Re: What's light integration ??? /UV exposure light boxes

In my previous message I did not address the issue of whether one
really needs a light integrator.

With a HID lamps I consider the integrator to be almost essential,
regardless of process, because of the fact that such lamps take
several minutes to reach full output.

With the UV bank you get full output on power-up, but exposures will
vary according to voltage fluctuations. Typical variations are in
the 5%-10% range but in some houses the range can be much greater.

Some processes do not demand absolute consistency in exposure. Such
processes include both gum bichromate and carbon, where there is a
great deal of control that can be exercised in developing to deal
with a small amount of over or under exposure. In carbon, for
example, if the image is too dark I just leave it in the warm water
developer for a longer period of time. If too light I know to pull it
out of development earlier.

Other processes, such as kallitype and Pt/Pd, do not offer as much
control in the processing stage and your printing sessions will
really benefit from the use of a light integrator, even with the UV
tube bank.

However, regardless of process I have never found the ability to make
repeatable exposures with 100% consistency to be a disadvantage.

Sandy King
Received on Wed Feb 4 09:41:34 2004