Ricardo Leite

In 2012, after starting by research on biodegradable film processing I thought about growing a garden with the plants I already knew that could work as a developing agent or as another useful ingredient in film processing. My first photographic garden was planted next to my lab in Porto, but I started to grow many others in different countries. Native ingredients are obviously a more interesting object of study. Caffenol is definitely an effective film developer, but coffee seeds don’t grow in some parts of the planet. In a temperate climate it’s easier to test spearmint or hyacinth because we can grow them in our place of study. It´s very interesting to grow a small garden next to our lab where we can easily grow plants that we can use in our projects. Photographic gardens are not only poetic and ecological but also a very useful tool to grow next to your film laboratories.