Greetings -

I've read every period technique book every which way, every thread on this forum, have both an Adams and Homer English machine, all manners of pointy leads, old-stock Spotone, Ansco coccine on the way, old-stock retouching medium, and some old 8x10 negatives for practice, and...I just can't get it right.

Every degree of lightness-of-touch either gives me no change, or ugly, discernible chicken scratch.

Alas, having spent my life in photojournalism, the nominal "old-timers" in my circles are all newspaper veterans, not studio people. As such, is there anyone who, either through their own experience or second-generation, teaches retouching for portraiture? I am, specifically, going for the aesthetic of common commercial studio work from the '40s and '50s, which was not subtle, but, at least, it was neat. I'm familiar with Katherine Gillis, but her emphasis seems to be on spotting landscape prints for fine-art, not turning the 1944 graduation portrait into a too-perfect enlargement that will live in a frame atop a dresser for the next 78 years.

I haven't cracked open my first pack of 8x10 film yet, having spent most of my LF time in 4x5; and, while I intend to do contact prints from them, eventually, am I missing something obvious in flatbed-scanning on my Epson? Do scanners just not handle retouching strokes the same way that conventional printing does?

In short, if there's anyone-of-a-certain-age-and-experience, in the NYC area, who wants to yell at a vapid millennial that he's doing it wrong and proceed to show him how to do it right, I am an eager student.

Thanks, all!