Originally Posted by
agregov
Short answer, yes you can use an enlarger for contact printing. And no, you should not have problems with vignetting. Simply make sure your enlarger light fall over your entire contact printing frame.
Longer answer.... I'm unclear about your experience with contact printing so forgive anything obvious the follows. There's some mention in the thread about using a light bulb. That's the traditional way for exposing contact prints and works great. However, it also often assumes one is using one of the slow silver chloride papers. Light bulbs throw too much light for most variable contrast papers. There's only two silver chloride papers left, Lodima and Adox Lupex. Lodima has been largely out of stock for some time. And Lupex only comes in a single grade 3 paper. For doing traditional contact prints with a light bulb, you need both a properly exposed negative paired with the right grade of paper. For instances when you need more or less contrast in your final image that is not contained in the negative, the lack of additional grades of paper (grades 2, 3 and 4), makes it more difficult to make very high quality work contact printing traditionally. You also have less access to paper developers as many traditional b&w developers make poor prints on silver chloride papers (often a blue hue). So, you would need to use Amidol or Formulary 130.
The advantage to making contact prints with an enlarger is you can choose from many excellent variable contrast papers available from a variety of manufacturers and many paper developers. In this case, if you need to add more or less contrast in your image, you simply dial the magenta (more contrast) or yellow (less contrast) filters on the enlarger head in the case of the Leica, and you're off to the races. You have unlimited contrast options. In addition to far more control over contrast of the image, you can also print your 35mm negatives with this enlarger.
So, the longer answer is if you have the room, the Leica would be a great way to make contact prints. Extra bonus is you can make enlargements from your 35mm negatives. With respect to the lens being taken apart, I'd probably assume that won't work and buy a new lens. The Leica enlarger uses a 39mm screw mount so you should be able to find another lens fairly easily (50mm might be best). Make sure the enlarger comes with a film holder or two. Those will be difficult to find used. Good luck.
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