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The 4 Best Ways To Create Stunning Art By Destroying Film Negatives

Fire, gasoline, high voltages, and even the human body can add an extra zing to your photographs.
Peter Hoffman's Fox River Derivatives

This article was published on May 14, 2013, but we think it still rocks!

Combining a film negative with an unconventional material is a great way to create art because not only do you get some abstract and intriguing pictures, but you also get to play around with dangerous chemicals or do something that ordinarily would be looked at as stupid or insane. Everyone's a winner.

It can also add an otherworldly quality to an image as the fractals of nature go to work on the film negative, reacting with whatever substance the photographer or artist has thrown at it. To show you just how impressive the results can be, take a look at the examples below and then go out and try it at home. But make sure you have an adult supervising.

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High Voltage and Cleaning Products

Artist Phillip Stearns uses instant color film and zaps it with some high voltage after dousing it in household cleaning products like vinegar and bleach for his elaborately named series Retinal Pigment Epithelium and Other Vision Technologies, Real or Otherwise Imagined. The results look like ink-blotch jellyfish or like you're staring at some bizarre microscopic underwater world. [via]

Photos courtesy of Phillip Stearns

Gasoline, Fire, and Water

In his series Fox River Derivatives, Peter Hoffman decided to augment the photos he took of the Fox River in Chicago by dousing the negatives in gasoline and then setting them aflame. He then dunked them in water to stop them from being completely destroyed. [via]

Photos courtesy of Peter Hoffman

The Human Digestive Tract

Luke Evans and Josh Lake swallowed 35mm film squares and then left their bodies to do the rest for their series Inside Out. This epic adventure caused marks to be made on the film which was then retrieved and scanned using an electron microscope.

Photos courtesy of Luke Evans and Josh Lake

A Polaroid Camera's Digestive Tract

If you'd bought a broken camera, you'd understandably be a bit annoyed. But photographer William Miller decided to turn it in his favor. The Polaroid SX-70's defect was that the film would often get stuck in the guts and the gears of this 1970s classic. After figuring out how to control these he created a series of ethereal images Ruined Polaroids, that are full of warped and wonderful beauty. [via]

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