salt printing as practise for platinum/palladium
Michael,
> B+S has palladium chloride solution, 250ml for $300 or so, 100ml for $150, and 25ml for $62.50. It typically takes about 3/4 to 1 ml of solution for an 8x10, so your costs per print can be as low as about $1.25 per print for the palladium. I don't know if B+S has the best prices, but I do think they are the most knowledgeable, and they are very willing to help out a beginner with information and guidance. >
B&S prices have been pretty much the same for the past few years, the prices don't reflect the market trend for the past 12 months. But that is understandable since they are selling palladium in solution and is targeted to small quantity users. Besides B&S has always had the best service and I've never been dissatisfied with my purchases.
But at the same time I want to make more and larger prints so I was thinking about purchasing the metal and making my own solutions to save some $$$.
Thanks,
salt printing as practise for platinum/palladium
Don,
There are other places out there that sell palladium chloride. Artcraft in particular sells the powder, and their prices may be based on market prices.
If you want a very large amount of palladium chloride, you can find a precious metals supplier, I suppose, but that involves a very large investment, since those guys are not normally used to selling in small quantities.
I bet a bit of time on Google will yield a reasonable number of sources to persue.
---Michael
salt printing as practise for platinum/palladium
Just a few more thoughts that might be of interest to anyone currently working either kallitype or palladium who might be interested in trying the other process.
1. In my experience all papers that work well for palladium also work well for kallitype. The opposite is not true because kallitype is much less paper sensitive than palladium.
2. For coating a given area you need slightly less of the palladium sensitizer than kallitype sensitizer. An 8X10 print, for example, might need 2.5ml of solution of kallitype sensitizer but only 2.0ml of palladium sensitizer.
3. Exposure times for kallitype are about 1/2 stop faster than palladium.
4. Kallitypes clear much faster than palladiums.
Because of the fact that exposure times are shorter, and because kallitypes clear faster than palladiums, in my experience total processing time is less with kallitype than with palladium.
I am aware of the fact that the price of palladium chloride is fairly low at this time but if you make large prints there is still going to be a significant difference between making a palladium toned kallitype and a straight palladium print. Now quite frankly cost would not be a consideration for me if the straight palladium offered me anything that the palladium toned kallitype did not, either in ease of operation, richness, tonal range or permanence. But for me there is just no difference. In fact, I see the two processes as simply different ways of arriving at the same finished product, a palladium print, because that for all practical purposes is what you have with a well-processed palladium tone kallitype.
On anothe forum a couple of pt/pd printers have expressed the opinion that kallitype is a lot more trouble than palladium. Quite frankly I just don't get the point because in my own work flow I just don't find any significant difference in ease of operation between the two processes. But people are gong to believe what they want to believe so that is that.
But in case you might want to know a bit more about making permanent palladiumd prints with the silver iron process see my my article on kallitype at http://unblinkingeye.com/Articles/Kallitype/kallitype.html
And by the way if you do wind up making palladium or platinum toned kallitypes and don't know what to call them just label them platinum or palladium prints, because that is what they are.
salt printing as practise for platinum/palladium
And by the way if you do wind up making palladium or platinum toned kallitypes and don't know what to call them just label them platinum or palladium prints, because that is what they are.
Well, I never thought I would disagree with anything Sandy said, but there is always a first time for everything. :-)
I think if it is a palladium print it should be called palladium print, not pt/pd. The same goes for a pd toned kallitype, it should be called a palladium toned Kallitype. If we object to the usage of terms like "digital platinum glicče" on the basis that there is actually no platinum in these ink jet prints, then I think we should strive to be as accurate as possible in the naming of our own processes or prints.
I think from a collectors point of view a person would be dissapointed and perhaps even mad if they found out that what they thought was a palladium or pt/pd print is nothing more than a toned kallitype....
salt printing as practise for platinum/palladium
Jorge,
Two different persons who know a lot about alternative processes and the chemisty of processes made this suggestion to me. And the reason is that there is in essence no difference between a palladium toned kallitype and a straight palladium. Both consist of a image made up of palladium metal on a paper surface. The only differnce is in the process by which this palladium metal winds up on the paper surface. And my understanding is that there is no test, destructive or other, capable of indicating any physical difference between the two. If there were some kind of test that could show a difference I would certainly have another opinion on the subject.
Frankly I am much more interested in exhibiting and selling carbon prints than kallitypes or palladium, but unless someone could prove to me that there is any real difference in the final print between a palladium toned kallitype and a straight palladium print I personally see no ethical problem in the label.
BTW, you probalbly know that Dick Sullivan of B&S has expressed the opinion that in all probability many vintage prints that are being sold and exhibited as platinum prints are in reality platinum toned kallitypes.
salt printing as practise for platinum/palladium
Hmmm, perhaps you misunderstood their explanation Sandy, I am a chemist and I can tell you with 100% certainty that a palladium tone Kallitype is not a palladium print. IOW the palladium tonning has not replaced silver as the image forming material, it has simply bound to the silver layer to produce a silver/palladium complex, much like selenium does not replace silver when you tone a silver print. As a matter of fact one of my "just for grins" experiments was toning a kallitype with selenium. Not surprisingly you get a similar effect when you tone a kallitype with selenium as you do when you tone a silver print.
On the matter of testing, if I recall correctly there was a talk in the last APIS where a lady talked about a recent non destructive testing procedure which can differentiate between a kallitype and other metals based prints. I dont konw about this test so I am unable to provide you with more info. My guess is that it is some kind of spectrometric/exitation state method, perhaps you can ask about it in the B&S web site. But I do know about destructive test that can easily and readily differentiate between a kallitype, a pd toned kallitype and a straight pd print. To name a few there is chromatography, x ray diffraction and mass spectrometry. So I would not rely on the "there is no test to tell them apart." Perhaps to the naked eye they look identically, but I assure you, chemically there are plenty of ways to tell.
Since toning with palladium can form an outer layer in the silver of the kallitype print, if one uses a loose definition of a palladium print this could be true, but then, we dont call silver prints toned in selenium, selenium prints do we?
I dont know Sandy, but I doubt any chemist worth his/her salt will tell you that a Kallitype has becomed a palladium or platinum print just because you toned it in the respective toner. And if they did, I can tell you with a 100% certainty that they are wrong and will be glad to prove it to them.
salt printing as practise for platinum/palladium
Jorge wrote, "Since toning with palladium can form an outer layer in the silver of the kallitype print, if one uses a loose definition of a palladium print this could be true, but then, we dont call silver prints toned in selenium, selenium prints do we?"
Jorge,
I am not a chemist so I have to rely on what published information I can find on the subject of toning, and on the information provided by chemists with whom I have discussed the subject. My review of the literature suggests that the subject is rather complex. Putting aside for the moment your question about selenium toning, my understanding is that the process of toning a silver metal image with either gold, platinum or palladium does not involve merely the formation of an outer plating of the silver metal, but a *replacement* of the silver metal with metallic gold, palladium or platinum, plus silver ions. I can not find any details of this chemical reacion with palladium or platinum but Grant Haist provides the following information relative to gold.
3 Ag + Au3+ gives Au + 3Ag+
metallic silver + auric gold gives metallic gold + silver ions
or
Ag + Au+ gives Au + Ag+
metallic silver + aurous gold gives metallic gold + silver ion
Depending on various conditions the degree of replacment could be partial or total.
Thanks for your comments, and for any additonal technical insights you may be able to provide on this subject.
salt printing as practise for platinum/palladium
Hey Sandy, I understand, I am certainly not accusing you to purposely try to mislead people. In my book you are one of the good guys and I certainly dont want to cause you any embarrasement, nor am I accusing you of being dishonest. My personal dealings with you have shown me that your honesty is unquestionable, coupled with your willigness to share your knowledge without any reservations I think makes you one of the most valuable persons in photgraphy today. So please, I want to make clear it is not my intention to offend you or ridicule you, as I said I understand you are not a chemist, but I also know many of us come to you for guidance and questions and I know you would not want to provide misleading info if you can help it. That is the only reason for this discussion.
Lets examine the equation you were given, on the surface this might appear to be a reasonable outcome. What this equation is telling us is that 3 atoms of silver donate an electron each to an atom of gold. When this happens silver becomes ionic, thus it becomes soluble and gold falls into it's base state, also known as metallic state. I suppose whoever gave you this equation is theorizing that as silver becomes ionic and more soluble, gold in its metal state replaces those sites where silver has solubilized.
But, there are a few problems with this equation as presented. One, Silver in its metal state will be more stable than gold in its ionic state. IOW silver will not want to donate an electron that readily, unless there is another agent present that forces it to do so, what we know as oxidizers. Now, my understanding is that gold toner is a solution of gold chloride. Now one might say, hey chlorine is present and it is a terrific oxidizer! And this is true, the only problem is that chlorine in this solution is already in its reduced state, IOW it has already "robbed" an electron (from gold) to attain its more stable configuration. Chemistry is not an absolute process, it is not an either/or process, things are in transition all the time, so there is certainly the possibility that a chlorine atom might be "caught" in an electronic state where it needs an electron and it "takes" it from a silver atom rather than a gold one, and this can be the beguinning of the process you mention. But it will not be a process that goes to completion, nor will it be a predominat process IMO.
Let me give my attention now to the balance of the equation, IOW the quantities involved to acheive this process. As the equation states you need 3 atoms of silver to donate an electron which then become soluble and the gold atom "deposits" in the place that silver occupied. Can you see the problem now?
Unless the optical density of gold is much greater than that of silver (which I doubt, but I admit I dont know and perhaps it is so), you would run out of silver way before you have deposited enough gold in those sites to give the same tone. The result of course would be a much lighter print if this was the way it happened. Remember, at this time you have a finite amount of silver, and once it is all gone that is it, the process cannot continue. Where is the extra silver necessary to acheive the same optical density comming from?
There are other objections I have for this theory, but I dont want to bore the rest of the group with a technical disccusion.
I am a water chemist, metals chemisry is not my area of expertize. So I am fully aware that I could be wrong and there is a mechanism here which I dont know that does produce the results you mention. But from a simple chemisty examination I find some things that just dont make sense. My guess is that the process is somewhat in between, some gold replaces the silve completly, some forms a silver/gold/some other thing complex, and some if not most of the silver is left untouched. Perhaps the persons who gave you these explanations can give me their sources or e mail me and explain to me the basis of their theory. I will be more than glad to come back to this forum and admit I was mistaken, after all the pourpose of this forums is to learn and offer accurate information.
salt printing as practise for platinum/palladium
Sandy and Jorge,
If the resultant toning with palladium or platinum results in a true, pure palladium or platinum metal, and there is not remaining silver left after the toning process, then I will accept a toned kallitype as a palladium print.
My reasoning is that if I could be assured tha the two printing processes actually result in an identical image, with identical characteristics and identical archival properties, then I guess there is no functional difference between the two, and they are simply two paths to the same end.
However, I am doubtful that the silver is completely removed from the kallitype, and so the resultant image is actually a combination of silver and palladium particles. If this is the case, then I don't think it is 'right' to be labelling a palladium toned kallitype as simply a palladium print.
As you state, Dick does mention the fact that there are many masqueraders out there in museum archives, and I think his point is that it is very important that the actual process be identified correctly, at the very least for the sake of researchers and archivists of the future.
---Michael
salt printing as practise for platinum/palladium
I agree completely Michael and it is exactly my point. If the process occured as it was explained to Sandy then why hassle with making a pure platinum print, it would be a lot easier and much cheaper to make a kallitype and then just tone it in a platinum solution. Nothing to it, and then you would get a "platinum" print.
Certainly it would be to our advanatge to be able to market "gold" prints, no?
I dont know, something about this theory does not sit right with me, and unless someone can unequivocally prove to me that this is in fact what is happening, I think I would preffer to to call a pd toned kallitype just that...