 my presentation this morning will be about the use of plastic in photographs with a special look at color photography. Like photography, the history of plastic starts in the 19th century. In the early 1830s, at the same time, Daguerre and Talbot were searching for methods to capture images in the camera obscura. A handful of chemists made some important discoveries when mixing cotton and other cellulose materials with nitric acid. Following these pioneer works, Swiss chemist Christian Schoenbein established the conditions of control and saturation of cellulose. Although his wife had forbidden it to do so, Schoenbein occasionally experimented at home in the kitchen. It is said that one day, when his wife was away, he spilled a mixture of nitric acid and sulfuric acid during one of his clandestine experiments at home. After using his wife's cotton apron to mop the spill, he rinsed it up and hung it over the stove to dry, only to find that the cloth spontaneously ignited and burned so quickly that it seemed to disappear. In fact, Schoenbein had converted the cellulose of the apron with the nitro groups added from the nitric acid, serving as an internal source of oxygen. When heated, the cellulose was completely and suddenly oxidized. With this incident, Schoenbein accidentally discovered a way of producing gun cotton, also known as nitro cellulose. Gun cotton soon became of interest as an explosive and in the manufacture of collodion, a cellulose solution in an alcohol-ether mixture. Collodion was first used medically as a dressing. But in 1851, Frederick Scott Archer discovered that collodion could be used as an alternative to albumin on glass photographic plates. And that it reduced the exposure time necessary for making an image. This method became known as the white-plate collodion or white-collodion method. With the white-collodion process, one of the kind-positive images with a silver image bearing collodion binder could be produced on glass. The amber types and on Japanese iron sheets, the tin types. Amber type and tin types were often placed in protective cases, mostly made of wood covered with embossed leather or papier-mache. In 1856, Samuel Peck, one of the owners of Scovia Company, which manufactured these cases for photographs, patented the Union case, made with a mixture of sawdoughs, sawdust, sorry, shellac and dyes, one of the earliest form of thermoplastic material. Cellulose nitrate plasticized with camphor was patented in England by Alexander Parkes and sold as Parkesine in 1856 and later at Xelonite in 1869 before being registered as celluloid in 1870. And the introduction of Parkesine is generally regarded as the birth of the plastic industry. Although Parkes took a number of patents for his newly discovered material, it was not until the Hyatt Brothers of New Jersey developed it into celluloid in 1870 that its commercial potential began to be realized. It was first widely used as a substitute for ivory, horn, or tortoise shell. Celluloid was originally a trademark, but it's now a generic term for cellulose nitrate plasticized with camphor. In photography, the most important application for celluloids was as a film base due to its high transparency, homogeneity, and flexibility. And we heard a lot about it yesterday. Eastman was the first to manufacture a commercial transparent roll film for public sale in 1889. And yes, Andrew, our date match. The availability of this flexible film made possible the development of Thomas Edison's motion picture camera in 1891. Meanwhile, prints with a silver image suspended in a collodion binder on a barita paper support became popular. In the 1880s, collodion POPs, together with gelatin POPs, replaced the traditional albumin silver prints before being supplanted themselves by gelatin DOP papers. The introduction of autocoron glass transparencies in 1907 filled the public's desire for color prints. A flurry of assembly processes was introduced during the first decades of the 20th century to fulfill the scoring needs. Among them, Frederick Eugene Ives' three-layer color printing process called ICROM. Also known as SIF prints, ICROM print consists of a base paper with a blueprint and two sheets of celluloid with a gelatin layer dyed yellow or magenta cemented together. And you can see a detail here on the corner. Ives later developed the polychrome process he introduced in 1929. And polychrome prints are two layer image, consists of two separation image, one blue on paper, and one dichroid red orange on a celluloid base also cemented together. Other example of separation prints on celluloid sheets cemented together to form a full-color image include the auto-type carburet on celluloid that we see here. Carburet was introduced in 1919. And celluloid sheets were normally used to transfer the pigmented gelatin layers from the tissue to the final image support. But in this case, the image is not transferred and the three celluloid are just cemented together to form an image. And in the case of this, the image is actually over a sheet of paper. So it's not seen by transparency, but by reflectance. Amira prints produced with a dye imbibition process invented and commercialized in 1932 in Hamburg, Germany are another variant of the techniques where sheets of plastic materials dyed with separation colors are put together to form a reflective print. The period of 1930, 1940 saw the initial commercial development of today's major thermoplastics, polyvinyl chloride, polystyrene. These names are so difficult to say. Polymethyl methacrylate and low density polyethylene. However, cellulose nitrate and celluloid continue to be used as the base support of most photographic materials, including the additive color screens, roll films such as lignos, lumicolor, film color, autocolor, and aqua color. And here you see a roll of autocolor substitute for autochrome. In the 1930s, early form of resin-coated photographic paper were developed to speed up washing and drying time in automatic coin-operated photo booth. The direct positive photographic paper base used in the machine was coated on both sides with a water-resistant polymerized vinyl compound in order to minimize processing solution penetration into the paper support and thus dramatically reduce the washing and drying times. The vinyl compounds used were polymerized vinyl acetate or vinyl chloride, or a mixture of the two. The concentration of the polymerized vinyl acetate could be varied to suit the coating conditions and the thickness of the coating desired. 1936 saw the introduction of coda-chrome and aqua color-noy, the first direct positive integral color films on acetate base. The commercialization of these decoupling materials marked the beginning of the modern era of color photography. With the popularity of color transparencies, the demand for color prints increased. And in 1941, Kodak introduced a printing service for what its size, mini-color prints from koda-chrome slides. The printing of mini-color was done at Kodak in direct reversal Kodak-chrome chemistry. Although fiber-based papers could be used, a white opaque pigmented acetate base had been adopted because it provided an extremely smooth surface that could not be achieved with paper. The smoothness of acetate minimized the risk of model arising from the lower sign emulsion layer reflecting a possible ineveness of the base. Another reason for choosing the plastic base resided in the fact that in Kodak-chrome reversal processing, the print was developed four times. First in a black and white developer, then in three successive color developers. And it was very important to completely clear residual chemicals in between each development. So since the plastic base doesn't absorb any chemical, washing was therefore more thorough and faster than with a paper base. Plastic, however, was more expensive to produce than paper. So prints were made small to compensate the high cost of materials. The black margins typical to direct positive prints were trimmed off, and the corners rounded to eliminate sharp, stiff corners. In 1943, Ansco followed suit and launched Ansco Printon, a decoupling material on white pigmented acetate base. Printon was very similar to mini-color, except that it was processed in a chromogenic chemistry with incorporated couplers, as opposed to the added coupler of the Kodak-chrome chemistry. Gaspar color opaque soon followed, and it was the first commercially available silver dyed bleach-printing materials. It featured a white pigmented acetate base that was actually manufactured by Ansco. Like all other color materials at the time, its use remained restricted to the armed force until the end of the war. The advent of World War II in 1939 brought plastics into great demand, largely a substitute for materials in short supply, such as natural rubber. In 1942, English chemist John R. Winfield and J.T. Dixon patented polyethylene terephthalate, also known as polyester, but due to wartime secrecy restriction, their discovery was not made public until after the war. That same year, Kodak and AFA developed their dye coupling color, negative and positive system, Kodak color and AFA color. The color photographs were printed on fiber-based burrida paper. During the war, waterproof aeromapping photographic papers were produced for the armed force service by melting a cellulose derivative similar to that used for film base and coating the hot melt on paper. After the war, the hot melt method was replaced by coating paper with a solvent solution of cellulose acetate, but the expensive method met with limited success. The decade that followed the end of the war saw the development of polypropylene and high-density polyethylene and the growth of the new plastics in many applications. New developments made it possible to create the ribbed sheets, the ribbed sheets used with lenticular images, a technology that was created in the 1940s and became extremely popular in the 1960s. Early examples of lenticular prints were made with two images that either gave a parallax perspective on the same image or switched between two images like you saw in the previous slides. To make a lenticular image, each composite image is divided into parallel strips and distorted so that each strip is squashed thinner. The two images are interlaced, so one very thin strip of one image is printed next to a strip from the next. A lenticular ribbed sheet is then applied on top of the interlaced image. The lens reflect the images beneath them so that as the viewer's point of view changes, the image scene changes, creating the illusion of movement. Most of the screens early on were heat embossed in PVC. Today, lenticular plastic sheets exist in a wide range of materials, including acrylic, amorphous polyethylene terephthalate, A-P-E-T, polyethylene terephthalate glycol, A-P-E-T-G, polycarbonate, polypropylene, PVC, and polystyrene, you know, any kind of plastic, I guess. Lenticular images are now typically printed directly on the plastic sheets, no more applied on top of image. And the technology is usually UV cured inks. In 1948, Kodak launched a safety film using a cellulose triacetate base that would soon replace completely the highly flammable cellulose nitrate base in the motion picture industry. That same year, Edwin Land revolutionized photography with the invention of instant photography. The early Berrida paper support introduced in 1948, sorry, were rapidly modified. The years that followed the launch of Polaroid Type 40, layers of various polymer were added to improve image sharpness, print flatness, or as a protective coating to prevent image degradation. You see here a nice cross-section provided by the graphic atlas. In 1952, DuPont produced Introduce Mylar, a biaxially oriented polyester film that is chemically inert and dimensionally stable. Its excellent mechanical properties and dimensional stability made it an ideal support for certain photographic applications. In 1955, polyester was adopted as a base for graphic arts film and Kodak di-transfer matrices, eliminating the considerable difficulties experienced until then with exact registration of the different collages and printing. So even though plastic is not directly present in di-transfer prints, plastic played an important role in the final result. Sibacroam was announced at the Fodokina Fair of 1963. The strongly acid-bleached solution of the silver di-bleach precluded the use of Berrida-coated fiber-based paper. Early Sibacroam materials were manufactured on pigmented cellulose triacetate base, which made the cost too high to be competitive and for Sibacroam to become a hit in the consumer market. Also in 1963, Polaroid introduced Polacolor, the first color instant film. However, Kodak in Stamati camera and its film cartridge were the most important novelty for amateur photography that year. Millions were sold and as a result, the demand for color prints increased dramatically. Soon after and for the first time in history, the number of color photographs taken surpassed that of black and white in the US and the trend will never be reversed. That going demand created pressure on the photo finishing industry, improvements of wet processing in respect of size, performance and special requirement of processing machine came against difficulties. Since the early days of the negative positive color processing, color paper had required long processing times. The fiber-based paper absorbed large quantities of chemicals that had to be washed out. It also needed to be dried out on large ferro typing drums and you see some of those drums in this image here. The drum occupied considerable space and consumed a lot of energy. The poor resistance of tearing of the, to tearing of the white photographic paper also limited the speed and the length of the machines. In order to meet the need of expanding markets and the economic requirements of photo finishers, in the aviars were made to find a base material that would limit waste of water and chemicals, permit quick and easy drying and thereby considerable, considerable reduction of total processing time. In October of 1968, Kodak announced the launch of Hectacolor 20RC, a resin coated paper that dried quickly to a high gloss without the usual ferro typing procedures. ACFA followed suit in 1970 and launched ACFA color PE. RC paper afforded many advantages of over-buried coated paper, including reduced washing and drying time. The dry strength and stiffness of the paper was maintained during processing, permitting faster processor speeds and reduced tearing propensity. Resid coated paper prints could be finished and dried within 20 to 30 minutes. They had improved dimensional stability and did not curl upon drying thanks to the curl control built into the product. RC rapidly replaced Faber-Base for color print. For black and white, the challenge was slower because the advantage of RC were less evident than for color. Two stability problem quickly arise, quickly became apparent after the introduction of RC paper. They have been extensively discussed in the literature. The first problem was cracking of the polyethylene, referred to as resin cracking by the manufacturer. Resin cracking results from the oxidation of the polyethylene polymer and embrittlement of the polyethylene paper layer. Oxidation eventually caused the emulsion to crack leading to a disfiguring create surface. The second problem was the formation of red spots and silver mirroring in image areas. The manufacturers quickly realized that both deterioration reactions were accelerated by the presence of the white pigment, titanium dioxide in the polyethylene and its reaction would like to form free radicals that will then attack the silver image or the plastic layer. Both problems were eventually reduced or eliminated with the incorporation of stabilizer, anti-oxidant and peroxide or oxidant scavenger and by stabilizing the pigment before its incorporation into the polyethylene. The next major innovation in photography happened in 1972 when Polaroid introduced its revolutionary one step SX-70 instant camera in film, a marvel of photographic engineering that became an immediate success. SX-70 in take-off films are complex multi-layered photographs in case between two sheets of polyester clear at the top and pigmented black at the bottom. The image receiving layer and the polymeric acid layers are proprietary and have uncertain composition. The tremendous success of Polaroid and we heard a little with Peter yesterday about the lawsuit between Kodak and Polaroid about this product. So the tremendous success of Polaroid led competitors like Kodak and later Fuji to also introduce their own instant material. This film also contains multi-layers of clear polyester but they have a different chemistry and if you look at the two, you know, they have a different look anyway and they have a different layering. The 1980s saw the development of several di-diffusion products including the large Polaroid 20 by 24 and the short-lived ectaflex and aqua-chrome speed. But, no, I'm sorry. According the amateur market, I went ahead for myself, Siba Gagi commercialized Siba Chrome on RC paper in 1974. The RC base was much cheaper than acetate and the product enjoys some popularity for a while. In 1979, Siba replaced its white pigmented plastic base with voided polyester where the opacity is created by micro bubbles rather than white pigment. And the bubble creates an internal light scattering that give this illusion of white color. So I already said that but I will repeat the 1980s saw the development of several di-diffusion products, the large Polaroid 20 by 24 and the short-lived ectaflex and aqua-chrome speed, for example. But most informal digital imaging and printing technology made the entrance on the scene. In 1994, Durst introduced the Lambda printer at Fotokina. The stop and white format inkjet printers rapidly took the lead of the industry and during the 1990s, new consumables are introduced at a dizzying pace. The new digital enlargers and printers made the once cumbersome production of large print much easier than ever and wall-sized photographs became a common feature in both fine art and commercial application. Today, mounting this large print onto rigid substrates has become a must. Mounts and adhesives become irremediably part of the photographic object. The most popular substrates include aluminum composite materials with a firm polyethylene core, such as Dibon, or expanded closed-cell PVC extruded into rigid boards like Cintra. And the mounting adhesive also often contain a plastic core. So more plastic layers added to our photographs. A wide variety of plastic films made of PVC, polyester, polyethylene, polyvinyl fluoride, polycarbonate, etc. is also available for laminating. And while clear acrylic PMMA are cemented to the face of prints to provide the now familiar white look of contemporary production, that we will hear more about today, later this afternoon. Finally, the evolution of inkjet and media, inkjet inks and media photograph can today be printed on many different plastic substrates, including RC paper, vinyl, vinyl, PVC, polyester, SGPE, etc. Latex inks introduced by Yulet Packard in 2008 are the latest development in inkjet ink technology. Also known as resin inks, they use a type of polymer to encapsulate the pigment, which are then suspended in water as a carrier. Heat is used to evaporate the water away and to activate the polymer to bind the pigment to the media. So now the plastic are part of the image materials. And Pablo will tell us more in a few minutes. I would like to thank you all for listening to me and thank the Jay for inviting me here and the committee for making my coming possible. Thank you.