Silver gelatin prints UV exposure unit

[Daniel Unkefer]

Thanks all for answers!

So, basically, UV light should be avoided for silver gelatin printing. In that case, my UV exposure box is useless Or, half useless — I can make another top side of the box where my UV lights are attached, and attach the light more suitable for silver gelatin, so I can interchange them depending of if I'm printing silver or pt/pl.



I assume this would affect the look of the print, depending of which filter color I use.



Sorry for the confusion, I'd use silver gelatin chemistry and paper. I even have some Ilford Multigrade warmtone fiber and RC paper around the house that I never used. I have a room that is completely dark during the night, but it's a living space, not a permanent darkroom, so I can set it up temporarily during the night, and disassemble it after I finish the work. That's the reason I don't want to buy an enlarger, because it's usually bulky, and not the thing that you move around all the time.



Do you make your pt/pl curves using QTR? And then use those transparencies for silver gelatin printing?



My UV is in the box, so I don't see it direct, pretty much never.





As an absolute beginner, I'd try avoiding coating my paper at this stage. I'd rather use anything that's already available on the market. As I said, I have some Ilford Multigrade papers, but I can buy anything that would work. In my case I have contrasty XRAY negatives and I'm always fighting to get lower contrast



I have very similar unit, also built by Tim Layton's design. But I have UV lights instead. I'm curious, does that light you have there spreads evenly on the paper? How large you can print? I have 16x20 contact frame, but in order to print that big, I don't think one bulb in the middle will cover the whole paper. So far, I printed only pt/pd in 11x14 size.

My largest negatives are made in camera 8x10's. Absolutely no problem with even light coverage at this size and bulb distance. Of course, you could try different reflectors, or simply raise the light up, if you have a high enough ceiling. Or put the frame on the floor, I have mine on an old cheap formica table I use for film loading and sometimes VC contact printing. I think you should ask Tim about this, he's very helpful. No question it can be made doable for you. Maybe he's already doing what you want to do

This is a cool machine. Amazing how split filtering can fine tune a negative to perfection. Easy peasy doing it this way. It shows great promise with my Fuji HRU XRAY negatives, where I am always fighting to get good looking lower contrast.

[Daniel Unkefer]

Here's my UV exposure box. For Pt/Pd it works great.

Attachment 232186
Attachment 232187

I'm thinking seriously about building one of these. I'd love to platinum print certain of my 8x10 negs. Perhaps in the future

[jnantz]

Sorry for the confusion, I'd use silver gelatin chemistry and paper. I even have some Ilford Multigrade warmtone fiber and RC paper around the house that I never used. I have a room that is completely dark during the night, but it's a living space, not a permanent darkroom, so I can set it up temporarily during the night, and disassemble it after I finish the work. That's the reason I don't want to buy an enlarger, because it's usually bulky, and not the thing that you move around all the time.

no worries, good luck !
John