Re: Unknown areas in Gum printing?, etc.
Apologies for having a sense of humour.
I too have used unhardened gelatine when not having had a hardener to hand.
The only real pain was having to recoat with gelatine prior to each layer of
gum. This was with both Arches Aquarelle HP and Fabriano Artistico HP extra
white.
John
www.johnbrewerphotography.com
----- Original Message -----
From: "Katharine Thayer" <kthayer@pacifier.com>
To: <alt-photo-process-l@usask.ca>
Sent: Tuesday, May 01, 2007 5:54 PM
Subject: Re: Unknown areas in Gum printing?, etc.
I hate to disturb all of you folks falling on the floor laughing and
whatever other kinds of hilarity the rest of the acronyms stand for, but
you're all laughing at the wrong thing, seems to me.
I have to wonder if any of you who are laughing so hard actually looked
at Jacek's step tablets. At any rate, as has often been pointed out in
the past, there are people other than Terry King who have used
unhardened gelatin for a size and found it worked quite well; I used
unhardened gelatin as a size early in my gum printing career, with no
problems . But I've come to believe that in cases where unhardened
gelatin works well as a size, the same paper will probably work well
unsized, at least that's been my experience. So in Jacek's predicament,
of not being able to get hardeners, I'd suggest trying the Fabriano
paper that worked well with unhardened gelatin, without bothering to
size. (I can't remember if he tried that with the Fabriano paper, or
only with the Arches).
At any rate, if you want something to fall off your chair laughing over,
the idea that if you print gum on unhardened gelatin, the dichromate will
harden the entire layer of gelatin, is the laughable idea here, not the
idea that unhardened gelatin can serve as a reasonable size. If you
print gum on unhardened gelatin, of course the dichromate doesn't harden
the gelatin overall, any more than the dichromate hardens the gum coating
overall. The hardening occurs differentially as a function of exposure,
in both the gum coating and the underlying gelatin layer. This is the
fundamental underlying principle of gum printing, and carbon printing
too; neither of them could occur without this principle holding true. So
this statement that the dichromate would harden the whole layer of
gelatin isn't consistent with an accurate understanding of how
dichromated colloids work.
I've had on my website for several years a demonstration of what actually
happens when gum is printed on unhardened gelatin: as could be predicted
from a knowledge of the process, the dichromate in the gum emulsion
hardens the underlying gelatin exactly where exposure occurs. Where
exposure doesn't occur, the unhardened gelatin stays unhardened and can
be washed off with hot water, if a person is concerned about the archival
properties of unhardened gelatin, without disturbing the hardened gum or
the hardened gelatin under the hardened gum. It may not be the most
efficient way to size, but there's nothing particularly wrong or stupid
about it either. Here's the page:
http://www.pacifier.com/~kthayer/html/Current2.html
I personally would prefer a more reasoned and professional discussion of
issues; this hooting and jeering and LMAO and LOLOL and other juvenile
expressions of disrespect to colleagues is very annoying on a
professional forum and doesn't speak well of our community, besides it
shuts down a reasonable discussion of issues. Jacek, when he couldn't
find hardeners available, tried printing without a hardener, and the
thing is, it's not that unreasonable an idea, as I and others have
demonstrated. It certainly didn't deserve all this ridicule.
Katharine Thayer
On May 1, 2007, at 8:16 AM, john@johnbrewerphotography.com wrote:
LMAO
www.johnbrewerphotography.com
----- Original Message ----- From: "Christina Z. Anderson"
<zphoto@montana.net>
To: <alt-photo-process-l@usask.ca>
Sent: Tuesday, May 01, 2007 3:55 PM
Subject: Re: Unknown areas in Gum printing?, etc.
LOLOL yeah, you ain't a kiddin', don't you remember when I took up
Terry King's suggestion to use unhardened gelatin for a size and got
wonderful black squares of no image because, OF COURSE, the am di in
the gum/pigment mix LOVED the unhardened gelatin and hardened that into
a nice complete layer, too. So much for 250 bloom gelatin and all
that.
Chris
----- Original Message ----- From: "Loris Medici"
<mail@loris.medici.name>
To: <alt-photo-process-l@usask.ca>
Sent: Tuesday, May 01, 2007 8:48 AM
Subject: RE: Unknown areas in Gum printing?, etc.
Oops! Sorry for mis-quoting, it was Marek then...
Anyway, that could be better than trying to print on unhardened sizing
(+ w/o struggling to buy a locally restricted chemical) - at least,
that's how I take it ;)
Regards,
Loris.
-----Original Message-----
From: Christina Z. Anderson [mailto:zphoto@montana.net]
Sent: Tuesday, May 01, 2007 5:37 PM
To: Alt, List
Subject: Re: Unknown areas in Gum printing?, etc.
Just for the record, Loris, wasn't it Marek or Terry King (not me) who
recommended a hardened layer of di/gum?
If the highlights are protected, there will be slight tone in them
with
the di/gum layer, which adds an overall dullness to the image.
But what do I know, I'm one of those glutaraldehyde addicts, you
know...
Chris
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