Selenium treatment for VC RC Paper

[Gerry Harrison]

Hello,

I have not tried this but from what I have read regarding Kodak Selenium toner its has little or no effect on VC RC paper. Do any of you know of any selenim type toner that has the same effect on VC RC as it does on VC FB paper, or maybe there is a type of VC RC paper that accepts Selenium toning well. Thanks for your time and consideration. Gerry

[Mark Sampson]

I can't think of any reason selenium toner wouldn't work on RC paper. Although my experience with that is from a long time ago, and the papers are different now. The best answer to your question is to "TRY IT". Start with whatever paper you're using now, or intend to use. Make a series of prints; leave one untoned, and then try KRST at various dilutions and times, and see what happens. I predict that a toner dilution of 1:3 will give you brick-red tones with any VC paper...
As far as increasing permanence, it's RC; so fugeddaboutit.

[Robert Ley]

Gerry, I have had good success with toning Ilford MG VC and the MG VC warm tone paper. I routinely use KRST 1:5 to 1:10, but use it at a fairly warm temp 85-90F. I find that the KRST tends to take out the olive tone of the paper and makes it a colder tone and turns the warm tone paper to a reddish brown tone. I have used both Kodak Brown Toner and the beach and redevelop Kodak Sepia toner with good results. You will have to experiment with the various toners and figure something out for yourself. Ctein in his book "Post Exposure" touts KRST as the best way to improve permanence in RC paper. Agreed that RC does not have the permanence of fiber.
Robert

[Jim Jones]

The degree to which RC paper is developed can have an effect on the color shift with selenium toner. Full development tends to mask the color shift. Ilford MG RC Warmtone seems to tone better than the Kodak RC papers I've used.

[Glenn Thoreson]

It should work fine. Don't use a hardening fixer on it. I have been playing with redeveloping in Kodak Brown Toner. Use the sepia bleach and redevelop with brown toner, then selenium enough to protect without color shift. If you want the selenium to give color shifts by itself, use a higher temperature to speed things up. Up to around 100°.

[Oren Grad]

In general, selenium toner works the same way with VC RC paper as it does with VC FB paper. That is, the response varies considerably depending on the formulation of the specific paper.

As you may know, Ilford Multigrade IV FB doesn't change color very much in selenium, but does gain a bit of DMax with the appropriate dilution and time. OTOH, Ilford Multigrade FB Warmtone reacts very strongly to selenium toner.

Recently I've been doing a fair amount of selenium toning of prints made on the Ilford VC RC papers, typically 2 minutes in KRST 1+9. I can report that Multigrade RC Warmtone is as hyperreactive to selenium as the FB version is. It doesn't come out looking the same, mind you, because the curve of the RC version is quite different from that of the FB version, and of course the surfaces look different too. But it most certainly responds. If DMax is something you worry about, the DMax you can get from MG RC WT given a fairly stiff shot of selenium toner is a wonder to behold.

MG IV RC Deluxe and MG RC Cooltone show very little color change, but both show a noticeable gain in DMax with this treatment.