Recently I have been giving serious thought to the use of a contour pack mask for contact printing. The article in Darkroom2 gives some basic description of the process. From the interview with Emmet Gowin the process seems to work very well. Has anyone ever used this technique?
Hi Bruce
Is this the method where one uses tissue or diffuson material and place smaller pieces on top of each other to dodge out dark areas?
If so I like the idea and I tried it years ago, I think the idea was for printing multiple prints of the same negative and by using this method one would not have to do a set of complicated dodges on a large run of prints.
The dye dodge method is somewhat the same idea. Also using Red Coccine sp? was a method my first teacher out of college used for holding back dark areas in contact prints. ( I believe Red C was used intesively in the 30's and 40's but since I was only a glint in my fathers eye I could not say for sure. Maybe some of the folks on this site who have been around for a longer period could answer this.)- I love Lillian Bass sp. work and I think she must of used Red C.
I do not use this method (contour) now and would think of using it if I ever got into editioning prints made from very large negatives.
An alternative idea I have considered , that was prompted by this book is to have a large sheet of good glass swing into the light path under the enlarging lens. Then I would consider putting diffusion material,as well as contrast gels into the image path to lighten and control contrast in local areas of the print. This idea I have never persued but I think it would work as well as the contour method as I understand it.
Bob,
This is the method of using diffusion material with various layers to bodge areas of the negative. The method seems to be a good method for working while contact printing. My negatives are both 8x20 & 11x14 so I only contact print. When printing on Azo the ability to burn and dodge gets slightly more complicated due to the broad light source. Increase the distance from the light to the negative to illuminate the entire area and the printing gets even more difficult.
As this method would be mostly for more difficult negatives I wondered if it actually works.
Bruce
I think this would be a very good method to try , I remember the sample of a landscape where the artist had laid diffusion on the negative and this neg would then be placed in the enlarger.
I think this method would work the same way with the method you use.
good luck and post after you have tried with your thoughts.
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