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RE: Gum vs. Kallitype
On Thu, 23 Mar 2000, Keith Gerling wrote:
> Hi Judy,
I discovered that if I printed, for instance the C, M, and Y with
> gum, and then used a noble salt for the black, the final impression was one
> of a far more detailed print. I was printing gums over palladium, but due
> to the cost, have tried to move over to kallitype.
You might well get better detail with sumi ink (in the green bottle)
instead of paint, because total will be thinner... but in any event, where
the coats are different (as in CMY), the kallitype (or other) makes more
sense -- may in fact be MARVELOUS !
> ... I AM
> impressed, though with the "duotone" effect I get when I print, for
> instance, a cold kallitype over a sepia gum. To get the same effect with
> ONLY gum, I would have to print multiple layers of the "cold" color, which
> is very hard to keep in register for large 16 x 20 and 20 x 24 prints.
The combo surely sounds tasty. I'll add however that in my experience the
more coats, the more the paper stabilizes -- tho I guess it can be like
Russian roulette -- the more coats, the more chances to screw up.
> Occasionally I will use a "soft" negative (soft as in slightly out of focus)
> to print the lower contrast gum layer, and then pull it all together with a
> very sharp, higher contrast kallitype layer. If I could achieve this with
> gum alone, I probably would!
I'm not exactly sure why you can't -- but in any event sounds like you've
got something good going -- if the extra solutions and chemicals for the
kallitype isn't too draggy...
> Here's one for you: I keep hearing about clearing out the "residual
> dichromate stain". I've never had the need for this. Never. Usually, the
> dichromate is the first to dissolve out of the print - often in as little as
> a couple of minutes. Is this unusual?
The actual dichromate does dissolve out right away, but there is often a
residual stain (check the back of the print) that needs a longer soak...
But, like I said yesterday ....
> HOWEVER, why clearing bath for gum anyway? Except in the RARE case when I
> have done something really dumb, like leaving emulsion on paper overnight
> in unairconditioned August, simple water soak (up to 2 hours) clears any
> residual dichromate stain...
> In fact I once compared notes with another gum printer who got heavy
dichromate stain with same paper & same brand paint, trying to figure out
the difference. We decided tentatively on the water, but since then I've
learned other factors are operative if not controlling _ humidity,
exposure, time on the paper before exposure, etc.
I brought home a litre of water from his state to try (Washington), but
the tests were inconclusive -- I didn't realize at that point how many
variables were really at work... Also I think some people may "clear",
like saluting the flag -- just in case.
Sometimes i like the color of the dichromate stain & am tempted to leave
it. The conventional wisdom is that that's bad archivally, tho I wonder if
it really is. Does anyone know have facts about that?
Judy
> .................................................................
> | Judy Seigel, Editor >
> | World Journal of Post-Factory Photography > "HOW-TO and WHY"
> | info@post-factory.org >
> | <http://rmp.opusis.com/postfactory/postfactory.html>
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