Cyanotype: Test 2

 art, awesomeness, cyanotype blueprints, drawings, history, news, rockets  No Responses »
Dec 162022
 

Todays test involved mounting the UV light bar to a crude frame and just letting it run, not waving it over the print like an idjit. As you can see most of it is pretty uniform; the end of the print that was furthest from the light bar wasn’t adequately exposed. However, come the weekend two more UV lights will arrive and will extend the reach.

 

The learning curve this time around is going *much* faster than the first time. This should probably not be a surprise, but it’s nice to see that things are trending quickly in the correct direction.

 

 Posted by at 6:32 am

Starship test fire

 awesomeness, news, rockets, spacecraft  No Responses »
Dec 152022
 

Some interesting shots of a brief static test firing.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Posted by at 10:11 pm

First cyanotype test

 art, awesomeness, cyanotype blueprints, drawings, Hmm..., news  No Responses »
Dec 152022
 

The cyanotype setup in Utah relied on direct sunlight to process the image. But the sun is difficult to find here in Illinois in December, so I decided to give technology a try. When I originally set up in 2014, this wasn’t really an option, but Amazon now has 100 watt LED UV light bars for only $30, so I decided to try one. The result is shown below:

 

 

Clearly, it looks terrible. But I judged it to be a rampaging success: this was achieved via the crude process of simply waving it over the paper and the transparency by hand for five minutes. My goal was not a pristine cyanotype, but  proof that the UV actually worked to process the image. Where it shined adequately brightly for long enough, it really did the job. So I went ahead and ordered two more. I will build a framework to hold them over the print, boxed in with reflectors. Some experimentation to dial everything in, but at this point I’m quite optimistic that a technological solution will make this work reliably repeatably.

 

On the other hand: the UV light bars are Chinese. So… explosions? Sudden random changes in wavelength? Burst into flames? Microphones directly to the MSS? Who knows.

 

Bonus wisdom: if you put a rectangular piece of paper on the floor, a cat *will* occupy it.

 

 Posted by at 9:51 am

And they weren’t wearing full containment suits because…

 AARRRGH, awesomeness, books, Crazy, dumbassery, Gah., history, Hmm..., youtube, ಠ_ಠ  No Responses »
Dec 132022
 

And so Adam Savage goes to the Royal Society In England and gets to look at not only a first edition of Newton’s “Principia,” but the actual *manuscript.* And both he and the archivist handle them with their bare hands.

Shudder.

There are books that *I* own that I hesitate to actually touch without cotton archival gloves. But the Principia? Dude, I wouldn’t touch that unless I was fully sealed. I’d be deathly afraid of not just touching it, not just sneezing on it, but simply *breathing* on it.

 Posted by at 2:39 am

Yup: Cyanotypes

 art, awesomeness, cyanotype blueprints, drawings, history, news  No Responses »
Dec 092022
 

I am going forward with the return to cyanotyping. I’m gathering the supplies needed to rebuild the capability; learning some lessons from before, this setup should be a little better and a little bigger. I should be able to make prints 24 inches by up to 7 feet. It’s a bit of a chore and certainly an expense, but the end results will, I hope, be an improvement over what I produced before.

 

As before, I plan on taking commissions. I don’t care what it is… aerospace diagrams, ships, architectural diagrams, sci-fi movie prop diagrams, gay wedding cake layouts… if it can be blueprinted, I’ll do it (for a fee). So if you have anything along those lines you’d like blueprinted in the old-school cyanotype fashion (white lines on a Prussian blue background), made by hand using chemicals, sunlight and effort rather than hitting “print,” let me know. Something I will try again is blueprinting onto linen. I ran off a few back in the day; interesting, but perhaps a bit niche.

 Posted by at 9:17 pm

This will put a smile on your face

 art, awesomeness, science fiction, youtube  No Responses »
Dec 072022
 

If you want to get your soul crushed, try to display a classical talent before an audience composed of modern high school kids. “Disrespect” won’t begin to cover it.

So prepare to be surprised as this kid manages to get an auditorium of his classmates to fall into utter silence as he plays the theme from “Interstellar” on the piano. It’s not perfect, but damn it’s good.

 

 Posted by at 12:28 pm

The return of cyanotypes

 aircraft, art, awesomeness, blather, CAD diagrams, cyanotype blueprints, drawings, history, Hmm..., new products, news, projects, rockets, spacecraft  No Responses »
Dec 072022
 

Some years ago I produced a range of cyanotype blueprints of a number of aerospace subjects. The hardware needed for this was disposed of when I left Utah at the end of 2019, so starting again seemed unlikely. However, someone has expressed interest in a special commission. Rebuilding the hardware needed will be an expensive chore, and sadly getting the large format transparencies printed looks like it will be much more difficult here than it was in Utah. Nevertheless, at this point it looks probable that I will restore that capability sometime in the next few months, assuming one further detail can be ironed out.

You can see my now-defunct catalog here:

https://www.aerospaceprojectsreview.com/catalog/cyan.htm

 

When I get back to it I will probably focus on the larger format stuff rather than the smaller prints. I have plans on how to improve upon the prior hardware to make things work better and more efficiently. If there are any of the former large format prints you’d like to see returned to production, or you have any prints you’d like to see, let me know. And once this is up and running I plan on trying to take commissions, working with a local print shop to find customers interested in this somewhat unusual and certainly obsolete form of art.

 

If you have a diagram you’d like me to turn into a cyanotype, contact me. Commissions aren’t going to be restricted to aerospace subjects; naval, architectural, movie props, whatever you’ve got, so long as it *can* be blueprinted, once things are in place I should be able to do it.

 

 

 Posted by at 11:54 am
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