Pyro restaining?

[koraks]

I have stained every film I have ever processed since 94 with PMK...

And I trust the negatives are just fine. The issue is: would they have been any less so without the second staining bath?

[bob carnie]

Hard to say.. I have placed silver prints in Museums, Gallerys and private collections world wide and never once did anyone ask me did I use a staining bath. This issue reminds me of the silver bullet many look for in printing.

[Drew Wiley]

I've done it both ways. Sal is right. It just adds extra staining overall and not selectively, so does nothing except to in effect increase fbf and slow printing speed.

[bob carnie]

Here is a novel idea for the OP or others who have not tried this before.

Expose two identical pieces of film, process one with stain , one without.

Now try to make an identical print from each negative... Upon reflection pick the method that most suits you. then move on.

[Kiwi7475]

Here is a novel idea for the OP or others who have not tried this before.

Expose two identical pieces of film, process one with stain , one without.

Now try to make an identical print from each negative... Upon reflection pick the method that most suits you. then move on.

And that scientific method, if done by more than one person, as the method demands, will yield all answers.

Isn’t that what Hutchings already did and found that there’s no proportional difference, publishing this, and yet here we are years later asking the same question again? :-)

[Pere Casals]

Expose two identical pieces of film, process one with stain , one without.

Yes... it would also be interesting to plot the two curves from Stouffer contact copies, as the silver density will be the same we would see if added density is more proportional or more general.

[PRJ]

There is no right or wrong answer to this. If you do it and you like the negs, fine. If you don't and you like the negs, fine too! People make too much of these things.

IIRC I used to do the afterbath, but I am too lazy these days so now I don't.

[John Layton]

actually, the above mentioned test should not seek two identical prints...but each (with and without afterbath) negative should be printed to its own best possible outcome prior to making a judgement about which is process variation is "better."

[Pere Casals]

There is no right or wrong answer to this. If you do it and you like the negs, fine. If you don't and you like the negs, fine too! People make too much of these things.

Well... if you scan later you bend the curves like you want. A pure optic print is way more difficult to control.

Say that you calibrate that process, in the case that second stain is proportional then you can adjust the yellow stain level with a longuer or shorter second bath. This would allow to adjust how highlights depiction is.

A darkroom silver print is something great, but we need every available trick if we want to control what we craft.

[Drew Wiley]

Here's something everyone is missing so far. When you do the alkaline afterbath, whether metaborate or recycled PMK dev itself, you risk an even greater differential edge fogging than otherwise, into the perimeter of the image area itself, potentially requiring much more edge burning during printing to correct. It depends on the film. Old-fashioned thick emulsion films were the most susceptible, but newer ones like HP5 and dual-emulsion types bothered quite a bit too; thin emulsions like T-grain films not much at all. That extra stain soaks into the edges and corners more than the main body of the image, so it's not even. You don't gain anything except a headache. Gosh knows how many hundreds of prints I've made both ways, with all kinds of films. The tanning and staining advantages of using pyro to begin with aren't necessarily enhanced at all with the afterbath. You just make the image harder to print. But there are probably miles of past threads on this subject if someone wants to dig them up. I have no interest in starting yet another pyro war.