Blueprint Productions

The history behind the blueprint/ cyanotype process

The blueprint process was invented by Sir John Herschel in 1842. Blueprints are often refereed to as cyanotypes or sunprints.

Sir John was born in Slough in 1793 and went to Eton College and Cambridge. His name is synonymous with astrology, he was one of the founding members of the Royal Astrological Society. He designed and built his own ground breaking telescope. In more recent times his name was given to the European Space Agencies observatory.

Sir John was good friends with John George Children who lived about 20 miles away (in Kent). John was very impressed with Sir John’s photographic process and told his daughter Anna Atkins (1799-1871) all about it. She thought it was a great idea, and learnt all about the process. She then went on to publish the first ever book with photographs in. She made beautifully simple cyanotype images of algae, ferns, feathers, and waterweeds. You can see some of her work at Victoria and Albert Museum. It has a timeless, natural, simplicity that I find inspiring. Imagine being at the dawn of the photographic era, it must have been so exciting.

The blueprint process explained

The blueprint process is very simple, there are two principle ingredients; ferric ammonium citrate and potassium ferricyanide. These ingredients are mixed together in equal parts to create a light sensitive solution that can be applied to paper with a brush. The sensitized paper is then left to dry in dark place. A photographic negative or object (such as a leaf), are placed directly on top of the paper and then exposed to UV light via the sun or a light box. The paper is developed in water and left to dry again. Any areas that were blocked from the UV light will be left white or tones of blue depending on how the light has been filtered.

My journey with this process

I made my first blueprint back in 2013 with some help from Chris Waller at the St Pauls learning Centre in Bristol. I also received some guidance from Martyn Grimmer (at Spike Island) THANK YOU.

After this I made a large UV light box and never looked back. The chemistry is simple but the possibilities seem endless. I’ve now made thousands of prints and I still have lots of ideas to try out, new things to discover, which makes it so good.

Having just one blue colour range to work with has forces creativity, especially on my quest to add colour to some of the artworks.

I use a range of 300gsm papers depending on the piece I’m making. I’m able to stretch paper and make very large blueprints. My largest developing tray is 1.2m sqaure. I can put my light box on vertical stand (with wheels) to expose the largest prints.

The process is simple, clean and pretty reliable with just enough variables to keep me thinking; producing the unexpected outcomes you often end up liking the best.