Re: Eight Days To Become A Master
Thanks John. Beware, you're going to spoil me! I was lucky. (And a little
bit prepared also - thanks to my previous gum experience, even though
brief.)
About polyurethane coating: The bleach developed prints are not as shiny as
normally developed ones, therefore I just wanted to add shine and improve
the blacks + dynamic range (since I print on unsized paper there's a small
amnt. of stain involved - diminishing the punch of the print).
Unfortunately, as I said before, I can't show you the two failed prints on
sized paper (due flaking) because I totally brushed the emulsion off,
thinking I can use the papers later.
Regards and thanks again,
Loris.
From: John Grocott <john.grocott403@ntlworld.com>
Reply-To: <alt-photo-process-l@usask.ca>
Date: Fri, 07 Dec 2007 21:03:39 +0000
To: The List <alt-photo-process-l@usask.ca>
Subject: Eight Days To Become A Master
Loris,
The images you have kindly put on w/s, at my request, are very
impressive, indeed, even the ones which you might consider as
failures..........and all this with a process which you have only recently
become acquainted.
It was only eight days ago that you wrote the following in response to
Marek's brief outline of his work with Javel Water.
Such a short time to achieve so many tests with the Bleach / Gum technique !
!
The images of the attractive lady look exactly as if they are the same image
and not different images produced as gum prints. I noticed this by studying
the small but definate blemishes which are obvious even on the monitor.
You have surely achieved mastery since you are able to reproduce different
gum prints with this amount of accuracy,
i.e. each one with with this amount of faithfulness to the negative.
But please could you explain why you attempted to polyurethane coat test
number three and spoil it ?
After several years of working with a direct carbon technique I must admit
my results have not come near to what you are now doing.
I am looking forward to seeing the other two failure stages, flaking etc.,
when time permits.
Very many thanks for your startling response to my irritating questions.
Regards
John - Photographist - London - UK
...........................................................................
Tuesday 27 November Loris wrote
''This is very interesting Marek. Thanks for sharing!
I would like to try this tomorrow but, what exactly you mean by ³Chlorox²?
Is it a specific trademarked product or just a short name for ordinary
household bleach? (Such as using ³Kleenex ³for paper towels in Turkish, we
use ³Selpak² for the same instead of longer ³kagit mendil²...)
Thanks in advance,
Loris.''
On 11/27/07 11:52 PM, "Marek Matusz" <marekmatusz@hotmail.com> wrote:
> Very interesting thread. I was in the Big Bend NP hiking and taking pictures,
> happy without a computer or cel phone for a few days. I only got to read some
> of the emails now.
> Here is my comment from the practical standpoint of a gum printer. My one
> coat gum prints have eveloved to a practice that gives maximum darks and long
> (relative) tonal range of the final print (not to be confused with long
> negative density range). Some of my prints were included in the travelling
> portfolio last time around.
> Here is a description of my pratice.
> Coat the paper with gelatine / harden it.
> FOr the gum layer I prefer highly pigmented carbon black.
> Use longer exposure (3 to 5 times normal exposures). I really have not tried
> to push it even further.
> Soak in water to remove dichromate.
> Develop in a weak chlorox solution. My dilution is about 20 cc/liter of
> water. Could be as little as 10cc if I want slow action or as much as 40 to
> 50. Once the print starts bleeding the pigment I place it in water and watch
> for a few minutes following the development. If the development is slow, dip
> back in chlorox for a few minutes. The reason for moving it back and forth is
> that the action of chlorox continues for a few minutes and it is easy to just
> wash the gum layer completely.
> Actually I use this method a lot for my tricolor gum prints as well.
>
> How close is that to direct carbon? I call it gum, but it has all the
> ingredients mentioned in this discussion, geletine, gum, chlorox (or Javelle
> water version).
>
> Marek