Getting the best out of Gold Toner

[Michael Graves]

I have an opportunity to get some of this at a very good price and I want to make the most of it. In the viewing of actual prints over the years, I recall that there seemed to be a great deal of color variation between them. I'm assuming that is due to the paper that was toned. Is there a resource that will describe the differences between warm and cold toned papers when toned in gold? Does anyone here have some experience with that?

[Andrew Tymon]

There are many Gold toner recipes. Some give a cold blue black image some more of a reddish purple. Look here for a brief primer.https://www.moersch-photochemie.de/content/artikel/anleitungen/128/lang:en

[Mark Sampson]

Not usually a fan of warm tones, but Nelson's gold toner has produced subtly beautiful results for me on several occasions. When my new darkroom is finished, I may try it again.

[Michael Graves]

Thanks, guys. Mark, what I'm getting is the Photographer's Formulary version of Nelson. What kind of paper did you like with it? Andrew, thanks for that link. Not sure why it didn't come up for me with I googled gold toners.

[Michael Graves]

Also, does it have a shelf life? I am getting it from a local photographer who is getting out of darkroom work all together. I wanted to buy his Ilford 500 head, but it sold for too much at the auction. He didn't sell the chemistry so I'm dickering with him over it.

[Mark Sampson]

It's been ten years at least... but I used NGT on Agfa Multicontrast Classic- that paper's replacement is supposed to be made by Adox. I've bought a box of that but haven't printed with it yet (unbuilt darkroom in new house). Agfa MCC had a very subtle warm tone- the NGT made it a little deeper and warmer. I thought that look went very well with low-key scenes- those prints had luscious dark tones.
It was expensive then- and a PITA because it works at 100F- but I do hope to go back to it someday.
If the kit hasn't been opened I'm sure it's still good.

[Drew Wiley]

You have to be more specific. I routinely use gold chloride to either achieve a true cold tone on neutral papers, or as the cold complement when split toning warm papers. Basically, I use a formula analogous to GP-1 at about a quarter the normal strength. There is no reason to waste gold chloride, and it takes remarkably little to get the job done. You mix up the separate A & B concentrates and store them in glass bottles. Then right before toning you take just enough of the two mixed concentrates and dilute them in plain water for that one particular toning session. I find that only 1/4 fluid oz each in about 24 oz of water will easily tone a days output of 16x20 keeper prints, say, six to ten of them. A $75 100ml bottle of 1% gold chloride typically lasts me an entire year. I never got along with Nelson's, so won't comment on that.

[sanking]

There are many Gold toner recipes. Some give a cold blue black image some more of a reddish purple. Look here for a brief primer.https://www.moersch-photochemie.de/content/artikel/anleitungen/128/lang:en


Gold toner formulas can give virtually any tone desired. But for archival purposes it is important to understand that toning a silver halide emulsion with gold to completion should result in a cool bluish black image tone. A reddish purple look results from replacing a smaller percentage of the silver metal with gold.

See my article on toning vandyke prints for an idea of how toning to completion of a silver metal print with gold should look. http://www.sandykingphotography.com/resources/technical-writing/vandyke

Sandy

[Philippe Grunchec]

Nelson was Paul Strand's favorite toner.

[tgtaylor]

According to my lab notes, the very first print on this page https://www.spiritsofsilver.com/galleries/black__white_gallery entitled Japanese Lantern Monument was printed either on Ilford MGWT and developed in Ilford warm tone developer OR Oriental WT Fibre and developed in Dektol. I printed both for a Christmas gift exchange at work but only toned one in Nelson's. At the time I decided that the untoned version was best and mounted and gave that one away. But several months later the toned version appealed to me and I mounted it and now have on display. My notes doesn't indicate if it was the one on the Ilford paper or the Oriental. The negative was Fuji Acros with a 250mm Imagon.

Thomas

[Duolab123]

You have to be more specific. I routinely use gold chloride to either achieve a true cold tone on neutral papers, or as the cold complement when split toning warm papers. Basically, I use a formula analogous to GP-1 at about a quarter the normal strength. There is no reason to waste gold chloride, and it takes remarkably little to get the job done. You mix up the separate A & B concentrates and store them in glass bottles. Then right before toning you take just enough of the two mixed concentrates and dilute them in plain water for that one particular toning session. I find that only 1/4 fluid oz each in about 24 oz of water will easily tone a days output of 16x20 keeper prints, say, six to ten of them. A $75 100ml bottle of 1% gold chloride typically lasts me an entire year. I never got along with Nelson's, so won't comment on that.

This is how I use Gold toner. The Kodak Blue toner formula that uses Gold is usually way more blue than I want. I use at room temperature, makes the color shift easier to manage. The Fomalux contact paper gives very nice blacks with Gold.

Nelsons Gold toner never thrilled me, 3 separate solutions, silver nitrate etc. I haven't tried it in 25 years, so might be interesting.

By the way, Foma Fomatone paper tones like crazy. I tend to use Se at 25% for Ilford neutral multigrade papers. I reduced to about 3% with the Fomatone and got nice results, anything stronger and it looked like Sepia toner.

I need to mix up some GP-1. I'm after D-max more than anything.

[Drew Wiley]

GP-1 deepens DMax just like selenium, but to a cooler tone. They can both be used if desired, depending on the exact image tone you want. It takes very little GP-1 to get the job done. I use it at about 1/4 the recommended strength of working dilution, and mix just enough to allow a print to be evenly covered when rocking the tray side to side. No sense sending gold down the drain; you can't store it after the A&B mix. And the paper emulsion can only hold so much gold, so any excess concentration is just waste.