I had a better day than this unhappy looking guy – a sculpture on top of a tomb in the Mt. Hope Cemetery in Rochester NY  – where I went with France Scully Osterman to learn how to make wet-plate pictures on location.

It was a great day of learning the tricks and techniques of working in the portable darkroom in the back of a car.  France and her husband Mark Osterman are the world’s most prominent practitioners of the historic wet-plate collodion process.  (And they are experts in many other historic photographic processes.)  I learned the basics about 10 years ago and have been doing it extensively ever since then in my studio darkroom, and now wanted to learn how to work the magic on location.  France and Mark teach the technique in their own  workshops and tutorials both directly and through The George Eastman House where Mark is the resident expert in historic photographic processes.

Here are a few photos from my day in Rochester.