print sales
reproduction & copyright
black & white portraiture
quinninup photography workshops
technical information
black & white portraiture
quinninup photography workshops
technical information
I work exclusively with traditional black & white photography. Prints are selenium toned silver gelatin limited edition prints made from the original negatives
John Austin's Black and White Photographs
"John Austin's fine black and white photographs are a means of showing places and events meaningful to him as clearly and deeply as possible. This holds for his documentary images of environmental degradation as well as his work with land and people. The apparent simplicity of John's images belie the depth and meditative awareness that illuminates his work, qualities that are best revealed by studied viewing of original prints
To achieve the sensuous tonal depth of his black and white prints John uses the largest format cameras practical in any situation. His use of large negatives is coupled with his mastery of traditional silver gelatin photographic printmaking
John's black & white photographs are in many collections, including the National Portrait Gallery; Art Gallery of Western Australia; Australian National Library; Curtin University, Bunbury Regional Art Gallery; Western Australian Department of Justice and private collections in Australia, Singapore, USA, South America and England
Rae Starr
August 2010
Black & White Print Sales
Black & white prints are available for sale as limited edition archivally processed selenium toned silver gelatine prints from the original black & white negative. Images will not be cropped, however, some images were made in both horizontal and vetical format, so please enquire. Maximum print sizes are being added to this website, these size limits have been added as I am now offering some images as silver gelatine prints to 32 x 40 inches. The size limits are based on what I believe is the maximum size that older negatives will enlarge to consistent with good print image quality. In the case of 35mm Infra Red there is no limit as the image is already grainy and not particularly sharp
Original silver prints are on permanent display at Mountfords Gallery, Pemberton, Western Australia and Greg James Sculpture Studio and Gallery, Fremantle, Western Australia
Naked portraits and Nudes prior to 2010 and some portraits, documentary and landscape photographs are limited to a total of eight prints of any image in any print size
Landscape Black and White Images are limited to a total of thirty two prints of any image in any print size
Documentary Images, Forest protest, most Artist Portraits etc are limited to a total of thirty two in any print size, excluding digital files for magazine, video or book reproduction
Limiting the size of a print edition traditionally came from the use of metal plates for etching, where the etched plate was compressed and the lines which held the ink crushed slightly with each impression. This tradition has been adopted within photography to give a guarantee to purchasers that prints will not appear everywhere. For on-line sales please contact me
Large Silver Gelatin Print Service to 45x36”, 114x91cm
From October 2011 I shall also be offering my silver gelatin prints to 40x32”, 114x91cm from all my negatives made from September 2011 and from suitable negatives prior to that date. The basic sizes for my images are now 16x12”, 20x16” 24x20” 30x24” 32x40” For pricing and delivery information please contact meReproduction
Images for reproduction can be purchased at normal international or MEAA/AJA reproduction rates
Free reproduction is available following written agreement for legitimate research or educational projects and environmental publications.
I am mindfully brutal with cases of copyright breach
Quinninup Photography Workshop
Quinninup Photography Workshop, QPW, was first conceived in 1994 as a vehicle for teaching fine black and white photography. It remained in a conceptual state while I studied non photographic printmaking techniques. At that time I was also documenting the destruction and defense of the south west Western Australian Southern Forests. I have chosen now to restart the idea at the time that there is a world wide rekindling of interest in film based fine print photography, as the recent exhibition of alternative photography at Mountford's Gallery, Pemberton showed
Quinninup Photography Workshop services
- Silver gelatin printing from your 35mm to 10x8" black and white negatives in print sizes from 10x8" to 32x40"
- Teaching of traditional silver gelatine photography in formats from 35mm to 10x8"
- Photographic language, meaning, composition and history
- Alternative process, cyanotype and gum bichromate tuition from negative preparation to finished print
- GIMP Gnu Image Manipulation Programme tuition, for groups or individuals
- Photographic technical support for community and arts group workshops
Technical Notes
This section is condensed from the previous process and equipment page and now only includes information I feel is relevant to my current work
Printing & Matting
Archivally-processed selenium-toned fibre-based silver-gelatine black & white prints. "Silver gelatine" is the traditional black & white photographic print medium. Silver is the metal used to form a permanent image in the gelatine coating on the paper. Fibre based means the print substrate is paper, not plastic, and is made acid free by the final print processes. Selenium toned, and for some prints gold-toned, refers to the layer of selenium or gold coated on each crystal of silver to protect the image from city or industrial pollution. Archival processing means the print has been treated with care and all acid and sulphur compounds from fixing the image have been removed
Rag board mats are the board backing and board frame supporting the print, which are Crescent Rag-Mat 100% cotton, acid-free and lignin-free. These are amongst the best acid free museum quality boards available. The print is held in the mat by two acid-free paper hinges, which allow the print to move when changes in humidity occur, such as when a print is taken from a gallery to a house. This movement is caused by the changes in humidity affecting the layers of the print at different rates. The print will settle flat again in a few days or so.
Darkroom
| The four enlargers on the left of my black and white darkroom are the finest available. The monster at the far end is a 10x8", 20x25cm, negative size DeVere 5108E. The DeVere and the Leitz enlargers are the vehicles by which my black and white negatives become the silver gelatine prints I take great care in producing |
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A note on enlarging lenses
I only use the very best modern German enlarging lenses. While it can be fun to work with old or odd lenses it is crucial that the most modern and efficient German enlarging lenses are used in the best available enlargers. The enlarging lens in the means by which my images are made visible and to use an inferior lens at this stage is to loose the quality gained through the care taken in the making of the negatives. To use a cheap enlarging lens would be to throw away my investment in carefully chosen and expensive camera lenses
Cameras, Obscura Objects of Desire
Every so often I still hear the phrase "The camera makes no difference etc. . .". Try selling this idea to a concert pianist, or a cabinet maker, or painter, or car mechanic. The properties of tools do affect the the nature of a work, so a pianist might choose a broken piano for specific effects or a photographer use a pinhole camera because of its particular properties. The cameras chosen do affect the work produced and must be chosen with as much mindfulness as a violinist would choose between a Stradivarius or Guarneri
When I was learning my craft in the early 1970s I quickly learned that for the best results the largest format negative format practical in any situation should be used
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The current series of Naked Portraits and Nudes is being photographed with 10x8" and 5x4" negative size Sinars with Voigtländer Heliar lenses. For the two Water Margin portfolios I use a 5x4" Linhof with a lens set hand picked over the last twenty years to secure the most appropriate quality for my work
My square images are photographed mainly with a Rolleiflex and sometimes a Hasselblad SWC. I have used a Hasselblad 500, but prefer the quietness, simplicity, speed, reliability, and quicker focussing of the Rolleiflex
I also use 35mm, for serious work Nikon F and for snapshots a Voigtlander Vitessa. After the F Nikon went downhill. When I retired from commercial photography I got rid of my metered and newer Nikons and kept my Nikons F
Only one Nikon F ever died on me. That was while documenting the WA karri forest logging protests. An environmentalist, Geoff, was asleep on the ground with his shorts gaping. Peta from Northcliffe picked up a Nikons F and photographed Geoff's Jewels. That was the last exposure that camera ever made. It was dismantled and re-assembled by my repair man three times, nothing was worn, nothing was broken, nothing was distorted, but nothing would make it work again
A note on Bokeh
A topic of the Wise and Wonderful Web is the Japanese term bokeh, the scent of a lens. Bokeh is a function of the way spherical aberration is corrected and is one aspect of the overall quality of a lens. These qualities are sharpness, the beneficial affect of flare on shadow detail, field curvature, distortion and everything, what marks a great lens design is the balance of its correctionsBokeh refers to the appearance of the parts of the image that are out of the depth of sharp focus. While looking for information on early lens designs in Photographic Lenses, Conrad Beck and Herbert Andrews, pub London circa 1905 I came across the first sensible description of bokeh
John Austin, Quinninup, Western Australia 6258