Re: heat drying (was sol A & B
Carl Amick (c_amick@conknet.com)
Sun, 28 Jun 1998 08:29:03 -0400
Here in the woods of New Hampshire, the rh of my darkroom swings from the
low 30s in winter to 80 in the summer. The change is often sudden and
invariably happens the exact time I start feeling comfortable with my
drying/humidifcation procedure. When humidity is low I steam my paper
prior to coating and either air dry or "blow dry in the box" (John Rudiak)
for traditional pt or extravatype (see Weese and Sullivan's new book) and
blow dry under a fan ( in a box, fan above, print in the middle, and tray
of water on the bottom) for ziatypes. I couldn't find a blow dryer that
was not using some level of heat on the cool setting; the fan seems to do
the trick. When humidity is high I do not steam the paper prior to coating
and use pretty much the same drying procedure but for traditional pt and
extravatype I always blow dry in the box and keep the box warm and dry
(keep the blow dryer on low) during the entire time I am printing. I find
it is better to have warm dry paper prior and during printing than a cool
damp one for traditional pt. With the exception of zia, has anyone noticed
a problem with room temperature as long as it is over 65 F or so? For
those of you living full time in dry climates, have you ever had problems
with paper that is too dry prior to printing?
Kerik, I'm curious how you get your traditional (?) pt prints dry enough
when you blow dry with no heat. Is your dryer putting out some heat even
when it is on the cool setting? I'm also curious as to what your steps are
in double coating Platine.
----------
> From: Kerik717@aol.com
> To: alt-photo-process-l@sask.usask.ca
> Subject: Re: heat drying (was sol A & B
> Date: Saturday, June 27, 1998 12:31 PM
>
> Here in the Sierra foothills of California, I air-dry my coated platinum
paper
> routinely and never use heat. This works well on papers that I
double-coat
> (Platine and Simili Japon/Socorro Platinum and a few others) as well as
papers
> that I single coat (Gallery 100, Lenox, Bienfang 360, Strathmore Bristol,
etc)
> It is now (more or less) summer here. Cooler than the norm, but El Nino
is
> finally sleeping. My darkroom is aroud 40% - 50% and about 70 - 75
degrees.
> Outside it's in the mid 80's. On occaision when I want to speed up the
> process, after about 10 minutes of soaking time, I'll dry the surface
with a
> hair dryer with no heat as Carl suggested. With air drying I get very
rich
> blacks and smooth tones throughout the scale. I have never had any thing
like
> flat, weak, or "sunken" prints using this approach.
>
> Kerik Kouklis
> http://www.jps.net/kerik/