A small sidequest that I took on in our last few days was trying to develop a roll of b&w film using bladderwrack seaweed from the nearby beach! This was a recipe I had researched before leaving for iceland, so I brought the soda ash and vitamin c, but was able to scavenge for seaweed and saltwater. I will attach the link to the original website and photographer that developed this technique, but for now, here is what I did:
1. Collect a handful of fresh bladderwrack seaweed – about 150g.
2. Boil 500ml of hot water, pour onto the seaweed and leave overnight.
3. In a separate jug, mix 50g of soda crystals with 150ml water and dissolve completely.
4. In the jug with dissolved soda crystals, mix 12g vitamin C with the dissolved soda crystal solution and dissolve completely.
5. Add around 150ml of your seaweed “brew”.
6. Heat to 26-30 degrees. You can do this by putting the jug of seaweed developer into a larger jug of hot water.
7. Pour the developer into your developing tank. Invert the tank every 2 minutes for 60 minutes. You can also stand develop for the full hour but this may create bromide drag.
8. Wash for 2 minutes.
9. Salt has a dissolving limit of 359g per litre. So for a 35mm film you could mix the following solution. 150g salt with 500ml water. You will then need to leave the film in the salt water for 24 hours.
10. Wash for 10 minutes, and hang to dry.
The original link: https://www.alternativephotography.com/seaweed-developer-film/
My results! I don’t know how much playing with these variables would affect the photos in different ways so I wanted to be as methodical with this first attempt as possible. I am pretty happy with how they turned out!
