In the old days …. a little red lipstick was used on the back of the negative to dodge ...…. still works
In the old days …. a little red lipstick was used on the back of the negative to dodge ...…. still works
Red creosin dye is a lot less messy than pencil smudge and can be used as a permanent mask on frosted mylar, or even applied to the back of the sheet film itself, though I don't recommend doing that because it can be difficult to remove. A tiny bottle of Kodak red dye powder will last you a lifetime. It's used highly dilute and gradually built up to the degree of light blockage you need. Being red, it inhibits both blue and green light. If you want to be selective just one or the other for sake of VC papers, then something like Alan Ross' method would be recommended. Whenever anything complex gets involved, I defer to optical unsharp masking on actual pan film. To do any of this kind of technique accurately, except when painting dye directly on the back of your original neg, you need precise punch and pin-registration equipment. My masking registration frames are excellent for contact printing too, though I mostly enlarge my images.
Yup, "selective masking" (as Alan calls it) is exactly what I was referring to earlier. It encompasses basically anything from pencil shading to layering of mylar (aka contour masking) etc etc all the way to inkjet masks.
I still have Alan's written material on this from years ago. Well worth the price if people are interested.
One of the reasons he started putting together these various techniques is that he has to repeatedly print the Special Edition prints from Adams's negatives. Since they need to be consistent and readily reproducible, for some negatives, over the years he ended up creating/building up these mask "packets" which when put on top of the negative, virtually automate all the print controls he would otherwise need to apply manually.
For example, the well known Early Morning, Merced River by Adams. Here's the mask:
It's amazing how many "new techniques" can be found in 1930's Kodak literature, or just about any basic darkroom textbook over a fifty year span. It took the arrival of Photoshop to convince people that it can't be done the easy old-fashioned way anymore. Even selective VC tweaks can be done with frosted lighting gel cutouts taped atop the contact frame glass. No need for a scan and inkjet printer. Many once-routine techniques have been forgotten. All Alan did is revive about 2% of it.
"Morley Baer made 1:1 enlargements with 8x10 rather than contact print. This made dodge and burn easier."
Once I had an 8X10 enlarger capable of making a 1:1 print, I seldom made contacts again. There is a subtle difference that can only be seen in a side by side comparison, but gone are the problems associated with frequent handling of the negative, Newton's rings, etc. One can make multiple prints very quickly.
Just use Anti-Newton glass for the contact printing glass itself - and there go your ring problems! Lest I sound like a hypocrite, I prefer to use an enlarger myself. But there are times a contact print has a special quality of tonality difficult to achieve otherwise. Yes, I know how to reach and even exceed that by means of unsharp masking of enlarger projections; but the same mask can be used for a contact print itself. However, I lean toward the greater detail that can be brought out and visibly seen in a larger print. Afterwards, I might pick out a few special negs for sake of contact printing per se, the one or two times a year I do that. It's all fun.
This thread is fantastic, most useful I've seen since I joined.
Thank you all for sharing for thoughts and advice.
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