Help on DIY horisontal enlarger

[Marcus Carlsson]

Hi,

I was thinking on either building a vertical or a horisontal enlarger (4x5"). But I think that a horisontal has two major advantages.

1. The negative will be vertical and therefore there will not be as much dust on the negative as with a normal vertical enlarger

2. I can use my Sinar F2 and put it on the tripod and therefore I will only have to build a lamp-house to attach at the back (and naturally a negativeholder, but I have to create one anyway)

but my biggest consern is how to hold the paper?
I intend to do mostly 24x30 and 30x40 fiber and you know that those edges can be curly from box.

Does anyone have an idea of a fast and sturdy (as it can be) to hold the paper?
I was thinking first on attaching it on the freeze, but I understand that the engine may cause vibration on the paper.

Naturally I know that if I build a vertical one I will have a sturdy base, but at the same time then I have to hang my camera in a pole (or create an entiry enlarger) and I think that has too many bad parameters.
And naturally I can buy an 4x5" enlarger, but where I live (Jönköping, Sweden) they don't seem to grow on trees :(

/ Marcus

[vinny]

Well for the paper holding part search my posts. I posted photos and directions for making an easel to hold 16x20 paper. It works great. You just slide the paper into the slots. You could also use magnetic strips. For a lightsource, look up the led strips that are now available. 3200K versions are available.

correction: I think i actually posted the pics on APUG.ORG

[Nick_3536]

I wouldn't use a tripod.

It's fairly easy to find 1/4" hardware. Maybe not in Sweden but what you'd need is fairly small and mail order shouldn't be too bad. Building something like a table with a 1/4" mount won't be that hard. Unlike a tripod you can make it heavy and very stable. You can support the light source on the table.

[Marcus Carlsson]

I wouldn't use a tripod.

It's fairly easy to find 1/4" hardware. Maybe not in Sweden but what you'd need is fairly small and mail order shouldn't be too bad. Building something like a table with a 1/4" mount won't be that hard. Unlike a tripod you can make it heavy and very stable. You can support the light source on the table.

I can find 1/4" hardware where I live, but I was thinking of having the light-source on a different tripod and having a bellow between the light-source and negative-holder (so I don't have to super-align the light-source and camera with each other.

Or were you thinking of using a tripod would be not as sturdy as a table-mount? Maybe a table is more sturdy, but on the other hand the tripod I would use is the same I'm using when photographing with the camera.

/ Marcus

[Marcus Carlsson]

Well for the paper holding part search my posts. I posted photos and directions for making an easel to hold 16x20 paper. It works great. You just slide the paper into the slots. You could also use magnetic strips. For a lightsource, look up the led strips that are now available. 3200K versions are available.

correction: I think i actually posted the pics on APUG.ORG

Thanks,
I will have a look at both places.

/ Marcus

[Struan Gray]

Marcus, keep an eye on blocket.se and the classifieds at fotosidan. The older 13x18 Durst 138 models tend to go for very little money, even with colour heads, and they do turn up relatively often. If you are prepared to go down to northern Germany to pick something up the options multiply amazingly. Hamburg isn't that much of a drive.

If your negative stage (camera :-) and baseboard are not linked by a rail of some sort it can be hard to maintain parallelism as you focus and change print size. Not impossible, but fiddly. You might want to investigate a copy stand or even a junked vertical repro camera as a source of suitable hardware. A simple rail or track to mount everything on will make life much easier.

[Nick_3536]

Or were you thinking of using a tripod would be not as sturdy as a table-mount? Maybe a table is more sturdy, but on the other hand the tripod I would use is the same I'm using when photographing with the camera.



Ya and every time you need the camera it requires moving the tripod. Then when you need the enlarger you need to set it up again. Make sure it's all perfectly aligned. It'll grow old quickly.

[Alan Rabe]

Since your into building things. Try making a vacuum easel.

[Brian C. Miller]

I think that the support where the camera is would be far more critical than where the paper is. The vibrations from a heavy upright freezer would be nearly nothing, except maybe when it is starting or stopping.

I have a magnetic easel, and it works fine. A vaccuum easel would be easy too, just use perf-board and a small blower. Hooking it to an actual vaccuum cleaner would be overkill.

[Eric Woodbury]

Don't do horizontal for the dust. Dust sticks because of static electricity. Gravity has little to do with it unless your negative is going to be there for months in the open.

[Mick Fagan]

I agree with Eric about the dust and whatever on horizontal enlargers.

I have used two different 10x10" horizontal enlargers, neither of them were any different in dust spots, or lack thereof, compared to vertical enlargers.

If you do go with a horizontal enlarger then a metal plate and magnets to hold the paper, work quite well. The best magnets are rare earth magnets, they stick like you wouldn't believe, and don't slide anywhere!

Having used horizontal and also vertical vacuum systems, I can say that the magnets are simpler and don't break down. They are also very quiet, compared to a suck machine pulling air in a darkroom. One last thing about vertical vacuum easels. They can be real interesting in getting the paper in the correct position, remember you need two hands for this, then starting the vacuum with a foot switch. You then run the risk of the paper crinkling if the vacuum sucks the paper in with a slap, been there done that! To overcome this, one uses magnets to position the paper smoothly, then apply the suck.

In your part of the world I would look to Germany, Holland or England for an enlarger. Possibly the best buy would be a beat up DeVere 504. Brilliant enlarger and almost impossible to destroy. Plus, you can align them so accurately, everything from the neg stage, lens stage, and baseboard can be aligned with quality allen headed bolts.

Mick.

[Alan Rabe]

If you are thinking of using magnets you might want to try www.magnets-flexible.com they sell sheets of a white flexible magnetic board like those use on marker boards that are magnetic. The best thing if you make it larger than your largest paper you can write on it and then also magnets will stick to it. The back has an adhesive on it so it is easy to apply. I covered the board on my enlarger with it and I now use eraseble markers to write and update my exposure information on it as a print progresses.
You can also get rolls of flexible magnet strips in various magnetic strengths. You can attach these to plastic or metal bars to use as "edge clamps" for the paper. I actually have made a magnetic easel in which I use 1/4" thick nylon bars 1 1/4" wide. I routed a dado along the edge the width of the magnetic strip. I made it just deep enough that the strip would sit proud of the surface just a hair higher that the papers thickness. So now there is a 1/4" edge around the frame that the paper will sit in.
You can place one bar along the bottom, slide a sheet of paper in place, then attach the side and top bars in place to hold the paper down.

[ZoneIII]

I shouldn't say this because I don't like it when people don't answer my question as asked, but I am curious as to why you want to go to all the trouble of building a horizontal enlarger in the first place. I could understand it if you were printing 8x10" negatives and you didn't have ceiling clearance. Great 4x5" enlargers are going for next to nothing now. There has never been a better time to buy one. You will probably end up spending as much money building one as buying one and what you end up with will be makeshift at best based on the plan you described. Putting your Sinar on a tripod will simply not work well. A good enlarger will allow you to adjust and lock down alignment infinitely better than what you are describing. Trying to keep everything in alignment would be a nightmare if it's possible at all with that setup. I have found that many photographers don't understand how critically important enlarger alignment is. Things have to be locked down solidly. A camera sitting on a tripod just won't do it. All you have to do is bump your tripod and all alignment will be off. (I use a laser alignment tool.) I check and alignment just before printing important final prints or, in other words, when my enlarger will no longer be adjusted. I can guarantee you that you will never get your homemade enlarger aligned properly and, if you do, it won't stay that way. Just making normal adjustments will throw it off. You have to keep the film, lens, and easel boards in perfect alignment for best results. The only horizontal enlarger setup that I would even think of using would be one with a permanent rail on which the easel and enlarger head is attached and, in fact, that's exactly how they are built.

Also, less dust would definitely not be a "big advantage" to a horizontal enlarger. If you think you will gain a big advantage with that, you can put that out of your mind and the disadvantages of your proposed setup would far outweigh any advantages it might have but I can't think of any advantages that it would have anyway. Dust is attracted by static. Gravity is a very minor factor. Also, dust is generally picked up before the negative carrier is inserted in the enlarger, not after. The interior of your bellows should be clean. In fact, if anything, your horizontal setup would cause more of a dust problem, IMO. With a "real" vertical enlarger, you can cover it up when not in use and it won't be moved around. In other words, it's easier to keep clean and dust free than a portable setup. And that portability would also make alignment next to impossible.

Then there is the cost and work involved in making a light source.

By the time you were all done with this, I am willing to bet that you would end up spending more money on it than you would on a fine used large format enlarger that would work infinitely better.

You should certainly pickup a good used 4x5" enlarger and, if possible, mount it to a solid wall and brace it at the top, if possible. I have personally never seen a homemade horizontal enlarger that was stable except for Ansel Adams setup. But he did it because he was printing 8x10" negatives and often making very large prints and it all rolled on big iron rails in the floor. The components were not separate.

I have never heard of 24x30" sheets of enlarging paper but I very often print 20x24 and occasionally 30x40" with no problem using my 4x5" enlargers. I could even go larger if necessary because their tables can drop when necessary.

Another thing to consider is that a vertical enlarger generally takes up less space. I have low ceilings in my darkroom and I have no problem printing to the sizes mentioned above.

Now, if you insist on building a horizontal enlarger for whatever reason, holding the paper should be no problem. There are several solutions that I can think of off the top of my head. First, you can just have a sheet of smooth plywood with metal strips or a framing square to work from. If you are leaving margins, you can use push-pins to hold it down. Or, better, cover the board with sheet metal and hold down the paper with strips of magnets. You could even make straightedges out of metal or wood with heavy magnetic tape on the back. Whatever you do, do not use the refrigerator. They do vibrate. After all, you go to all the trouble to make large format negatives for the sharpest prints so it would make no sense to put your paper on something that could vibrate.

A fancier method would be to build a vacuum easel. There really isn't much to them and you could use a Shop Vac to create the vacuum necessary. (You can find plans for them on the internet.) There's nothing to them. In fact, you may be able to find one on eBay with the vacuum pump.

Why reinvent the wheel when there are great wheels out there for next to nothing?

[ZoneIII]

BTW, I should mention that I am an incurable do-it-yourselfer myself. I never hesitate to build something myself but only when I can save a lot of money and end up with something as good or better than a store-bought version or I will even spend more money building it if it is better than a store-bought version. I love finding substitutes for "special" things. I have absolutely nothing against building my own equipment if it makes sense. In fact, I just build something this weekend along these lines. But I also know when it's simply best to buy the manufactured item. And 4x5" enlargers are going for next to nothing these days. People are practically giving fine enlargers away! Again, unless you are enlarging 8x10" negatives and don't have the head room, just go with a good used vertical enlarger. You won't regret it.

[Marcus Carlsson]

Thanks for your very long reply.
I will try to answere why I "want" to build one.

First of all I live in a small apartment where I really don't have room for an enlarger, so when I want to print I will have to darken my kitchen. I know that it isn't the funniest thing to do, but right now I don't have any other possibillities.

I usually scan my negatives, but sometimes I want to get an image on real double weight fiber just for the feeling and that's why I want to print. So I don't "have" to print all my negatives just to see that they are allright.

When it comes to quality I understand that such an enlarger that I intend to build will not be as perfect as a real one, but my main reason for using LF is not for better quality.
I just shoot much better with an LF than other format because due to the fact that it is so slow I think a lot more when taking my images and I almost only take portraits of children and I don't like sessions with 200+ photos, but more like 2-4 photos during a whole session (that will not last more than 30 minutes).

And one thing is that I have two children (age 5 and 10) and I want them to see how a photo is developed. Maybe they will just think it's cool the first time, but I still love when the image appear and want them to have seen it :)

I may be wrong, but is the sturdiness of the enlarger super-important? I mean when I take the image I have the camera on a tripod and maybe it's windy. Naturally I understand that a non-sturdiness enlarger simply make the image not as sharp as it could be, but I'm not out for super-sharp images.

/ Marcus

[Brian C. Miller]

My ceilings are 7-1/2 feet and my doorways are 6-1/2 feet, and I don't have a problem getting my Omega D2 & D3 around on home-built carts. The carts are high enough for the top of the beam to clear the door frame. The total area used is the area of the enlarger base board, maybe 20in x 24in. Then the space under the cart is used for storage. I made the cart out of 2x4s and casters and screwed them together with lag bolts.

Instead of going through the problems with setting things up, why not just make contact prints? You'd still show your kids the process of film photography. For enlargements, pay $10 a print at a good lab.

[Marcus Carlsson]

Brian, I do have room to have it set up when I will use it, but I don't have the room for storage it.

When I had a 8x10" I contact printed them, but I don't like to moving the negatives around and having a heavy glass on top of it and I will never send my 4x5" negative for develop when I can scan them and do the digital printing my self.

Naturally I appreciate your comments and maybe I will end up buying an enlarger when I feel that I have place for it (I have a wife that I have to persuade to)

/ Marcus