Calling for rain later today, and it feels it. Rather than spend the entire day indoors I opted to set our early to see about making a few tintypes. Loaded up the wagon, and headed for The Bridge.
This was both the warmest day of working with collodion, and by far the most humid. By the time I was set up I was soaked. My least favorite type of weather, but I needed to work in these conditions to get an idea of how it affects the wet plate process.
The collodion gets poured onto the plate, then is placed into the bath of silver nitrate where it will remain for 4 minutes. This is the step that makes the plate light sensitive.
Once the 4 minute mark has past I then, under safe light, load the plate into the film holder, and then to the camera for exposure. 10 seconds.
Back to the dark box, which is not really all that dark as I wear a red headlamp for illumination. Remember, the plate is only sensitive to Ultraviolet light.
Developer is poured over the plate, and slowly an image begins showing. Highlights at about 5 seconds, and shadows at about 10, to 12. Water is poured over the plate now to halt the development process. At this point the plate is no longer light sensitive, and can be brought into the daylight for fixing.
My test plate was spot on for exposure. I next made an ambrotype, seen in the above video, and then a few 8×10 tintypes.
I was not happy with the weather, but very pleased with the images I made this morning. Once they have dried I’ll get them varnished, and if I don’t mess that up I’ll post them.
Time to clean up now.
Webster’s Wet Plate 
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