Digital Negatives: Silver Printing and Alternative Processes

[timothy]

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I brought up the subject of alternative processes in another thread but decided it deserves its own thread.

 

I asked:

 

Are any Leica shooters on the forums doing alternative process printing? Platinum/pladium. Albumen. Gum bichromate. Lith prints. Etc

 

To which Keith Bingman replied:

 

Actually, yes. I have been doing quite a few platinum/palladium prints lately and also some cyanotypes. Of course with the Leica, you have to enlarge the negatives, and the best way for me has been with an Epson 2200 and something called Spectral Density negatives, basically just a colored negative that blocks whatever wavelength the process is sensitive to.

 

I usually use my M6, with Fuji Acros 100, but recently got an M8 and have used that as well. Still, if I am going to go to the trouble of doing a platinum print, I guess I should stick to film. But it's nice to have a choice!

 

Keith Bingman

kbingman :: home

 

Although I have not yet crafted digital negatives to contact print silver or alternative process prints, I know that many "fine art" photographers, especially large format users, have been doing so and various authors have written about it over the years. Recently, I bought the ebook Precision Digital Negatives by Mark Nelson, which offers a new take on digital negatives. Instead of outputting digital negatives in grayscale, the ideas is, as Keith says, to create "a negative that blocks whatever wavelength the process is sensitive to." There reasons for creating these Spectral Density negatives are (1) ability to create denser negatives than straight grayscale allows (from an inkjet printer anyway), (2) precision in matching the negative to the specific printing process and calibrating it to your specific working methods, (3) flexibility to switch to different paper or chemistry and different printing processes altogether because it's easy to reprint digital negatives that are specifically calibrated to the new situation. So that sums up the benefits of Mark Nelson's system to which, I think, Keith was referring. Now, let me get back to the big picture.

 

One of the obvious advantages of digital negatives is that manipulation can be done in Photoshop before printing in the traditional darkroom or alternative process work area.

 

In recent years, my photographic workflow has been to shoot film and scan. I have never been satisfied with the look of inkjet prints, especially for black and white, even using custom black and white ink sets. I'm working on getting access to a darkroom so that, in sha Allah, I can add digital negatives and silver printing to my workflow.

 

For any of you have been reading my other threads, I'm also considering purchasing an M8, but I have reason to doubt that it is up to the task of producing good enough quality black and white files compared to scanned 35mm film like Efke 25 or Tri-X.

 

I welcome questions, comments, and suggestions.

 

Timothy

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[kbingman]

Mark Nelson's book is without a doubt the best place to start. The calibration is tricky, but he is working on a newer system which should go a lot faster. Another book, though not nearly so in depth and technical as Mark's is Digital Negatives. It may be worth a look as well.

 

I recently did a show using only the M8 and platinum prints. It was very much a success and the low noise at high ISOs (640) helped. I shot everything indoors, so tonal range was rather limited, but the M8 handled it well. The prints came out very well.

 

Just afterwards, I was in Guatemala for a few weeks and again used the M8 (and an M6 as well): Somehow, for black and white I haven't been as pleased with those prints. The color (as long as you have an IR filter) was great, but sometimes there was a bit of posterization. I think I just need to fine tune my workflow, but for now the film pictures still seem to have the edge. Still, I love the M8 and would recommend it highly.

 

I never really liked Tri-X for 35mm and for me it is definitely not a film I would use for platinum printing. Grain, while sometime very attractive in a silver print, looks weird and mushy in a platinum print. At least to me. In medium format it is another story...

 

Any good 100 ISO film would be great. APX100 was wonderful, but alas that is no longer an option. For many years I have been using the Fuji films, but that is a very special taste...

 

If you have never hand coated a print before, I would start with something cheap like Cyanotype or Van Dyke prints until you get the hang of it. Both Bostick and Sullivan and the Photographers Formulary offer "starter" kits.

 

It is a very time consuming way to make a print, but I think you end up with a unique print, often far more stable and certainly very different from an inkjet. I haven't scanned any prints yet, but my plan is to get some posted on my new website this week.

 

Keith Bingman

kbingman :: home

[Guest stnami]

Thanks for the link Keith.... the palladium printing sounds quite plausable, I'll give it a bash

[timothy]

APX100 was wonderful, but alas that is no longer an option.

 

I just shot my last roll of APX100 yesterday!

[timothy]

If you have never hand coated a print before, I would start with something cheap like Cyanotype or Van Dyke prints until you get the hang of it. Both Bostick and Sullivan and the Photographers Formulary offer "starter" kits.

 

It is a very time consuming way to make a print, but I think you end up with a unique print, often far more stable and certainly very different from an inkjet. I haven't scanned any prints yet, but my plan is to get some posted on my new website this week

 

No, I have never coated a print before. Cyanotype would be good practice for me to get the hang of it before going Platinum/Palladium. However, that will be down the road for me. What I want to do in the near future is make the Spectral Density digital negatives for traditional silver printing on fiber base paper, perhaps even Azo.

 

I still have a concern. It seems that the idea with Mark Nelson's method is to calibrate the digital negative so that it produces a very very similar result to the image as viewed on the screen. A lot of my images feature large areas of black (or areas that I intent to go black in the final print). Should I take these areas to black in the file itself and stick to trying to represent the file as much as possible? Or should I take these areas to black not in the file but in the print?

 

Timothy

[christoph_d]

Timothy,

 

Can't answer your question. However perhaps this helps: in Dan Burkholder's book "Making Digital Negatives for contact printing" (ISBN 0-9649638-6-8), a disk with curve profiles for different processes is included, to be imported in Photoshop. Workflow is something like: make the photo look good on screen, then apply the curve to print he digital negative. Haven't tried them yet, but it sounded convincing.

 

Best regards,

 

C.

[timothy]

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Chrstoph,

 

Thank you. I'm looking forward to trying digital negatives. Which alternative or traditional processes have your interest?

 

Hmm, I'm going to email my question directly to Mark Nelson.

 

Timothy

[christoph_d]

Timothy,

'

My "alternative" interests starts a bit earlier in the photographic process, I am regularly using selfmade pinhole cameras. For printing I've dabbled with cyanotypies but hope to find some more time this year on that. Having said that, I do find all these processes "magic".

 

Regards, C.

[kbingman]

I still have a concern. It seems that the idea with Mark Nelson's method is to calibrate the digital negative so that it produces a very very similar result to the image as viewed on the screen. A lot of my images feature large areas of black (or areas that I intent to go black in the final print). Should I take these areas to black in the file itself and stick to trying to represent the file as much as possible? Or should I take these areas to black not in the file but in the print?

 

Timothy

 

Timothy,

 

I try to leave a bit of detail in the blacks in the file, then apply the correction curve.

 

I make it roughly how I want it, but a computer monitor is not a platinum print, nor a silver print. The monitor is in the end only a guide, but a pretty good one. If you calibrate your monitor and keep all the variables under control, you can get a very good idea of how your print will come out.

 

One thing about Mark's system that is very different than normal darkroom work is that you have a set time. This is important. It is tempting to adjust this time, but don't do it, it will change the curve and upset the system. It is better to adjust the curve, then all prints will be correct.

 

I did 12 prints this weekend and was able to hit 11 of them on the first try. Once you get your curve built and adjusted, the whole system is very accurate. The last print I had overcorrected on the monitor and when I went back, realized that my first correction was better. I printed out a new neg and it was perfect.

 

As for Dan Burkholder's book, it was groundbreaking at the time, but the idea of a "one size fits all" curves is a bit behind the times. You really have to build your own curve, as every paper, developer, printer and light source affects the end result. There are just too many variables to get really good results with someone else's curve.

 

That being said, I did get started with his book. But it is getting old, I think it is 7 or 8 years old now, and that is really a long time in digital photography. Check out hi s website though, he sometimes has some new info.

 

Mark Nelson also has a Yahoo User's group for people who have purchased his book. There isn't too much going on over there, but some valuable info. Lastly, there is the alt.photo mailing list, a list which has been going on for more than 10 years. There didn't didn't used to be too many silver printers over there, but that is changing. And there are a lot of people doing enlarged digital negatives. http://www.usask.ca/lists/alt-photo-process/

 

Hope this all helps. It can be frustrating, but in the end is worth it.