[alt-photo] Re: Steichen book on color

[Richard Knoppow]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Christina Anderson" <zphoto at montana.net>
To: "The alternative photographic processes mailing list"
<alt-photo-process-list at lists.altphotolist.org>
Sent: Friday, December 23, 2011 8:51 AM
Subject: [alt-photo] Re: Steichen book on color


>> Ives' Hichro (imbibition) proc-
>> esses,
>
> Ahhh, interesting. There were a lot of "dye imbibition"
> prints in the book, whatever that refers to (I used to
> know--it was either dye transfer or carbro or some other
> thing, someone can chime in here) so I wonder how Hichro
> differs.
>
     AFAIK dye imbibition refers to dye transfer. The
Technicolor company referred to their process as dye
imbibition. The matrices can be made using either a silver
emulsion which is differentially hardened using a hardening
developer like Pyro and some others or by using dichromate.
Kodak had a process called Eastman Wash-Off Relief before
the Kodak dye transfer process. I am not sure how much
difference there was but the dye transfer process was based
on patents which Kodak bought (actually I think they bought
the whole company). Technicolor evidently used the
silver-gelatin type material.
     Carbro is carbon exposed chemically by placing the
sensitized gelatin in contact with a regular B&W print.
Preferably the prints used should not have a gelatin
overcoating and such materials were made especially for
Carbro. The advantage of this over carbon printing is that
it is not a contact printing process requiring intense
light. The carbon tissue carries the color and color prints
are made by overlaying three carbon prints in register. Dye
transfer type reliefs can also be used in this way by dying
them and overlaying the resulting tissues. I think the
process Tom Sobota refers to is like this.
     Both dye transfer and three color carbro were used for
making high-quality original prints for photomechanical
reproduction. Dye transfer was somewhat less fussy than
either its predecessor the wash -off-relief process or
three-color-carbro but the labs who made these prints
specialized in them and generally did nothing else. Both are
capable of extremely high quality work but dye transfer
slowly replaced carbro for advertising work because it was a
bit cheaper and made sharper reproduced images. Kodachrome
began to replace both eventually.
     Steichen did a great deal of high-end fashion
photography so its not surprizing that he left behind many
dye transfer and color carbro prints. Both processes are
longer lived than chromogenic prints, especially carbro.
     The camera originals for both processes were color 
separation negatives, usually made with a one-shot camera. 
The two main suppliers of materials were Devin, which 
incorporated National Photocolor, and Thomas Curtis. Both 
companies made cameras and supplies for three-color carbro 
printing. The materials made by the Autotype company were 
not considered reliable enough for commercial work.
     There is a pretty good article at:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_print

--
Richard Knoppow
Los Angeles
WB6KBL
dickburk at ix.netcom.com