Sun Developed Photos

To celebrate Earth Day, I thought the kids would enjoy doing something, well, ‘earthy’. So I went searching on one of my favorite kid’s toys websites, Fat Brain Toys, and found this photo paper that uses the sun and water to develop it. You can place any object on the paper, but since it was Earth Day, I thought that we should do leaves and things like that. So the kids went searching outside and cut some leaves from the trees and a few from my herb plants.

After gathering all their leaves they placed it on the photo paper in whatever design they wanted.

Then they simply placed it out in the sun and watched the paper turn colors. It starts out blue, but the sun makes it turn white.

To set the photo, they dipped it in water for a minute or two. The water makes the paper turn back to blue and the place where the objects were laying turns white.

Then they laid them out to dry. As they dried, the paper turned an even darker blue.

I thought they turned out really cute. In fact, I like Mandy’s so much that I cut it down a little, framed it and hung it up in her room. It looks like a beautiful piece of modern art!