actually very easy to produce and easy to apply.The main chemicals were readily available and still are which makes the process more likely to stay around longer. Artists and photographers have found their own uses for it in creating prints. The process gets its name from yielding the same kind of brown famously used by the painter Van Dyck.The quality of the print, if performed correctly is very high, making this a very versatile and a time tested process. This kind of print came around the time of alot of experimentation with photosensitive paper treatments and therefore stands out from the others.
Process: The Van Dyke process uses an iron and silver mixture as its photosensitive agents. The formula used in these prints were 3 different solutions combined into one.

Solution A

• Ferric Ammonium Citrate: 9.0 gm
• Distilled Water: 33.0 ml

Solution B

• Tartaric Acid: 1.5 gm
• Distilled Water: 33.0 ml

Solution C

• Silver Nitrate: 3.8 gm
• Distilled Water: 33.0 ml

 Fixing: The fix baths used were in 5 stages.
1) Water and citric acid for 5 minutes
2) Running water bath for about 2 minutes
3) 3% hypo fix for about 1 minute
4) Remove, quick rinse of water, and repeat 3
5) 40 minutes in a running water bath

Conclusion: These prints were so easy to make and yet they yield such nice results. The coating wasn't as easy as others, but it was good to try this process last so we had experience with coating. Next time I would push for better exposures and try to find the best kinds of negatives to use. I would like to also try a wax paper negative with the process to see what sort of results you can get with the sharpness of the image.