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Ulophot
1-Mar-2021, 19:45
The cost of buying Nelson from Photogs' Formulary, it's high capacity and keeping properties notwithstanding, will keep it out of my darkroom for a while, at least, but I am curious as to whether anyone else printing on Ilford WTF has had experience with it. It appears that it may produce a deeper brown tone than selenium with this paper, which could complement certain images well. I am interested in two aspects:

1) whether it shows the sort of split toning effect that higher dilutions, e.g., 1:15 and above produce with WTF, Classic, and other VC papers, and

2) what sort of color it does produce with this paper.

Thanks.

esearing
2-Mar-2021, 05:14
You control the tone of Nelsons Gold toner by length of time and temperature. But used to full toning ability it is reddish-brown to brown depending on the volume of mid tones in the image. Color shift is in the highlights first then darker tones.
Here is my first attempt back in 2018 on Ilford MGFB Warmtone paper with some of the test images: https://www.searing.photography/nelsons-gold-toner/

Thiourea is easier and can be varied from yellowish to deep chocolate depending on ratio of A vs B, and split toned with Selenium. Highlight only Bleaching , redevelop with Thiourea, then Selenium will lean toward brown rather than purple. The bleach has an impact in the darkest areas despite not lightening them.

Ironage
3-Mar-2021, 05:36
This stuff is classic. I have found that I like the more thoroughly toned images the best. I have not used these papers though and cannot say how they will do. The down side is expense, but it is replacing the silver image with gold! How can you beat that? The longer you tone the images, the less images you can tone. I would say that I got about 5 11x14 prints deeply toned before it needed to be replenished. Another drawback is that it needs a very warm temperature to work. Large prints will need a large water bath for the tray. I am not currently using it, but contemplate starting another batch in the future