Re: My first attempt - digital negatives.

>I have not yet made a final print due to the end of class but I was up to 5
>minutes and 20 seconds with 70 magenta in the colour head of the enlarger at
>f4 and 50 mm lens. The enlarger height was set to 70 and the light was
>focussed through an empty 35 mm film holder.

Hi Ehud,

That's a mightly long exposure. First off, I take it your lens is
wide-open at f4? If not, of course, open it to f2.8. Next, adjust your
enlarger height so the rectangle of light on the easel (assuming you have
the negative carrier in place) is just big enough to cover your print.

Finally, if you are printing alone in your own darkroom, you can remove
the lens board and let tons of raw light spill down on the neg/print
surface. Obviously, you don't want to do this in a community darkroom
because you'll fog other workers' paper. If you do take the lens board
out, try to have your enlarger head high enough that the light is even
from corner to corner on your paper (one of the lens's jobs is to provide
even coverage).

Lastly, the only reason we usually use an enlarger to expose digital
negatives is because 1) we already have them, 2) they provide a variable
source, and 3) we can time the exposure with the enlarger timer. You
could use any timer with any light bulb that gives even light. Make
sense? Oh, there's one other reason: we're used to making prints under
them. ;^)

Usually the exposures run about 90 seconds or so. You can make swell negs
on the OHP too (with shorter times) but the PGHGWF gives slightly better
results for many users.

Hope this helps!

Dan

www.danburkholder.com

www.TinyTutorials.com

----
"They called me mad, and I called them mad, and damn them, they outvoted 
me."
-- Nathaniel Lee
(on being consigned to a mental institution, ca. 17th cen.)