tintype

Smithsonian Buys Rare Photos From First African American Studios

A collection of early American photography from Larry J. West has been acquired by the Smithsonian American Art Museum, transforming the museum’s holdings. West’s collection includes 286 pieces from the 1840s, when daguerreotypes started to show up in the US, to about 1925.

Tintypes Made Using Focusing Loupes As Lenses

This personal project was born of a lifelong pursuit of charting new paths upon the broad field of the artistic landscape, combined with an unexplained passion for vintage ground glass focusing loupes.

This Animation Was Made from Seven Wet Plate Collodion Tintypes

Photographer Markus Hofstätter has made a name for himself by pushing wet plate photography to new heights, trying things others have never even thought to do. Today brings yet another example of his creativity, as he sets out to create an animation using, not digital files, but wet plate collodion tintypes.

Behind the Scenes: Shooting Wet Plate Portraits of the Cast of Little Women

Now these are some cast portraits we can really get behind. On-set photographer Wilson Webb recently got the chance to photograph the entire cast of Best Picture nominee Little Women, but instead of shooting glitzy studio portraits, he decided to stay historically accurate and capture wet plate collodion portraits instead.

Photographer Turns Symphony Hall into the World’s Largest Darkroom

During this year's STORY conference in Nashville, TN, photographer Blake Wylie did something really cool. He turned a massive symphony hall into what might be the world's largest darkroom so that he could capture and develop a tintype portrait on-stage, in front of an audience of 1,400 people.

Recreating the Look of 1850s Tintypes in Digital with Math and Science

While I was visiting San Francisco, Kristy Headley, a dear friend and fellow engineer, showed me her studio. There I was lucky enough to sit for her while she did some vintage tintyping. Tintyping was one of the earliest forms of photography, popular in the 1850s.

Hipstamatic’s New TinType iPhone App Taps Portrait Mode for Authenticity

Before Instagram became a worldwide phenomenon, Hipstamatic was the cool kid on the block that popularized retro photo filters. And while Hipstamatic hasn't achieved nearly the level of popularity as the now-Facebook-owned app, it's still innovating: it has just launched a powerful new camera app called TinType that shoots realistic-looking tintype-style portraits.

I Shot Ultra-Macro Video of the Wet Plate Collodion Process

Normally I use videos to document my work. This time the video is the main outcome of my work -- I shot an ultra-macro video that shows how the crystals/salts change during the wet plate collodion process.

Tintype Portraits at the Jazz Age Lawn Party in New York City

Once a year for the past 12 years, people descend upon Governor's Island in New York City to experience the sights and sounds of the 1920s through the Jazz Age Lawn Party. And for the past 4 years, the Penumbra Tintype Studio has been on hand shooting tintype portraits of the attendees.

I Shot the World’s First Drone Tintype

I've been shooting tintypes for almost six years now and love to push the boundaries of what is possible with this slow and difficult photographic process. Taking a tintype from the air was an idea that, years ago, I had shelved as the technology wasn't there yet. Drones were pretty scarce and the ones I had seen were extremely limited in payload and stability. But this spring I decided to revisit the idea.

Using a Rolleiflex to Make Tintypes and Daguerreotypes

Those who have known me long enough are aware of my passion for Rolleiflex cameras. Back before I got deeper and deeper into alternative photography I used to shoot my TLRs all the time.

Watch as a Tintype Portrait of Adam Savage is Made on Stage, From Start to Finish

Tested recently put on a show at the Castro Theater in San Francisco. One of the presentations was by local photographer Michael Shindler, who specializes in wet plate collodion photography.

In the 12-minute video above, Shindler transforms the theater into a studio and darkroom, introducing the live audience to this 19th-century photography process by creating a large-format tintype portrait of Adam Savage (the co-host of Mythbusters).

Recreating the Look of Tintype Photography Using Photoshop

The other night I came across the work of photographer Victoria Will, who made real tintype portraits of some actors who attended this year’s Sundance Film Festival.

The portraits themselves were excellent but what really drew me in was the effect of the tintype medium and the old lens and camera that was used to make the images; very narrow depth of field, low tonal range, and non-uniform exposure across the frame. I decided I wanted to see if I could replicate the look of tintype using my Sony A7R and some Photoshop massaging.

Video: MythBusters’ Jamie Hyneman Gets His Tintype Portrait Taken

We never get sick of watching talented wet plate photographers at work. This process, made to look so simple by those who have been honing their craft for years, is actually incredibly complex and finicky. And so when the Tested crew decided to get MythBusters' star and fellow host Jamie Hyneman's picture taken, they went to Michael Shindler, one of the absolute best.

Photographer Couple Captures Their ALS Ice Bucket Challenge in Tintype

When photographer Mark Dawson and his girlfriend photographer Kari Wehrs were challenged to the popular ALS Ice Bucket Challenge, they decided to go old-school. In addition to donating -- that is, after all, the real point of all this -- they set up an old tintype camera and captured the entire thing 1850s style.

Interview: Conversation with Tintype Artist Keliy Anderson-Staley

Keliy Anderson-Staley is an assistant professor of photography at the University of Houston. Her work has been exhibited at the National Portrait Gallery of the Smithsonian, the California Museum of Photography and the Portland Museum of Art, and is currently on view at the Houston Center for Photography.

Her book of portraits, On a Wet Bough, is forthcoming from Waltz Books. She is represented by Catherine Edelman Gallery.

The Living Tin: Making Movies Using Only Collodion Tintype Photography

If you don't really think about it, it's easy to take video for granted. After all, you can pull out your cell phone and be recording video in a few seconds flat (even fewer if you have Pressy). But what if you were limited to older photographic techniques? No, we don't mean film, we mean wet plate photography.

Capturing even a 12fps animation for only a few seconds would seem an enormous task, and yet, that's exactly what director Kellam Clark and his 40-person crew -- altogether The Living Tin -- are doing. They're shooting video made entirely of collodion tintypes.

Wedding Tintype Portraits with a Massive 20×24 1800’s Camera

When my wife Sara and I finally decided to start planning our wedding (after a crazy Muppet Proposal proposal that seemed to tickle quite a few people's fancy) one thing that became very important to us was what to do with our wedding portraits/photography.

We are both photographers. Sara and I have experience in handmade processes (Sara is heavily into large format pinhole photography and albumen printing), and after the proposal thing went viral we had all kinds of photographers contacting us pushing their services in our face.

This Gigantic Tintype Camera Shoots the Analog Equivalent of Gigapixel Photos

Gigapixel photography is all the rage these days, as photographers all over the world compete to hold the record for "world's largest photo," but one photographer in San Francisco is participating in a very different way.

Michael Shindler, a photographer at the tintype studio Photobooth, has built a custom giant tintype camera that shoots portraits that are the analog equivalent of a gigapixel photo.

These Are the First Combat Zone Tintype Photos Created Since the Civil War

Ed Drew is an artist who's studying at the San Francisco Art Institute, pursuing a BFA in sculpture with a minor in photography. He's also a defensive heavy weapons and tactics specialist for the California Air National Guard.

When Drew was deployed to Helmand Province, Afghanistan this past April as a helicopter aerial gunner, he decided to bring his passion for photography with him. What resulted were the first tintype photos to be created in a combat zone since the Civil War.