The Power of Selenium

  I've spoken many times on this blog of how much i enjoy working a negative until i get the final print that i want.  I love working out the dodging and burning for different areas of the print and thinking about the toning i want to do to complete it.  That being said, this print was an absolute killer.  Once again it is from my recent holiday away to the eats cast of England to enjoy the pleasant life of a fishing village for a week.  I have been here many times before and fancied some new spots to shoot so i had a quick look around online before i headed out.  A little bit of research revealed a somewhat hidden bay on the coast complete with rock shelves and nabs (a nab is an outcrop of rock which the sea has not eroded - think stack).  Perfect!  We ended up going there for a day midweek and had a fantastic time walking the dog and relaxing on he sand and rocks.  Of course, i had my Bronica kit with me and was going a bit trigger happy.  I took this shot low to the ground with a nice shapely rock in the foreground and a distant nab and cliff in the background.  The sky seemed good so marvelous, i could burn that in as much as need be upon my return to the darkroom.

  After i developed etc i setup a flat print (after determining the best overall exposure using split grade test strips) i got a flat print exposure.  And it looked rubbish.  So, off i went exploring my dodging and burning options - sheet after sheet after sheet after sheet of paper was used (i was using Slavich Unibrom for it's cold tone and nice heavy weight).  I got a print i was semi happy with and decided to tone (after a wash of course).  I copper toned for a short period then put it into selenium - after a few minutes large white spots started to appear (this is where we learn to selenium tone before copper) so i scrapped it, deciding it didn't look right anyway.

  No amount of dodging and burning that i did made the print look right.  I wanted something dark and i just wasn't getting it.  Perhaps i'm just not at the skill level to do that kind of print yet - hopefully one day i will be.  It's prints like these that really test me!

This is the best i got alas.

   After hours of trying and eventually running out of Unibrom i knew it wasn't happening - i just couldn't get any "pop" out of the print.  I decided to clear my mind and approach it from a lith point of view.  Sometimes, if i'm honest, lith feels like a bit of a cop-out.  I suppose that's because i'm not spending hours configuring dodging and burning charts, i'm just picking an exposure and slapping some paper in a tray.  There is more skill to it than that, and there's nothing wrong with dodging and burning for lith - a fact i had to reassuring myself with.

  Now one of mankind's oldest questions - which paper to use.  After much deliberation i decided to go for Fotospeed Lith paper as i knew it would give me a dark feel and suitable colouring.  So, i picked my exposure and developed until the sky had good detail.  After snatching, fixing and washing i was left with this:

  Good, i thought, but not quite there.  The shadows are a bit...green..!  As is usual with my lith prints i like to see how they react to selenium toner.  In this instance i chose a dilution of 1:5 as i knew it would give more of a colour change than a weaker ratio.  I popped the print into the tray and it went nuclear!  The shadows got absolutely obliterated, the sky darkened dramatically and almost all detail was lost in the foreground rock.  I felt crushed - all that hard work wasted.  I decided to let it dry and think about my next step.

  After a few days of moping about and being busy with work i went back to look through my prints and you know what - i decided i liked the final print i got.  I was suitably dark and it was moody.  It probably isn't going to go down in history as one of my greatest prints but i like it so i decided to leave it there and move on to another negative.  But then again - looking at the above photo of my pre-toned print, i'm liking that as well...

  One thing we learn - never underestimate the power of selenium!

Tapestry

  As usual at the weekend i had a bit of time to myself as Jess was working the morning shift (got to love that morning shift)!  What better way to spend this time than by dabbling in the ancient art of printy?!  I was in a very lith mood so i chose a negative from my latest roll of film and picked a paper.  As mentioned previously i recently won a bulk load of paper on EBay, mostly old Agfa Brovira and Portriga, but i also got a small pack of 8 x 10 Fotospeed Tapestry.  Is it lithable?  Internet says yes as does the good old Facebook lith printing group.  A bit of reading in Lord Rudman's lith and toning books revealed this to be a very special paper.  It liths very well and when toned in selenium a wide range of colours are available.  I got set up and gave it a try... and what a paper!  A lovely textured base with a nice matt finish, it liths fantastically and (as we will go on to see) is phenomenal in Selenium.  This is the print i finally got at the end of the process:

  As you can see it has a very different look to my usual lith prints.  It looks (to me at least) like a watercolour painting.  The colours you can get from this paper in selenium are fantastic, but instead of me talking about it - i have pictures!

  The first print i made of this messed up because i ended up putting finger prints all over the paper.  I decided to use this print to see how far the colour change in selenium would go.  What follows is a series of pictures (taken on my camera phone - sorry for the poor quality of some of them) from 0 to 23 minutes taken every 60 seconds to demonstrate the colour changes.

  Firstly here is the original, untoned print:

Untoned, wet print (note the golden yellow colour - when dry this turned a strong pinkish colour)

30s - note the shadows immediately turning a cool purplish colour

1:30 shadows cooling off further and working up to the lower midtones

2:00

3:00 midtones starting to be affected.  Hints of purple can be seen around the boats cabin

4:00 nice separation in the cabin area and increased separation in the sky

5:00

6:00 purple tones taking over the midtones now and moving up towards the highlights.  The sandy foreground taking on a cooler steely grey tone.

7:00

8:00

9:00 cloud separation reducing slightly as the cooler grey moves towards the purple areas

10:00

11:00

12:00

13:00

14:00 the cool grey now slowly turning into a soft creamy buff colour

15:00 as the creamy colour is taking over cloud separation has reduced significantly

16:00

17:00 shadows have a slight olivey brown tone

18:00

19:00

20:00

21:00

22:00

23:00 the cream has settled into a pale creamy grey colour across the print

  As you can see the print goes through many different colour changes before settling down at around 20 minutes or so.  My plan now was to give an overall toning in selenium to get things going then wash the print and, using a paintbrush, place selenium onto the areas i wanted extra toning on.  I started with the sky so as to increase separation between the purple and yellow areas, then i toned the foreground to change it from the cool grey to a sandy yellow colour.  Then i did a little extra on the cabin and prow of the boat to help it stand out from the frame a little more.  I think the final print looks much better with these multiple pastel colours than it would with just one overall tone.  But maybe that's just me.  One thing that i should mention if you should be lucky enough to come into ownership of this paper is that it dries a different colour.  For exmaple - here is my final print when wet:

And here it is dried out prior to toning:

  As you can see we've gone from yellow to pink.  Not quite what i fancied for this print but maybe one to kkero in mind for another subject.

  I'm sure this "toner painting" could be just as easily applied to any other paper.  You probably won't get as much of an extreme colour shifting but you may get something.  It's certainly something i'll be keeping in mind to try out in the future.

A Bank Holiday with Eddie

  Finally at last i got a decent session in my darkroom.  As many of you will know today is bank holiday Monday here in the UK.  Basically that means that everywhere is shut and everyone is out mowing their lawns and washing their cars.  Well they would be if it wasn't raining for a change.

  As Jess works at a hotel she doesn't have the day off so i dropped her off at 7 this morning and then headed straight into the shed to start printing.  Now, i recently shot a friends wedding on film and had a few frames left over which i went on to use on the coast at Lytham.  I decided to print one of the shots from that roll which i  really thought would let me get creative.  You see, i've been very inspired lately to give my printing skills a boost.  The book 'Creative Elements' by Eddie Ephraums is to blame entirely.  I saw it sitting on a shelf in a used bookstore and had a thumb through.  It looked interesting enough so i bought it and ever since i've been dying to have a good go at some negatives.  If you're into darkroom work i highly recommend you get this book.  In it Ephraums basically goes over ten or so of his shots and explains in detail how he got from camera setup to final print.  You know those shots you take and when you print them they just look dull and uninteresting?  Prepare to be inspired to dig them out again!  That's all i'm saying for now - if you want to know more then get the book!

  So, i decided to try and apply some of the things i had learnt from Ephraums' book to the negative i was planning on printing.  A straight print from the negative is just a bit...well...meh.  it's nothing special, very grey and flat.  Considerable dodging and burning was going to be required to get on paper what i saw in my head at the time of exposure.

  To start with i did a test strip (i should note that i have started using the f-stop printing method and i find it so much easier than dodging and burning by time - i'll be using this method from now on i think) and chose 18 seconds as the correct overall exposure time.  This gave me the tonality i wanted in the wood, which is the most important part of the picture.  The highlights were spot on where i wanted them but the shadows were weak, even though they had good detail.  I decided to step up from grade 2 to grade 3 to give the shadows a kick, even though it would mean a little loss of detail in the shadows.  I kept the exposure time the same and after processing the paper i was happy with the final result.

  Now came the fun of trying to realise the print i wanted.  I ended up using a lot of trial and error (and paper!) trying to get the sky how i wanted and getting the foreground nicely burned in etc.  You can see what i finally decided upon in my notes below:

  I spent ages working on the sky and couldn't get white clouds on darker sky until i realised that the sky was getting a hefty bit of exposure at grade 3 in the base exposure (sometimes it's just the obvious things that elude you for ages).  So, during the base exposure i dodged the sky for 1 stop (9 seconds) to ensure the clouds would be quite white ready for burning in later.  Next i focused on the foreground as i wanted it to be a lot darker, leading the eye towards the centre of the picture.  The right hand side got +1/3 of a stop (+4.7s) and the left hand side got +2/3 (2 exposures of 4.7s).  The very top of the sky then got +1/2 a stop (still at grade 3) to darken it slightly ready for building on later.  All edges were then given a +1/3 of a stop burn to darken them slightly and gently push the eye towards the centre of the frame.  I then switched to grade 0 to burn in the long white grass along the horizon and part of the foreground.  Had i merely extended the base exposure this would have affected the tonality of the wood which i wanted to maintain as it was.  Grade 0 would burn in a little highlight detail without affecting the shadows.  I decided that +1/3 of a stop would suffice to bring those highlights down.  Next i switched to grade 4 1/2 to burn in the sky and clouds.  I did several small passes up and down the sky with a piece of card during the +1/2 stop exposure.  This gave a gradational burn to the sky and enhanced cloud separation which is exactly what i wanted.  Finally i used a little bleach from a toning kit to paint over the sky just above the horizon.  It was very grey and kind of melted into the clouds above.  Lightly bleaching (with diluted bleach) separated this sky from the clouds above and the horizon line below.  It's easy to get carried away bleaching as i found out on a previous print - i had to go back and reprint it all.  Keep water nearby to wash the bleach off!

  After a good washing i bleached the whole print back in potassium ferricyanide/bromide 1:7 for 5:30 whereupon much of the highlight detail in the long grass had disappeared and some of the cloud highlights were starting to go.  I washed again and then sepia toned to completion.  After another wash i toned in selenium for 1:30 which gave the print a little kick.

  Finally after all that work i got this:

  And i'm really really happy with it.  It was so nice to focus in on one print and really work it.  Figuring out the dodges and burns required to get the print in your mind onto the paper beneath the enlarger.  Ephraum's book was invaluable in giving me the kick i needed to get creative.  I'm really looking forward to the prints to come.   have a few projects in mind and i am hoping to apply the new skills i've learnt to those too.