Contact Printing Using the Sun?

[Jac@stafford.net]

As Pere, suggests, it's a lot of light. Maybe I will use slower AZO.

Can we still get real AZO?

[Tin Can]

No, but I have a good supply. found on the floor of an abandoned Detroit Darkroom with broken windows. Chilled as it lay...

Recently on this forum 20X24 inch AZO was sold. A good quantity.

One print in the 2018/2019 Print Exchange is a portrait on AZO.

Top of the stack!

Can we still get real AZO?

[adelorenzo]

No, but I have a good supply. found on the floor of an abandoned Detroit Darkroom with broken windows. Chilled as it lay...

Wow! That's quite a find and a I bet its a great story Randy.

[Mike in NY]

Freestyle sells a PoP kit that you can use to make your own. See it here: https://www.freestylephoto.biz/07011...wder-Kit-500ml

[Tin Can]

It's a great story!

A person in Detroit found me on this forum about 6 years ago. Not an active member.

He offered me 2 free Elwoods if I came and got them. They were in an abandoned Darkroom above an old man bar. I was living in Chicago and could barely walk, my ankles were shot. I was 50 lbs heavier than now.

I crawled into my old Ford van and got there as soon as I could.

The donor wasn't his best either, but his 16 year old son was game. The young man did most of the work, we old men tried to not fall down the outside stairs. It was cold and wet. I slipped the muscle some cash. They both were happy.

The bar patrons ignored us the entire time.

2 Elwoods were put in the van, then we got a third from a yard. 1 5X7, 2 8X10.

Just as we were leaving the Darkroom, I spotted 2 Kodak yellow boxes in the middle of the floor. I picked them, they were heavy, one sealed. 500 sheet boxes of 8X10 AZO, no date. I didn't know anything about AZO, but asked if I could take that too. The donor said sure. I bet it would have been trash shortly as the whole room was in shambles. Actually the entire building was very rough.

I gave one 8 X 10 Elwood away to a friend and still have the other 2.

The 5X7 is in my Darkroom and the 8X10 is in a dry shed waiting...for Godot perhaps...

Wow! That's quite a find and a I bet its a great story Randy.

[peter schrager]

You guys need to find/make some good old-fashioned POP (printing-out paper). Exposure was done in sunlight, it was self-masking, ensuring good highlights and shadows and took a rather long time to expose in the sun. Exposure was checked by lifting a corner of the negative and actually viewing the image to see how it was doing. When properly exposed, the image was fixed and then toned. Very beautiful images on old POP, in my opinion. I think someone still makes a paper like this...

Best,

Doremus

the paper is gone. No one makes it anymore. you can either do alternative process like cyanotype; platinum/ppalladium etc.
there is also POP Collodion paper which I learned to make with Mark Osterman. that's a beautiful process and also uses the sun
using regular photo paper is going to be hard. I'm not saying it's not doable but why bother?? the printing speeds are way too fast.
most of all have fun!!
Best, Peter

[jnantz]

Sunlight works great with Physautotypes and Retina Prints.
http://www.photo-museum.org/niepce-i...n-photography/

[Doug Herta]

Can we still get real AZO?

The closest thing to AZO at this point is Lodima (amidol spelled backwards - lodima.org) which I have tried and like. There is another slow silver chloride paper in the market -Adox Lupex. Have not tried it.

The challenge with the sun is the differing amounts of UV depending on haze, time of day, etc. I would try cyanotypes (Blueprint) chemistry before sticking POP, silver chloride or (god forbid because of the expense) platinum or palladium out in the sun. The variability of the UV quantity in the sunlight drove me to using a bank of UV florescent tubes so I could get consistent results. The sun in Seattle is much more variable than in So Cal so YMMV!

[Tin Can]

Some of us have UV meters

[Bruce Barlow]

PT/PD works well exposed to sunlight. Surprised nobody's mentioned it.