You need to see an actual print. A scan doesn’t show it.Originally Posted by pdmoylan
You need to see an actual print. A scan doesn’t show it.
Watch out. I routinely get stoned to death for implying the same thing on a couple of photo forums. Apparently certain people demand some kind of Flickr or Facebook presentation, under the assumption that if it's not pixelated, it's not real. Makes me wonder why I buy darkroom paper to begin with. A deep addiction, I guess. Substitutes just don't do it. Oh well, glad I had the opportunity to look at real prints and aspire to making them myself before computer screens became more common than booklice.
Drew/JE can you describe what is the difference in these prints? Also, some of us are probably looking for an invitation to your next opening, Drew/JE, so we can assimilate the distinctions in prints vs pixels. Can't imaging Drew implying anything remotely blasphemous.
Some prints on Azo developed in amidol achieved a 3D look. One theory was that amidol developed the image from the bottom of the emulsion while more traditional developers developed from the top. I have no idea whether this theory is fact or foolishness, but I’m fortunate to have actually made a few of these prints.
Agree
Tin Can
Deep Prints - for me this describes the difference between lets say Brett Weston (deep) and Jock Sturges (open) or Sudek (flat) A Adams ( open tonal) - final Prints
I have always put Brett Weston print and even Salgado enlarger prints as something for me to try to work for , I would describe both of these photographers as Deep printmakers. I love the way that
both will allow the blacks to stay dark and slowly build up to a decent highlight that if compared to other work would not be a bright highlight.
I know some of you here have seen thousands of Brett Weston images in person, I have not , maybe 10 hanging pieces. But I did see Salgado's show at George Eastman Museum in the 90's which had over 200 original prints.
On a commercial note as a professional printer I would work with 70's early master printers who would describe a correction as.. Make it deeper, or Open it up, or make a Range.
"As my artist's statement explains, my work is utterly incomprehensible and is therefore full of deep significance."
Calvin & Hobbes by Bill Watterson July 15, 1995
Day before yesterday I printed three different images. One you could call "deep" and glowing in that sense Bob referred to. A full range subject with wonderful opalescent highlights right up to reflective specular highlights, and the other directions down into black upon black upon black. I tweaked it with glycin developer and gold toner, so even though on MGWT it looked more like a classic amidol print
on bromide paper, but even richer.
The next image involved an all-high-key coastal fog scene, very nuanced, but with a few deep black references in the distance, including some fence posts and a black angus bull. I wanted it very atmospheric, just like the feel of the day itself. But just a regular print of that would be bland. So I "deepened" that particular scene using a very different strategy from the one above. It was likewise on MGWT. After gold toning to gain neutral to slightly blue-black deeper values, I very subtly split-toned it in sulfide to get the transitions of the high values better defined via a gentle apricot hue, which accentuated the visibility of the opalescent swirling fog, estuary currents, etc, without needing to enhance contrast per se and spoil the mood.
The third print was a big rock formation scene with a misty farm scene in the background. It was triple toned (gold chloride, sulfide, and selenium, but just a little of each in order to crispy separate tones, but subtly. I didn't want any kind of artsy/craftsy look. The sense of depth was in effect deliberately halfway between the classic "deep print" first described and the deliberately atmospheric high-key shallow plane of field of the second example.
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