All of my carbon negatives have been made using 8×10 inch sheet film. HP5 to be specific.

This image was made using my f9 610mm Schneider Repro Claron. Generally, I prefer a standard lens for my landscape work, however with my tree series I have been drawn to compress the perspective and flatten the depth to give more of a graphic aspect to my tree studies.

The 24inch is equivalent to a 100mm using the 35mm film format. Using 8×10 inch format this lens provides very little depth of field especially when used with any amount of magnification. This image was made at dusk. The exposure was 7 seconds at f32.

Using the repro claron in the field is quite a challenge as the effective focal length with the magnification was about 27 inches (700mm) This is a considerable long bellows extension particularly when the wind is gusting!

I am currently exhibiting my first carbon exhibition print at The South Street Gallery during the North Yorkshire Open Studios.

The print on display is part of my ‘Celebrating Place’ project photographing the trees of North Yorkshire. During the event I was also making carbon pigment paper, which will be used to make future carbon prints.

Next Saturday 18th June at The South Street Gallery, I will be developing a carbon print at 3.30pm. This is a great opportunity to witness a live demonstration of a Victorian process.

This is the print in the final stages of development just before it was washed ready to dry.

This photograph was made in the twilight of a very cold and still winter afternoon. The quiet light produced at this time of day is delicate and creates an exquisite tonal scale that lends it self perfectly to the subject.

Carbon printing is a contact process. This means that the negative is in contact with the print surface and sunlight or UV light passes through the negative to form an image. The negative size therefore dictates the final print size. My 8 x 10 inch negatives are made with my Deardorff flat bed field camera. Probably the finest camera ever invented as it is compact, easy to carry and produces the large format negatives needed for my Carbon project.

I scrambled over a barbed wire  fence and I was now on the open moor knee deep in fresh powder snow. I approached my chosen trees very carefully from a distance, as I did not want to leave my foot prints in the foreground of my photograph to be.

I know these trees well and have photographed them several times. Today, was very special because the snowy conditions isolated  the structure of the weathered pine perfectly. I made one 8 x 10 negative using HP5 film with my Deardorff.

Two days later, I listened to the national news and learned that due to an accident the road had been closed. The artic weather conditions forced travellers to abandon their vehicles and take overnight shelter in a nearby Inn. The location of the accident was at the junction of the Whitby A171 and the Harwood Dale junction!

As  we headed back home down the snowy track in the twilight of the late afternoon we came upon a group of lads trying to push a transit van out of a snow laden rutt in the track. To our amusement the van had been towing a Canoe along as a makeshift sleigh!?

The four young men seemed quite unaware of their plight out in the wilderness of  Broxa forest at dusk with the light and the temperature falling. They calmly asked if  I would mind towing them  out of the ditch which I did. They had been digging out and pushing for about 2 hours and as far as I could gather did not seem at all concerned  about the predicament that they were in.

The winter snow has fallen early this year. Inspired by the heavy snowfall I have been exploring the forest of Wykeham. The snow levels have been building as each day passes and I have made several negatives. This afternoon, I had planned to make one last image of the day, which I had seen earlier. Whilst driving along I unfortunately mis-judged the depth of the roadside drift and lodged my vehicle on a bed of three foot deep snow.

Today, for the first time in several days of exploring the forest tracks I became stuck, not seriously…but stuck.

I began digging out my vehicle for about ten minutes when a yellow Defender County drove towards me. I spoke to the driver who asked for a rope in order to pull me out of the drift. As we untied and unhooked the ropes I thanked him and he introduced himself as David, the charcoal maker.

Destiny had played an uncanny card, as I had been searching previously for charcoal makers in the region, where I could buy charcoal dust in order to make my own black pigmented ink. It seems obvious to me now that the raw materials from local trees to make images of local trees should play an integral part in this project.

Meeting David, the charcoal maker will perhaps be significant  for me to proceed in the manufacturing of my carbon prints in their entirety.  David has been making charcoal for over twenty years in the forest where he lives. I can’t believe that I found him in this way.