Oil Printing

Instructor: Mac Cosgrove-Davies

Friday October 18th: 7 - 9pm
Saturday, October 19th: 12 - 4pm
Sunday, October 20th: 12 - 4pm

This weekend workshop will introduce the Oil Printing process, which produces photographic images with hand-applied inks.  

Briefly, the process involves:

• Coating paper with a gelatin layer that will ultimately become the print

• Sensitizing the gelatin layer

• Exposing under a negative, which selectively hardens the gelatin in proportion to the light passed through the negative

• Washing to remove the sensitizer

• This produces a ‘matrix’ which has hardened and unhardened areas corresponding to the shadows and highlights of the image.

• When the matrix is wet, the unhardened areas absorb water while the hardened areas don’t

• Applying an oil-based ink which sticks to the hardened areas, but not to the unhardened areas (since oil doesn’t stick to water)

*** Note that the artist has exquisite control of the final image through manipulation of the inking process, offering wide avenues for personal expression.

*** This process does not require a darkroom and is suitable for practicing at home.

Using materials provided by the Halide Project, students will experience the entire process.  

Medium or large format B&W negatives are ideal for this process, as are digital B&W negatives.  Students can provide digital images for the instructor to create negatives, at a cost of $30 for two images. Images must be provided no less than two weeks prior to class.

Workshop Withdrawal Policy

We recommend choosing workshops with care after reading our withdrawal policy. If you have questions about any of our workshops, please contact dale@thehalideproject.org

Instructor bio:
Mac Cosgrove-Davies is a self-taught photographer who since 1979 has been practicing historic photographic processes including gum bichromate, cyanotype, VanDyke, palladium, oil printing, carbon printing, and wet plate collodion.  Mac teaches hand made photo printing methods and leads the Hand Made Photo Group at PhotoWorks at Glen Echo Park, MD.

Mac’s images are contemplative observations of life and the world around him.  Using antique and hand-made film cameras in various large & panoramic formats (21/4x31/4, 4x5, 5x7, 6x8, and 8x10 inches as well as 5 inch panoramic) he seeks to match each unique image to the beauty and elegance of the selected photographic process.

This workshop has been generously sponsored The Phillip and Edith Leonian Foundation.