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07/26/2003 Entry: "gumming things up"

Several lessons learned in my first time wrestling with the gum bichromate process.

1. Recap all bottles immediately after use.
2. Do *not* use the computer desk as an alt-process work table.
3. Gum arabic and keyboards do not play well together.

It didn't get much better after that. My test strips, despite variations in pigment/gum mixture, exhibited little if any evidence of success. I'm thinking I may have coated the paper too thickly, thus not allowing the base of the gum to be exposed and harden properly. This would certainly explain why the gum layer seemed to just wash away rather quickly during the development stage.

I'm calling it quits for the day. I'll be back to try again but right now I am hot, tired and a little discouraged at so much energy expended with so little to show for it. The weather's looking bleak for a quick bounce back, with clouds all next week. Might be an incentive to pry the wallet open and finally build that fluorescent UV light source. I looked at some ready-built ones but at close to a kilobuck for the smallest model building my own looks more reasonable right now.