Hand colouring (By Jaco Wolmarans, click here to read more about Jaco)

Lillies, Centrestage

One of my favourite shots and by far the best seller. This particular one is still in my possession because it was too dark to my liking. I kept it back, but later added some highlights to the yellow arum lillies all the same.

By Jaco Wolmarans

Hand-colouring has been used to add colour since the invention of photography. Used primarily to add colour to black and white formal portraits, hand-colouring for this purpose went into a serious decline in the 1950's. This co-incided, not surprisingly, with the emergence of colour photography in the 1950's.

Still, the art form survived to re-emerge in the 1960's. It soon became part of the mainstream advertising and fashion photography of the time when it was rediscovered by a new generation of photographers, primarily in the United States.

The medium makes a serious statement against the use of "cold" computer manipulation. Those in the the computer industry who makes a living doing this will probably differ from this standpoint, and I respect that. There's a market out there for computer manipulated stuff. Hell, I even manipulate the pics on these web pages so that they look the same on screen as in real life!

What hand-colouring offers is not so much the versatility of Photoshop of Paint Shop Pro in terms of the possible effects these programs can produce, but rather the ability to fine-tune colour and effects to a degree that I'm not sure is possible in the digital media.

As such, it is infinitely more satisfying to me to see a picture shape before my eyes. It is probably far more relaxing and less frustrating than working on screen, having to print an image later and only then being able to see whether your work of art is the same that on the screen.

The Technique

There are very few art forms that include so many disciplines as hand-tinting. Problem is, you unfortunately have to be pretty damn good at all of them to have satisfactory results. They are:

Creating an arresting photographic image
Stunning printing
Subtle toning
Selective oil application

Creating an arresting image Think through your lens. When you take a picture, think about the fact that you will add colour to it later. Decide whether there's anything in there worth colouring later before you take the shot. Hand-colouring doesn't fit any picture - you have to have the right surfaces in the shot to take colour. For instance, if the shot is dark, in other words having very few light sections, your colour simply won't show.

Stunning printing Some books advocate dark, dramatic prints. I don't like them for the very reason described above. Lighter areas colour better, so don't overdo it on the contrast bit. I tend to go for a grade 2 filter as a standard for my shots. Make sure your hands are perfectly dry when handling unexposed paper, as the toning process later enhances any chemical smudges on the white edges.

Subtle toning Toning with a off-the-shelf toning kit works perfectly fine, provided you use the right paper. RC (resin-coated) papers doesn't colour very easily. Use fibre-based (FB) paper as they tone better and offer more grip for your oils. Also don't overdo the toning, as the brown hue can be overpowering. Be prepared to experiment. Do more than one print of one frame, using one as a back-up, toning it less and also colouring it differently as a comparison.
Selective oil application This section is entirely up to you and your taste. The beauty of using colouring oils is that you can wipe the whole lot off and start again if you're not happy. But always "under-colour" - that is stop before you spoil the print with too much colour. But that's my preference. Play around. It's safe. But only as long as you restrict your playing to painting!

My preferences
Lenses
I prefer shooting on wide angle - I have a battered old 28 mm Nikon 2.8 lens that does most of the work. It's sharp but offers just enough distortion to satisfy my craving for the dramatic.

Bodies
This lens only fits my Nikon F301 body, one that is officially in retirement but gets plucked out of its case for various jobs every now and again. I prefer the metering system on this camera, although outdated, to those in my pair of Nikon F801s - the smaller camera seems more accurate, although its entire metering system is centre-weighted and not at all fancy like those Matrix-balanced stuff on the larger bodies.

Film
I have no real film of preference - sometimes I use C41 process Ilford XP2, exposed at 320 ASA instead of the recommended 400. I don't care what they say about the supposed latitued of this film - don't dream of under-exposing on it.

Although a 400 ASA film, the grain is negligible in blow-ups of up to 18x20 - any grain actually adds to the effect. In addition, the fact that it is colour-processable makes for lots of time saving in the development stage.

If I really have to do a big job, I'll select on of the Kodak black and white films like T-Max.

Toner
As for toner, I'm still experimenting. At this stage, Kodak's system works fine for me, although care should be taken not to tone too much.

Paper
My biggest headache is finding the right paper. In South Africa, I'm restricted to Ilford's FB paper, which is gloss and doesn't really allow good absorbtion of oils. I'm still thinking about importing some proper FB stuff from LA. Problem is the Rand is sliding badly ...

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