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Steve O
30th December 2009, 11:23 PM
I often wonder if I'm a slow worker as I typically complete only one print in a 4 hour darkroom session. This usually involves working out basic timings, grades and dodges/burns on a smaller paper sizes then progressing to an 11"x11" print on FB paper. I like to complete the print at the end of the night which includes washing, hypo clear, toning, washing again etc before spotting, drying and mounting the best one on archival board.

I suppose the latter stages could be performed on another night but I enjoy seeing a finished result which leaves me free to concentrate on another negative during the next session. Whenever I try to complete too many negatives in one go I usually find the quality slips as I'm tempted to cut corners by doing fewer test strips and simpler manipulations:(

How long do you spend in a typical session and what sort of output do you achieve?


Steve

TheoP
30th December 2009, 11:32 PM
It depends, for school I spend about 30 minutes on one print tops, except for my final piece, which I spent about 3 maybe 4 hours on two prints (both the same apart from mirrored, so the second took the time it takes to expose and get wet). For my own work I spend roughly 2 hours on every print.
When I've just developed a roll of film, I usually make 3 small 5x4 prints of every negative I think looks acceptable, one at grade 0, one at 3, one at 5 etc. So in that respect I can take only 30 seconds per print.


This usually involves working out basic timings, grades and dodges/burns on a smaller paper sizes then progressing to an 11"x11" print on FB paper.

Do you do all your tests on FB paper aswell, or do you test them on resin coated paper first? I've recently been curious as to whether the sensitivity is the same, but haven't had the chance to test it myself.

Steve O
30th December 2009, 11:45 PM
Do you do all your tests on FB paper as well

I have tried using the RC equivalents of my usual papers to speed up the process but found that there were usually subtle differences that forced me to make alterations in time (and sometimes grade) on the final prints. This was frustrating so I now tend to cut down sheets of my usual paper size (11x14) into smaller pieces and work the settings out on those.

I no longer make quick prints of promising negs as the best ones get scanned and uploaded onto my website and Blackberry so I can look at them repeatedly over the next few weeks. Along with feedback from other photographers this gradually makes it clear which ones are worth printing. I don't know about you but I'm beginning to realise that I'm not the best judge of my own work?

Steve

TheoP
30th December 2009, 11:52 PM
I don't know about you but I'm beginning to realise that I'm not the best judge of my own work?
That is true, its a shame my teacher is really crap at giving me critique, she just tells me it will go well with my project or won't.

Scanning might be a better idea than making mini prints... definitely save paper. I shy away from my neg scanner at school, I don't know why, but it sucking my negatives away from me, doing who knows what, and spitting it back out again just makes me nervous!

Dave miller
31st December 2009, 07:35 AM
One print sounds fine to me Stan.
I could produce a finished print in a four hour session (except for drying and finishing), but rarely do. I suppose it’s because I simple don’t have to. I would not normally make only a single print, but generally from three to five near identical prints to process at the same time.

Couple that to the fact that I may wish to experiment with papers, finishes, and toning and the same negative could stay in my enlarger for a week or more. Another factor is that I will generally reproduce the same picture in a variety of sizes from 7” x 5” for the PPC, through 10” x 8” for our Print Exchange, to 16” x 12” for my club work.

PaulG
31st December 2009, 09:20 AM
How long do you spend in a typical session and what sort of output do you achieve?


Steve

Your experiences sound much like mine. I seldom have more than 3-4 hours at a time for printing and am often guilty of over-estimating how much I can get done in the time. I find that the more I try to cram in, the poorer the results. That's a product of too many negs and not enough time! :(

One 'good' print sounds not a bad output for that amount of time. Sometimes you'll get a neg that prints really easily, and you can concentrate on making a few 'copies'. Otherwise, it can take a whole session to get just the result you want.

If I tone a print, it can usually take several days to finish if I'm duotoning with selenium and gold. The toning is quite quick, but the washing takes forever!

Richard Gould
31st December 2009, 09:47 AM
one or two good prints from a 4 or 5 hour session is good going for me,not counting the drying and flattening etc,Richard

Steve O
2nd January 2010, 11:45 PM
It sounds like I work at a similar rate to many of you which is comforting.

The issue of toning raises the question of whether you tone straight after washing and assess the results before making another print or whether you tone in a separate session? Whenever I've toned separately there's always the chance that the original density was incorrect and I end up with a less than perfect end result. If I print and tone together I can adjust the print time to match the tone required.


Steve

Dave miller
3rd January 2010, 07:16 AM
It sounds like I work at a similar rate to many of you which is comforting.

The issue of toning raises the question of whether you tone straight after washing and assess the results before making another print or whether you tone in a separate session? Whenever I've toned separately there's always the chance that the original density was incorrect and I end up with a less than perfect end result. If I print and tone together I can adjust the print time to match the tone required.


Steve

I often tone half of my test strip print and assess that when it's dry.

Richard Gould
3rd January 2010, 09:27 AM
I tend to to decide what prints I want to tone before I make them, and print accordingly, and by using weaker than normal toning solutions, at least half of the recomended dilution, I have enough control to get the effect I want,Richard

IanDorset
9th January 2010, 12:22 AM
Hi there. I'm new to the forum, and found the comments on print output deeply comforting. I feel I've done well if a manage 2/3 prints in a session - I just spend a lot of time looking at proofs before making dodging/burning decisions. And I thought it was just me being 'slow'!

Dave miller
9th January 2010, 07:15 AM
Hi there. I'm new to the forum, and found the comments on print output deeply comforting. I feel I've done well if a manage 2/3 prints in a session - I just spend a lot of time looking at proofs before making dodging/burning decisions. And I thought it was just me being 'slow'!

Welcome to the forum Ian, and worry not, you fall into the "normal" category. :)

Richard Gould
9th January 2010, 09:20 AM
Hello Ian and welcome to Fadu, worry not about your print output,your in good company,Richard

Tony Marlow
9th January 2010, 06:31 PM
Hi there. I'm new to the forum, and found the comments on print output deeply comforting. I feel I've done well if a manage 2/3 prints in a session - I just spend a lot of time looking at proofs before making dodging/burning decisions. And I thought it was just me being 'slow'!

You are worried, I have spent the last 3 days in the darkroom and I still can't get the print right.
Tony

Rob Archer
9th January 2010, 07:25 PM
I usually manage one completed print in a evening session, perhaps two if I've got a whole day. I always make 3 or 4 copies of each print - more if I'm planning to tone them. I set up a separate session purely for toning, although I do occasionally selenium tone at the same session as the printing.

Occasionally a really good print seems to just 'fall off the enlarger' without much work. other times I fail to make it work in one session and need to go back to it some time in the future.

Sometimes I'll get a good print quite quickly and then start experimenting on the lines of 'what would happen if.....?'

That's the beauty of silver photography - the possibilites are infinite!

Rob

Steve O
10th January 2010, 09:18 AM
Over the years I've started to recognise the negatives that will print easily as soon as they're developed, you can just see the balance of tones and get an idea of the print manipulations required.
I used to feel guilty about producing prints with very little dodging and burning which may be down to all the books out there that explain how a lengthy sequence was necessary to produce one masterpiece or another. Now I see it as a bonus if the negative prints almost straight and allows me to concentrate on fine tuning such as edge burning and subtle toning effects like brief dips in selenium and gold.
I've lost count of the darkroom sessions when I've printed numerous versions of the same negative only to look at them the next day and realise that the second or third print was the best:(
I sometimes think that I may not be the best judge of my own prints and should leave it to my family to decide on the best one !

Steve

Trevor Crone
10th January 2010, 09:51 AM
I had a printing session yesterday and produced 9 - 9.5"x12.5" FB prints from 3 negatives. Took me best part of the day with washing etc. They are now drying slowly in a cold room :) Looking at one of the images in the cold light of day I'm not so sure why I bothered :confused: I should have done a work print first whch is my normal routine and 'live with it' for a few days before deciding in producing exhibition quality prints.

I'm with Steve O, I no longer see the merit in labourious printing plans, for I too see it as a bonus if a print, prints almost straight :)

Dave miller
10th January 2010, 10:38 AM
I had a printing session yesterday and produced 9 - 9.5"x12.5" FB prints from 3 negatives. Took me best part of the day with washing etc. They are now drying slowly in a cold room :) Looking at one of the images in the cold light of day I'm not so sure why I bothered :confused: I should have done a work print first whch is my normal routine and 'live with it' for a few days before deciding in producing exhibition quality prints.

I'm with Steve O, I no longer see the merit in labourious printing plans, for I too see it as a bonus if a print, prints almost straight :)


Ah yes! The cold light of day; such a harsh critic. :D

Richard Gould
10th January 2010, 10:43 AM
I agree with both Trevor and Steve o, an I no longer bother with printing plans, these days I use an R.H.Analyser pro, which almost without fail gives me a good starting point,including dodgeing/burning,and I then fine tune if I need to,which I don't always need to do, and I am always glad of a negative that prints easily, sometimes the prints simply flow,sometimes I struggle a bit, and other days I can spend hours and nothing goes right and I end up with nothing,Thankfully that is rare nowdays using the analyser pro,Richard

Alan Clark
10th January 2010, 12:03 PM
Ah yes! The cold light of day; such a harsh critic. :D

Nearly as harsh as my wife!

Alan

Phil
11th January 2010, 09:48 AM
Cooor - I thought I was a slow coach :) Glad to hear that quality not quantity rules the day!
Yesterday I was in there from 12 till 4, made 5 prints on 10x8 Galerie, and am really happy with 2 of them (to the point that I will add them to the modicum of prints I'm satisfied with). This time included toning for permanence in selenium. Washing was from 4 to 6 in a dodgy old Paterson auto print washer, and this morning they are dry. I tend not to fuss too much with dry-down as I feel Galerie to be really not too bad and quite predictable.
I also try to aim to get a good contact proof when I'm proofing my 5x4's and tend to look at these for a long time before I contemplate printing them.
Phil

Alan Clark
11th January 2010, 06:36 PM
Cooor - I thought I was a slow coach :)
I also try to aim to get a good contact proof when I'm proofing my 5x4's and tend to look at these for a long time before I contemplate printing them.

Phil

I am interested to know what you do to achieve this Phil.

Alan

Steve O
11th January 2010, 11:09 PM
I also like to 'live with a picture' for at least a few weeks before I make a print as I somehow seem get a sense of what look will work best. If I go straight to a new negative only a few days after development I usually end up having to reprint it months later as I always end up failing to emphasize the key picture elements.

Steve

Phil
12th January 2010, 10:08 AM
Hi Alan - I used to print my contacts slightly soft, on RC paper, and then realised that although you get a lot of info off them that way, you can get the same info from looking at your negs on a lightbox or the like (a window in my case :) ). So now I print them at Grade 2, which is generally what I aim for in my developing anyway . . . though I don't always get there.
I then leave the contacts hanging around my desk for a while, and have a gander at them every now and then and let my brain work away in the background until I want to print.
Aside from making a test strip at the printing stage, I often feel that the judgments I've made in the lead-up to printing tend to help in the making of a print that I find satisfactory. Does this sound artsy-fartsy? It does a bit, but it's just the way I've worked since I restarted darkroom work.
Back in college days, it was weeesh, develop your Tri-x in D76, dry it, contact it, and then try and print as much as you could in the time alloted the following day :o .
Actually, you can get a good feel for this way of working (better written too) in John Blakemore's book! It's essential reading.
Phil

Richard Gould
12th January 2010, 10:17 AM
Unless it is that is needed urgently I would never print a negative for at least months after I dev the film, that way I find I come to the image new and have lost the emotion that I felt at the time of taking,and end up with a far better print Richard

Alan Clark
12th January 2010, 01:24 PM
Thanks for the reply Phil. I am very interested in other people's methods of contact printing but don't want to go off-topic, so maybe I should start another thread.

Alan

Mark Snowdon
15th January 2010, 04:36 PM
I tend to print in the evenings and will spend maybe 3 hours printing followed by washing, toning and drying. If I get one good print then it has been a successful session. I usually work on a single negative and if all goes well will make say 5 prints and will try different toning on some of them. I always use FB paper so the washing / toning takes time.

Mark

Steve O
15th January 2010, 06:18 PM
I typically like to make 3-5 final copies of a print to give me toning options and let me compare side by side before choosing the best one to mount. It's always an eye opener to place what you believe to be your best effort alongside the others and suddenly realise that one of the earlier ones is actually better (usually because I end up printing later ones too dark).

With regards to contact prints I too prefer to have a bit more contrast as it can be uninspiring to look at a bunch of small grey shots on a sheet of 10x8. I'll have already decided if there's enough shadow detail in the negative by looking at it as soon as it's developed and I rarely underexpose any these days.

Steve

kazer
19th March 2010, 04:09 PM
What a relief! I thought I was a snail...

Richard L
20th March 2010, 09:44 AM
I've just taken a whole day to make one print that even now I'm not totally happy with. It's the one negative that made me take a good look at the way I expose and develop film, so it has a few issues such as higher than I'd like contrast, dev blotching, and about a dozen air bell marks that need a spot of bleach in each, then spotting out. It also has a way too complex burning and dodging pattern, and to make life more difficult I had to print it on a paper I'd not used before with it. It is without a doubt a pig, and sadly the one image that I seem to have to do half a dozen of a year. I call it my retirement gift pic, and I'm thinking of retiring it.