The year was 1851, and the first photographers were traveling chemists. They roamed from town to town, door to door, using teams of horses to pull mobile darkroom wagons — photographic vans. These itinerant shutterbugs did more than simply make portraits; they were creating heirlooms forged in silver by sunlight that would be passed down through the generations — historical artifacts so durable many survive perfectly to this day.

Tintypes are made by pouring a silver halide collodion solution over sheets of black metal and exposing them to the light. Because they are handmade, and made with old equipment built more than a hundred years back, they carry small flaws that give them their charm. There is something ageless about them, something that does not wear down with time. Looking at a tintype is not the same as looking at a modern photograph, and no words quite explain why. A person has to see one for themself.

Long after your paper photographs have yellowed or torn, and your selfies have evaporated into the cloud, your tintype will still be standing, unfaded. The wagons and horses are gone now, but the chemistry has not changed much. By using resurrected photographic techniques mastered and forgotten more than 150 years ago, we create the same lasting pictures they made in the days of the Civil War

THE TECHNICAL DETAILS — WAY TOO MANY

Wet plate collodion was invented in 1851 by Frederick Scott Archer. They call it "wet plate" because the whole job — start to finish — has to be done before the chemistry dries. Glass or metal plates are coated first in collodion, a syrupy stuff made of nitrocellulose dissolved in ether and alcohol. Doctors once used collodion to close small wounds and hold bandages in place. The word comes from the Greek kollodis, meaning glue, and it turns sticky as the ether and alcohol dry off. Archer was the first man to see that salted collodion worked better than albumen — dried egg whites — as a binder to hold and sensitize silver nitrate, the chemical that makes photography possible. That was the moment photography came into its own.

Once the collodion is poured onto the plate, it takes only a few seconds to turn sticky. Then the plate is dipped, smooth and even, into a tank of silver nitrate — the sensitizing agent. Any unsteadiness in the dip shows up later as artifacting, which can look fine on its own. Artifacting is one of the many small accidents, some of them happy, built into the process. The dip lets silver nitrate react with the iodides already salted in the collodion. What comes of it is silver iodide, and the plate turns sensitive to the blue end of the light spectrum— not the red — which is why a darkroom can be lit red without spoiling the picture.

Under the red light, the plate goes from the silver nitrate bath into a light-tight holder, and from there into the camera. The photographer has only until the plate dries to finish the work — five to fifteen minutes, depending on the weather. The clock is ticking.

The cameras used for tintypes are called view cameras. You have likely seen the old pictures of these — a man hunched over a big wooden box, a black cloth thrown over his head. That is a view camera: a hollow box with a small lens up front. You do not even need a lens, only a tiny hole, in which case it is called a pinhole camera. The image lands inside the camera upside down and backwards, projected onto a sheet of ground galss allowing the photographer to frame and focus. That is why tintypes come out reversed. Tintype subjects will see themselves as if looking in a mirror.

A sensitized plate is not sensitive at all, by modern measure — about ISO 1, give or take. So exposures run long, anywhere from a second to several minutes. One cannot hold a real smile for ten seconds, and that is why you never see anyone smiling in the distant past. We have strong lights now that shorten the exposure time, but natural light environmental portraits do not have such luxury. The subject must sit perfectly still, a few seconds at least, and mean it.

Once the plate has been exposed, it goes back into the dark, where the image, still hidden, is brought out. Developer is poured over it, and in a few seconds a negative appears. The warmer the day, the faster it comes. Developing is “stopped” by washing the plate with water. Develop too long and your blacks become grey, develop too short and the image is dark. I like to slightly overexpose then under-develop.

Here is where I part ways with 1851: I do not use cyanide in my fixer. I use a gentler mix of ammonium thiosulfate, one that will not kill a man unless he drowns in a barrel of it. The fixer washes away the unexposed silver, leaving behind the metallic silver that makes up the image. What remains is still, technically, a negative — but laid over black, it reads as a positive.

The plate goes into a water bath for half an hour at least — cyanide would have shortened that wait, but ammonium thiosulfate takes longer to wash away. Then it is dried and varnished with sap from the African sandarac tree dissolved in alcohol mixed with lavender oil. This is what lets a tintype last for centuries.

Some of the magic of a tintype resides in its absolute uniqueness, and some in the inevitable chemical artifacts created through the imperfect handmade process. Each is one of a kind and cannot be reproduced.

A UNIQUE COLLABORATION

As an artist, I view portraiture as a collaborative process. It is a unique opportunity for two people to come together and make one remarkable creation. It is not me taking a portrait of you, but rather making a portrait with you. I want to hear your thoughts, ideas, and expectations, if you have them... if not, that is OK too. I am happy to guide you through the process.

I think of portrait work as collaboration. It is a chance for two people to come together and make one remarkable creation. I am not taking your portrait — I am making it with you. Tell me what you have in mind, if you have anything in mind. If you don't, that's fine too. I'll guide you through the process.

-patrick cavan brown