POP Paper

[John Miller]

Hi

I'm wondering has anyone used the Chicago Albumen (sp?) Works paper? What's it l ike? Is it easy to make good 8x10 contact prints with? What do they look like? A re you pleased with the process? Since trying to get Azo paper seems like a lot trouble to get in 11x14 sizes without buying more than you will ever need in you r lifetime, this seems like a good way to go for 8x10 contacts with a good sized border. Thanks for your help in advance.

FYI I really enjoy this forum, I find it most helpful and good reading plus the opinions given are honest and real. Thanks again.

Sincerely John

[Wayne Firth]

John, This paper is a printing out paper so the process is very different from Azo. The paper is doubleweight with a thick emulsion. There is no developer but in order to get a neutral graytone the image must be gold-toned. Without the toning, the image is orange. You can make really fine prints with this but it requires more effort than Azo. The shelf life of the Centennial Paper is short. The paper will develop a base fog in less than a year at room temp.

You might consider 20x24 Azo and cut it down to a custom size that will permit a large border for your 8x10s.

[William Marderness]

I use this paper and am happy with it. You need a high constrast negative (about N+2 development) to get a normal-contrast print. With gold toner, the color can be brownish red, rose, or nearly neutral. It depends on how long you tone and what formula you use. Gold toner made with borax gives a rose color. You also need to use plain hypo with this paper. Any commerical fixer will wipe out the image.

[Chad Jarvis]

I'm to the point now where I use Centennial almost exclusively. I think the finish is sweet, but as stated, you better be using negatives with a long tonal range if you want nice results. Contrary to popular belief, though, you don't have to tone in gold. I use selenium with great results (1:200 to 1:250), but my favorite is still gold borax. (Some people use platinum toner.) Try it. 50 sheets DW FB for $60 from B&S.

[Stephen Vaughan]

William......when you say plain fixer, not commercial fixer, could you give more detail please. I tried printing POP with limited success. The density of the blacks seemed to reduce during rinse/fix. I used Ilford Hypam fix (1+9). However, the process of making POP prints is very enjoyable, and it is easy to see that the potential for making fine contact prints is there if the technique can be controlled. Many thanks....

[William Marderness]

Stephen,

Uing plain hypo is suggested in the literature provided with the Chicago Albumen Works paper. The formula is 150 g Sodium Thiosulfate to 1 liter water. This has to be used within a few hours. Regular fixer will wash out the image.

[Chad Jarvis]

Even plain hypo will reduce blacks. Hypo with hardener, such as Kodak RapidFix, will flat-out BLEACH your paper. I use two-bath Rapid Fix without the hardener (part B), which is plain thiosulfate, mixed from 1:10 to 1:7, depending on my mood and how many prints (and with which toner) I'll be processing. As far as blacks being reduced, as I said, it is unavoidable. Even if you print out until your shadows are thoroughly "bronzed," you'll still get A LOT of detail once fixed. That's just the nature of the beast; it takes a special negative to get it just right.

[Ed K.]

POP Revived A Comment and Another Question for the Experts

So the POP arrived. Love it. Really great scale, nice thick paper, appears to self mask, exposure times around the same as Pd, works well with NuArc 1K exposure unit. Very nice high quality stuff, capable of dealing with contrasty as well as pretty normal negs so far. Nice and sharp too.

Above in this thread, Chad says selenium works well in high dillutions ( sounds like a money saving move too ). Kodak Brown Toner is a sulfide based toner that is archival with gel/silver regular papers and films. Kodak's notes say that Kodak Brown Toner gives archival qualities to both film and paper. The Kodak Brown Toner stuff is cheap, and so far, I'm not wild about the gold/borax tone range.

I'm looking for a brown range and good archival properties, however I'm no chemist, and if possible, I'd like to keep the general toxicity levels low. ( please, no plutonium toner recipes!) .

Anyone know how Kodak Brown Toner would work on Centennial POP?

[Jorge Gasteazoro]

Yes, the brown toner will work with POP. You will have to experiment for best results. On another note, for those of you who are having problems with the fixers bleaching the image you can tone before you fix. Just make sure the print is washed very well before you fix.

[Mark_3632]

Toning a print in selenium before fixing produces, to me, the ugliest imaginable brown out there. Belive me I have tried.

The best thing to do with the bleaching when using selenium is to expose the hell out of the neg. I mean expose until the highlights begin to bronze out. Then fix and then put into the selenium. It takes practice, just like anything else, but you get some pretty pics. Nice choclate color.

[William Mortensen]

Which toner and technique produces the most neutral grey with the Century POP? Is that paper fairly analogous to the old Kodak Studio Proof paper?

[Jorge Gasteazoro]

Toning a print in selenium before fixing produces, to me, the ugliest imaginable brown out there. Belive me I have tried.

You can also tone is gold, pt, pd and sulfide before you fix. There are other toners as well, check out "Comming into focus" edited by John Barnier, it has some more formulas for tonning with some pretty nice colors.

[Ed K.]

Just got Kodak Brown, and for fun, Edwal Brown. After fixing and toning in gold / borax, which produced a rich red/rose/brown, but more at burnt rose after drydown, I dipped the result, which was too dark anyway, into Edwal Brown. Very interesting look of "antique" photo, lighter tone, and range from yellow-brown through dark chocolate. Odd result, but possibly interesting for certain thngs. Going to check out the Kodak Brown next, before and after fix...hey it only shoots a couple sheets to find out. Thanks for additional thoughts and book ref., Jorge.

[robert_4927]

You may want to check out what Wynn White is doing with Van Dykes. He exposes the hell out of the negative, much like Mark suggested, then bleaches the print back with a form of farmers bleach, and then into the toner. He's getting some stunning results. He has published his techniques in case anyone is interested.

[Ed K.]

Test runs update

All testing using hypo crystals for fix, and tap for first rinse to remove excess unreacted chems. Rinsing first, long enough, seems very important, and seems to take betwen 2 and 4 minutes to do this properly. First the murk, as told in books, but then the dark areas need longer to clear.

Edwal Brown - interesting options when used after fix. Before fix, looks okay until placed in fixer, then image goes from orange->yellow->gone completely in a minute or so. Great antique look when used following other toner. Does have a dye effect too, a coloring type toner. Smell reminds me of high school print shop, and the stuff is blood red. Somehow, it does not seem like something that will enhance archival properties. Too bad Edwal does not list the ingredients. Easy to get streaks or uneven areas, and possibly good to use as a masked off colorant.

Kodak Selenium Toner at 1:100, used PRIOR TO FIX, but after good clearing soak, seems to give WYSIWYG toning, in fact, just a tad of intensifying in the first moments of the fix. Will let you know how that looks in a day or so for full dry out. Seems capable of producing some very nice tones, dark browns through nearly blacks in some areas, and mid tones of milk chocolate. Seems like it could be a useful "base tone" for later additional toning. Definitely a toner that reacts with the emulsion, not a dye. For the low cost and modest quanties required for a session, this is definitely a keeper, worth exploring. Doesn't seem to streak. So far, the browns do not seem hideous at all.

Kodak Brown Toner. Ah yes, a fragrance that would please only a bulimic musca domestica larva, or prior to feeding, perhaps even the adult variety, this stuff needs much more dilution than the recommended amount. Toning occurs rapidly, followed by staining. Once in the fix, the image goes away for the most part, other than a residual low contrast yuck, suitable for foggy day effects I suppose. This is definitely a post-fixer toner from what I can tell so far. An initial quick test of it that way shows promise for a very brown, as in light brown to dark brown range, a bit on the cool side, but not purple. We'll see what happens when it drys.

Side notes - Centennial POP does seem to get a nice gloss on an unheated ferrotype plate with a a little LFN in a quick final rinse. Sharpness under a 10x loupe is better than textured enlarger papers, or even most papers for that matter, h0wever AZO has even more sharpness. ( this is not an AZO/POP comparison, both are great ). The POP does seem to handle those times when AZO needs a half grade between the 2 and 3 with much less hassle, and negs that just look flat on AZO soft enough to print most of their range show more tonal detail with the POP ( probably due to masking ). I would not say that getting a nice print out of POP takes more effort than AZO if it's a fairly normal to zippy neg, however I can't imaging doing POP printing using sunlight - it is just way to slow.

So, there is the black art, and well, some colorful alchemy with toning. One of the best reasons to get POP seems to be that it nearly forces one to explore more toning options, and at least, a way to get a good stock of toners on hand.

Robert, got a good link for Wynn White?

[Ed K.]

Additional Note/ Postmortem

Brown toner - not so good with POP. Even in high dilutions, before or after fixing. The stuff is just too agressive. It will turn an AZO into a dark chocolate, however somehow, that's not so pleasing. Interesting to hear if someone else finds a use for it. So it wasn't such a hot idea. Selenium by itself, or after first gold/borax toning seems most promising and worthwhile in my environment. Thanks for the good thoughts!