Cameraless Photography

Cameraless Photography: 

LUMEN PRINTS and the DASS Process

In search of ways to express my Botanical Portraiture Series:

Because Lumen Prints (aka sun prints) are impermanent, I discovered a way to create botanical images using the lumen prints as DASS lifts…that are permanent.

This process requires scanning and digitizing the original lumen botanical print and then printing it out on a special film produced by the DASS lift method.  Then this print on film is transferred or “lifted” onto a substrate, i.e. paper, plexi, glass, etc. where it becomes a permanent image of the plant.

In the process the printer, an Epson Sure Color Printer using pigment ink (not ink dye), like acrylic paint, onto a “transfer sheet” of special plastic.  In my search for digital processes that come close to my painting, this is very close.  Once the image is printed on the special plastic sheet and then transferred onto stone paper or plexi, it is very pliable and can be moved around on the substrate to enhance it’s botanical nature.