Re: Unknown areas in Gum printing?, etc.
On May 1, 2007, at 10:11 AM, john@johnbrewerphotography.com wrote:
Apologies for having a sense of humour.
Interesting, that the one rule of conduct that is supposed to be
inviolable on this forum (although it is violated with impunity
constantly) is that everyone is supposed to treat everyone else with
respect, but that when anyone is called on violating that rule, the
offender almost invariably takes refuge behind this idea that the
person who objects to the disrespect just doesn't have a sense of humor.
What's funny about ridiculing someone because something works for
them that didn't work so well for someone else? It just shows a
lack of understanding of the diversity of observation that obtains in
the gum printing world, rather than a sense of humor.
I used to print three layers of gum on Arches Aquarelle HP (an
antecedent to the paper of that name that's available today) on an
initial size of unhardened gelatin, and it worked fine, but before
long I discovered that I didn't even need the gelatin at all; if I
printed tricolor gum on unsized Arches Aquarelle it worked just as
well with less trouble, and I continued to print tricolor unsized til
the paper changed around 2000. The apricots on my home page are just
one of many examples of tricolor gum printed on unsized Arches.
http://www.pacifier.com/~kthayer/
I don't remember if I have any examples on my site of the earlier
prints made on unhardened gelatin, but they looked just the same as
those printed on unsized paper. I would never laugh at you for
saying that you needed another layer of gelatin for every layer of
gum; obviously there was something else in our practice, some other
variable that made things different so that the extra gelatin was
necessary for you and not for me. Maybe it was just that we were
using different iterations of the Arches Aquarelle. But in any
case, there's nothing particularly funny about it, or anything worthy
of ridicule about either of our experiences; it's just different
observations, which should be taken in stride by gum printers without
needing to make fun of anyone.
Jacek's step tablets printed on unhardened gelatin on Fabriano didn't
show any problems of staining or other problems; he got a reasonable
number of steps for the pigment mix he was using, as I recall, with
no stain. Yes, his pigment mix was a little weak, but that was
probably my fault, because I scared him into cutting way back on the
pigment by saying that beginners tend to use too much lamp black.
But that's got nothing to do with the fact that he was printing on
unhardened gelatin, and as I'll say for one last time, there was
nothing particularly ridiculous about the results that he showed, or
about his idea of using gelatin without a hardener. There's some
good precedent for doing just that.
Katharine
On May 1, 2007, at 10:11 AM, john@johnbrewerphotography.com wrote:
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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