I have had a pack of photosensitive paper sitting in my stash of craft supplies for years now, unopened. I think my mum gave it to me when she was having a clear out at home. You can buy some here.
So I thought I could see if it might be the sort of thing that I could include in this project, as Charlie had said to me that you can get photosensitive fabric dye that works in a similar way. You can find a good How To here if you are interested. Again, as with the flower bashing, it works best with sturdy flat leaves and flowers. The image above turned out the best, I used baby salad leaves and daisies.
These are vine leaves and geranium flowers that I had in the garden. Unfortunately the geranium petals were too delicate and shrivelled up in the sun before the paper had time to expose, so they didn't give quite the results I was expecting.
I'm not sure if the paper I was using had deteriorated due to age, but the results were not as clear and crisp as I was expecting. I thought the background would be darker like the images I had seen from Anna Atkins. She was the first recognised female photographer and she produced the first photographically illustrated book called 'British Algae: Cyantope Impressions'. This is one of her images of a poppy, just a little bit better than mine I think!
I don't think I will be using this process in my final garment, so I've decided not to shell out for the photosensitive fabric dye. Although I think with time and practise you could create some beautifully ethereal images, I think they look very scientific and wouldn't quite fit in with this project.
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