You might get one cheaper going directly to Stouffer, but $8 is a good
price. Stouffer seems a lot more reasonably priced than Kodak. I can think
of no reason for the average alt photographer to need the calibrated
version. I expect you would spend far more than $8 trying to make one!
Believe me, you will use this a lot. They are an enormous help in the alt
darkroom. I think I own 4 of them, and wouldn't want to own less. I
started in alt work as a die hard zone system person. For shooting I still
think that way, in the darkroom I now think in step wedge! I blame Judy
Seigel for my split personality ;-) They really are two different ways of
saying the same thing, but the step wedge is so easy and intuitive for alt
darkroom work.
Get Judy's PF, good article on their use. If you are as neurotic as me,
you might want to spend slightly more and get the Stouffer T3110. This is
very similar to the one the list has been discussing (T2115), but has
thirtyone 1/3 stop (0.1DU) steps rather than twentyone 1/2 stop (0.15DU)
steps.
I don't remember if PF covered this in it's article. Most people use the
"hole in the card, visual match" method of working with a step wedge. Most
people are quite accurate doing this. I seem to lack this ability. I made
a simple version of Phil Davis's spot meter/densitometer. Basically a spot
meter with closeup diopler filters. Now I can match negative densities to
step wedge densities very accurately and quickly.
tomf2468@pipeline.com (Tom Ferguson)