I don't know. You just have to test or wait for someone else to chime in. I've stuck to Farmers because it's predictable, affordable, and keeps a long time in separate A & B containers. It's highlight specific. Formulary's site explains the different reducer options.
Just to clarify, are you looking to achieve a split through selenium alone, or a combination of selenium and bleach/redevelopment in sepia toner? How much of a colour shift are looking for? And what colour shift?Originally Posted by DannyTreacy
There's no way around "sepia" coloured highlights, if you're just using a very dilute rehalogenizing bleach, high your highlights and upper upper mides, and then redeveloping in a sulphide, or a thiocarbamide toner. The only way to "neutralize" the colour shift to sepia in your highlights is to use a sulphide bath before the bleach. I'll have to check my notes, but I think you could use a 5-10% sulphide bath, or the toner itself. It requires testing (5 sec to mins in the bath), and the subsequent bleaching is VERY different.
The key bit with sulphide toning is that you need to give it an archival wash after hypoclearing, before bleaching, otherwise, you'll loose highlight information.
You can get a selenium split through using stronger dilutions 1+10 to 1+3, but because of the way selenium works from shadows to mids to highlights, it can be difficult to control depending on the tonality of the image in question. I've tried to achieve a split with a colour shift at 1+20 and it never really happened...rocking the tray for a good 30+mins. But it was a really "cool" print in colouration.
Your initial developing time will dramatically alter the selenium colour. Longer development equals smaller silver crystals which makes for a "cooler" colouration.
As the selenium toning occurs, you're converting the silver to silver selenide. Conversely, when you're sepia toning, you're converting silver to silver sulphide. Silver selenide doesn't really react to bleach/redevelopment, but a selenium application after sepia will cause a colour shift, typically to brown. So, the order of the toning matters, as well as how far you let each move through the print.
Thiocarbamide toners have more latitude and control, generally.
The archival benefit is relative to how much silver you're converting to either silver selenide or silver sulphide, both of which are more stable.
I've used weak dilutions of potassium ferricyanide to brighten highlights before. I typically prefer to dilute my rehalogenizing bleach, perform the bleach application, then fix, hypoclear, selenium tone, hypoclear again, and wash. The advantage of this is that if your bleach goes too far, you can just wash, and put the print back into the developer, wash, and start the bleaching process again. This will not how prevent your highlights from shifting colour in selenium, however.
But generally speaking, I will print an image with a tonal range of highlight and shadow qualities that are conducive to the subsequent toning applications.
As stated by others the selenium will attach to the silver to give an added permanence. which does in some cases add some Dmax , and I have seen it take the green out of the paper to a magenta colour depending upon the strength. I have never seen it cool the paper tone.
I use very strong dilutions 1 : 5 with short times with a water bath running beside to determine the look I am trying to achieve.
As others I do a bleach sepia routine , I have water bath beside the bleach tray to stop and start till I get the colour I want in the print. As stated above it will go yellow brown.
Selenium tends to cool Ilfobrom Galerie a bit, as well as intensify the DMax. It often further warms Warmtone papers instead, but not always - it depends on the specific developer and degree of development too. Cooler tone papers
are also affected in various manners, depending. I find all of this just another way to expand the tool kit.
I’m looking to split tone with as much neutrality in the highlights as possible as I don’t appreciate the sepia look. So soms kind of bleach for the highlights and selenium for the shadows. Minimal colour shift from the Ilford Warmtone I’m using. Thanks
Danny, in that case, you might have better luck dialing it down a notch, and using MG Classic instead of MGWT. It still split tones nicely, but without inescapable warmth in the highlights.
Maybe the issue is one of semantics. I don't quite understand what you mean by a split toned print, with neutral highlights, and minimal colour shift.
If you're using a bleach/redevelopment application (sulphide or thiocarbamide), sepia-ish highlights are unavoidable unless you "pre-sulphide" before bleaching.
What colour are you looking to achieve as a minimal colour shift?
Otherwise, I'd agree with Drew. MG Classic would take the sepia edge off your highlights. I would also use thiocarbamide rather sulphide for additional control.
I did a project with this paper where I was toning with strong selenium (1:3) to completion. You get a very obvious split toning effect, IIRC it was around 3-4 minutes. I found that with the purple-brown shadows and the neutral highlights it looked awful. I had a few prints where I inadvertently pulled them early and had to go back and re-tone to get rid of the split tone. All according to taste of course, some people might love it.
When I want split tone this paper I do selenium + sepia which I really like.
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