This is a light-hearted question. I have a couple of dodging tools that I've had for 30 years. Use these regularly. Is this a personal problem or do you have a fave dodger?
(Pencil is for size only.)
This is a light-hearted question. I have a couple of dodging tools that I've had for 30 years. Use these regularly. Is this a personal problem or do you have a fave dodger?
(Pencil is for size only.)
Add to your tools a largish button on a pair of threads.
While I like using ‘Magic Wands’ I really prefer waving my hands about.
A fellow recently made/gave me a huge burn in tool. Basicly a big piece of foam core with hole adjusting flaps. I think it was his proudest invention, after all he made me a new one!
Thanks stranger!
No favorite dodging tool, I rarely used one...if not my hands, then an 1" disk on a coathanger wire perhaps, there was a whole drawer of them in the lab. Making 16x20 silver gelatin prints from 4x5 negatives, I kept my basic exposure a little light, in the 20 second range. I then would use two black boards, one with a hole about the size of a quarter off-centered. Just one or both together, I burned in increments of the basic exposure. Just the way I liked to work...felt like I was carving with light, hitting the timer perhaps 30 more times before I was done. Way too much fun! Back in the days of graded papers.
Contact printing in alt processes, I now work in the opposite direction with straight prints.
"Landscapes exist in the material world yet soar in the realms of the spirit..." Tsung Ping, 5th Century China
*Card board.
*Scissors.
*Wire.
*Tape.
Using those basic item, burn or dodge tools can be made to the specific shape as needed.
Bernice
Mine is a length of black wire with a small alligator clip soldered to the end. I cut whatever shape needed from black paper and clip it on. Quick and easy to change - though the same circle has been there for years now
Cap from a 35mm film canister hot glued to a piece of coat hanger wire
I like to keep a supply of DIY black/white sided sheets on hand...which I make by either dry mounting or spray-gluing white and black poster boards together, which I can then cut into various shapes as needed for specific negatives. The idea is that I can see the image on the white side which faces upwards - handy for both the initial drawing and cutting process as well as during printing...while the black side, facing downwards, will not reflect anything back towards the photo paper during exposure.
Also...the two poster board sheets glued/mounted together provides a decent resistance to "floppiness" while still being relatively easy to cut into whatever shape I need.
I keep a couple of large sizes of these made-up sheets for edge-burning and "hole burning," while smaller, shaped dodging pieces are held by coat hanger wires (I raid my wife's side of the closet for the thinnest ones I can find - shhh!)...the ends of which are bent back upon themselves to create a "clip" which secures the pieces.
But after all this...at the end of the day - sometimes just using my hands is easier...and/or just feels more "natural" somehow.
oh...I have lost the spirit of this thread - favorite old dodging tool? Back in 1982 I took a workshop with Cole Weston...and Cole let me use some of his dad's dodging tools. Seeing as E.W. is (still) my hero...I'd have to say that his (now quite old) dodging tools are my favorites!
Sheets of card board can be bent into a curve to fit a lager dodge-burn area such as open sky.
Segments of board can be cut up then taped together to make up the dodge-burn tool as needed.
Bernice
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