Grain in burnt in sky

[alavergh]

Hi everybody. I've been printing a bit recently and came across some 16x20 Kentmere matte warmtome, if I remember correctly. I'm using 4x5 and in this case, I'm pretty sure it was ilford FP4+. The shot was made with a red filter and shortly after this shot, a storm rolled in over my head.

In the darkroom, I used the 5+ contrast filter to burn in the sky and add a bit of extra drama! but I've noticed that I've picked up quite a bit of grain with the extra exposure.

Is there any way to avoid this or compensate for it? I'm a big fan of Clyde Butcher's, and he's got at least one part on his website where he demonstrated how he adds drama to a rather plain and boring negative in the darkroom, and it doesn't seem like he has any of that grain despite even darker blacks in the sky.

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[alavergh]

For reference, this is the one of Clyde Butcher's negatives I was referring to...

http://www.clydebutchersbigcypressgallery.com/journals/81

[cowanw]

Well he did use the 00 filter to burn the cloud; do you think that may be a difference?

[jp]

A high contrast filter in the darkroom is also going to increase the contrast of the grain. In theory if you shot it with a red filter and exposed it right, it should have adequate contrast for printing without any filter extremes. I usually have too much contrast/range in sky scenes more often than not enough.

One method of having smoother grain is to use a staining developer like pyrocat hd, which will partially hide some of the grain because some of the printed image is from the film grain and some of it from a proportional stain (grainless).

[alavergh]

I wasn't aware that it would be that much different if burning with different filter grades in term of grain. If I burnt it with a 00, that would be affecting shadows and highlights together, right?

I've pretty sure I used a red filter, but perhaps I didn't...I was standing amongst semis in a truck parking area at the time. The negative looks nice and has great detail, but it's fairly flat.

[brucetaylor]

If you burn in sky like that with a 5 filter you will get a grainy look. Try burning in with a 00 or 1 and see what you get, I think you'll be pleased, the low filters primarily affect the highlights.

[Light Guru]

Take a magnifying loops and look to see how bad the grain is in the negative. It's possible your development of the negative effected the grain.

Keep in mind that Butcher used a 8x10 camera in that image and a bigger negative can make grain seem smaller in the final print.

With that said. I think the amount of grain in your enlargement of the clouds is fine. Grain tends to only be really distracting in a image if the image itself is not all that great.

[Robert Langham]

This may not seem like exactly your problem but I'd try prefogging the top half of the paper to get the whites down before I got started. I keep a second enlarger standing by set just to fog paper to get whites to print down. You have to test to get it to fog the paper but not enough to show unless you put more exposure on top of it. A test strip fogged and developed shouldn't show any density, but extra exposure on top of it in a print ought to pick up value. Very helpful for controlling contrasty whites.

[alavergh]

Thanks everybody. I'll go back and try it with a lower contrast filter. I still want to have some brightness in the clouds though. Hopefully it'll be manageable, or maybe I can get another shot before too long.

[jeroldharter]

Probably more than you are bargaining for, but masking might help that negative.

[Lenny Eiger]

I don't print skies like that because I don't like them. I like to see the world as it is. I prefer to show the subtle vs the dramatic - anyone can do exploding, it's a little harder to reveal something. Therefore, at least one option is not to do it at all. I offer this not as criticism or a rule, but just to say there are alternate views.

Another option is to use a red filter when shooting... If you burn a lot you will get grain... it's hard to go against physics.

Lenny

[Michael Wesik]

I wasn't aware that it would be that much different if burning with different filter grades in term of grain. If I burnt it with a 00, that would be affecting shadows and highlights together, right?

I've pretty sure I used a red filter, but perhaps I didn't...I was standing amongst semis in a truck parking area at the time. The negative looks nice and has great detail, but it's fairly flat.

A grade V print will definitely yield more visible grain. It may also show the texture of the paper you're printing with.

I've also never used a warmtone paper that produces brilliant white clouds unless it was selenium or gold toned.

In terms of printing skies, I've found that the best way to create dynamic skies with brilliant clouds is to use a combination of a mid-grade filtration (Grade I 1/2 to III 1/2) with grade V, saving Grade 00 for filling in highlight density to taste as it won't affect your shadows much, if at all. For example, you might choose a grade III or II to set the overall tonality of your image, print it just enough so that your highlight density starts to show, and then layer grade V and 00 to fill out your tonal range (you could use grade 0 as well but it would affect your shadow density more). There are several ways to approach a print in this fashion but you're really just taking advantage of the versatility of polycontrast paper. You can get super creative in how you manage your split grades.

On the other hand, if you found a grade IV or IV 1/2 filtration yielded the right highlight character but your shadows were hammered in too much you could also pre-bleach your print. This would entail making a .001% potassium fericyanide solution and bleaching the print (starting at 5ml per litre rocking continuous for 1 to 5 minutes and up to 50ml per litre rocking for 1 to 5 minutes) prior to going into the developer. This technique harkens back to the graded paper days and has the effect of reducing your contrast while maintaining your highlight values, allowing you to print a grade IV 1/2 highlight with grade II shadows, for example. Different papers react differently to this and your highlight values may change slightly from paper to paper and with the amount of pre-bleach used, perhaps requiring additional exposure to compensate. The pre-bleach bath is discarded after every use.

Hope this helps.

Have fun!

Michael

[Andrew O'Neill]

Keep in mind that Butcher used a 8x10 camera in that image and a bigger negative can make grain seem smaller in the final print.

Probably a factor, even though tri X is grainier than FP4. I think the big one here is the no.5 filter. Post your result here so we can see the difference.