One of the definitions of the word “folio” is “an individual leaf of paper or parchment”.<\/p>\n
Brooks Jensen<\/a>, the editor\/publisher of Lenswork<\/a>, has written about the idea of\u00a0photographic folios<\/a>*, an unbound collection of small prints wrapped up in an elegant folder.<\/p>\n In the past, I have made folios consisting of 5″x 7″ prints printed on half of a letter-sized sheet of paper and wrapped up in a home-made cover folded from a single sheet of heavy, decorative paper. These were quite economical to produce and I was quite satisfied with the final product. However, I did feel that margins allowed in this format were somewhat skimpy and thus the images felt a bit cramped. (I don’t believe that I wrote about these earlier efforts so I can’t point to a previous blog entry with more detailed information… sorry.)<\/p>\n In pondering what to do with some of my photographs from our recent trip to the southwest, I decided to revisit the idea of folios.<\/p>\n This time, I decided to use a full letter-sized sheet of paper for each print and to incorporate generous margins (three-quarters of an inch on top and one and three-quarters inches on the other three sides); the printed images are 7.5″x 6″. The end result has a much more luxurious feel than my earlier, smaller efforts.<\/p>\n When making an artifact that is meant to be handled, the materials used are much more important than, for instance, a photograph destined to be encased in a mat and frame and hung upon the wall. In the former case, the artifact has to feel nice when you pick it up! Thus, the paper used for printing is a critical part of the experience.<\/p>\n For this project, I decided to use nice heavy papers and to avoid papers that have a plastic-y feel. Of course, as with almost all of my prints, I only considered papers with a luster finish… not too shiny, but not completely matte either.<\/p>\n I ended up using a different paper for each of the two folios I have completed. For the first folio (titled “Canyon Light”) I used Canson Baryta Photographique (310 g\/sq. meter and alpha-cellulose based). For the second folio (“Puebloan Ruins”) I used Epson Legacy Platine (314 g\/ sq. meter and cotton rag based). Both papers worked well, but the Epson paper, because of its cotton rag base, does have a nicer, very soft feel when you hold a print.<\/p>\n In addition to the prints, the other, equally important component of a folio is the cover… first impressions are important! Although, I am usually a do-it-yourself kind of guy when it comes to things like this, for this project I decided to save some time and effort by purchasing folio covers from\u00a0Dane Creek Folios<\/a>. They are high quality and reasonably priced. Highly recommended.<\/p>\n Well enough about the presentation… what about the photographs!?<\/p>\n Thus far,, I have completed two folios each consisting of ten black and white images. The first folio (titled\u00a0Canyon Light<\/a>) contains photographs of the Grand Canyon from river-level. These were made during the ten days we spent rafting the river. The second folio (Puebloan Ruins<\/a>) contains photographs of the ancient Native American ruins at a number of sites in the four-corners area.<\/p>\n Clicking on the title of each folio (above) with get you an electronic facsimile (as a pdf file) of the folio. These are, in my opinion, a poor substitute for the physical\u00a0 object. You will have to come for a visit to see the real thing!<\/p>\n
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