Contact Printing

[Tin Can]

These work well

https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_fro...inter&_sacat=0

[r.e.]

Mostly this will be with 8x10 and 5x7... So, what paper should I be looking at? I've never made silver prints before. I'd like something cheap but easy to learn on, and later transition to something more "arty." I've been looking at youtube videos. Is there one that's really good?

I would start with Ilford Multigrade because it and Ilford Multigrade developer are readily available and cost-effective. Between test strips and experimenting, figure on a fair amount of paper winding up in the bin. With all due deference to those who think otherwise, I think that it's a mistake to start with papers like Lodima (what's left of it) and Adox Lupex for cost, finickiness and availability reasons. B&H got Lupex in stock about two weeks ago after it being out of stock for a long time. At US$2.80 per 8x10 sheet, it makes for expensive test strips and learning experiments and errors. As far as I can tell, neither B&H nor Freestyle even have 5x7 Lupex. If that's correct, you're probably looking at shipping it in from Europe.

When I decided to get re-involved with contact printing, I wasn't impressed with the contact printing frames that I looked at. Bought some sheet glass instead. Works perfectly well. To start, at least, so does a 7W bulb in a Home Depot reflector. Figure on wasting some paper figuring out how high, and where in your bathroom, to place the bulb. Another reason to stay away from expensive paper.

[Tin Can]

I bought 10mm 20X36" Tempered glass made in Texas shipped on eBay for less than imports

It will be used for X-Ray 14X36" contact prints

I add this as the thread is now active

[Jim Noel]

There is no such thing as "cheap" silver papers. Lupex is the only currently made contact paper I know of. Azo, Velox and other formerly made contact papers papers bring a premium price.
Enlarging papers are far too fast for contact printing and have to be used with a very small lamp, 5 watt or smaller. A 5 watt bulb 3-4 feet away, and wrapped with a few sheets of toilet tissue is probably your best choice. If on a timer, they will be easier to manage. You need to get printing times in excess of 10 seconds in order to have decent control.
Cyanotype and van dyke brown are both good contact printing processes, cheap and easy to make.

[r.e.]

Enlarging papers are far too fast for contact printing and have to be used with a very small lamp, 5 watt or smaller. A 5 watt bulb 3-4 feet away, and wrapped with a few sheets of toilet tissue is probably your best choice.

The point of putting the bulb in a fixture is that the fixture's rim can serve as a base for material to diffuse the light and for filters. As a matter of curiosity, have you tried wrapping an incandescent lightbulb in tissue paper? I don't think that there's any magic in 5W or 7W, it's an inverse square law matter that affects distance from the subject.

@Two23, if you can fit a 35mm enlarger in the bathroom, which you can probably purchase cheap second-hand, it's worth considering just to use the head as a light source. This is not something that I've tried, but I saw it suggested recently and I think that it's an interesting idea.

[jp]

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/produ...int_Frame.html
would be a step up for a printing frame. It will hold the paper nice and tight with the negative at all times. Some of the negative proofing frames are for convenient proofs not finished products.

If it's a soft photo, I'd recommend the Ilford art300 paper. For other photos, Ilford and Foma make great papers. multigrade RC will be most useful. If you like a really creamy warm tone, foma makes some warm tone paper where the paper is warmish tone unlike most warm tones where the image is warm toned. If money is not an issue, you can sometimes get azo paper such as lodima in certain grades.

[Daniel Unkefer]

VC Contact Printing Source by Nokton48, on Flickr

I saw that Tim Layton built this unit, so followed his lead and I had fun building this. The ulility light was $10 at Home Depot, I removed the clamp mechanism. The box is made from foam core board and masking tape. I put my Multigrade 6x6" #00 & #5 variable contrast filters in cardboard frames, so I can change the filtering out by touch, under the dark safelights. I tried a 7.5W bulb, amazingly way too bright for RC VC paper. So I ordered ROSCO ND sheets from B&H, in .6 and .3 densities. About a thirty second or longer time is what I am looking for, so I have time for burning and dodging. The four suspension wires keeps the box level and keeps it from swinging around in the dark.

https://www.homedepot.com/p/HDX-75-W...1102/205504032 Ilford HP5 (not +) PMK+ 90mm Super Angulon Sinar Norma 4x5

Garden of the Gods 1 by Nokton48, on Flickr

Voila! Results from the above. Arista Matte VC 8x10 in Multigrade dev.

[r.e.]

I saw that Tim Layton built this unit, so followed his lead and I had fun building this.

Great ideas. It might be possible to adapt at least some of this to a small/bathroom space. A question... Where are you mounting the Rosco ND and printing filters? I would think that the ND would be mounted on the fixture's rim, but in your photo there's what appears to be a white disc there (see arrow in the attached copy of your photo). What's the white disc? Diffusion of some kind?


Copy of Daniel's photo:

[mike rosenlof]

since I have an enlarger, I use it as my light source when contact printing (also 5x7 and 8x10 mostly). it lets me use multigrade filtration, and the exposure times are long enough for dodging and burning. I even put a lens on the enlarger and an empty neg carrier. This gets me into "normal" enlarging printing times more or less with Ilford MG paper.

I'm not sure if the OP mentioned having an enlarger or not, but if he does, this is one way to get light on the paper.

[bmikiten]

I may have purchased the remaining stock from Paula last year and would like to know if she is going to re-order in the future. When we spoke, it didn't seem like that was in the plans.

Brian