Cara Phillips: Ultraviolet Beauties

Whilst I'm waiting on various permissions to reproduce artists work in my much anticipated poetry blogs, I stumbled accross an interesting expose of Cara Phillips and her black&white Ultraviolet Photography.

Say what?

Cara Phillips | Ultraviolite Beauties | Copywrite Cara Phillips
Ultaviolite Photography is the process of taking a photograph using only the Ultraviolite light received from a source.

Titled Ultraviolite Beauties, Cara has used "Relfected Ultraviolite" light to capture an image that we ordinarily wouldn't see. That means, the camera is receiving Ultraviolite light.

Another form of Ultraviolite Photography we're probably more familiar with is "Ultraviolite Flurenscence" which is the use of Ultraviolite light to entice a surface to emit light in the visible spectrum - like white clothing at a night club.

Cara Phillips | Ultraviolite Beauties | Copywrite Cara Phillips
For this Ultraviolet photography, Cara must have used an Ultraviolet flash or lamp that pumbles it's victims with high energy light. The light that is reflected is a combination of the Ultraviolet flash and whatever light is in the surrounding area. Thus, to capture only the reflected Ultraviolet light a specialised visible light blocker is placed over the lens to filter out the visible light leaving only the Ultraviolet light left over which is used to produce these images.

Cara Phillips | Ultraviolite Beauties | Copywrite Cara Phillips
Ultraviolite light has a shorter wave length than our every day visible light. Or in other words, the lights vibration is faster, meaning, an Ultraviolite light particale packs a greater punch (carries more energy) than visible light. It is the same light that gives us sunburn and can cause cancer if exposure is sufficiently long.

It has a variety of uses in medicine, dermatology, criminology and theatrical applications. It is also often used (controversially) to show prospective clients the potential age spots/wrinkles they may have in X number of years, even though there is no proof that anything visible under UV light will appear on the skin in visible light given enough time.

Cara Phillips | Ultraviolite Beauties | Copywrite Cara Phillips
In Cara's work, participants have been very careful to keep their eyes closed. I'm sure such a short exposure may not have done any damage, but better safe then sorry.

Thank you to Cara for allowing me to reproduce her photos and of course a big thank you to Cara for taking the chance on the merger of art and scient in her work Ultraviolet Beauties.