Making Prints - Easy ones and not so easy onesFrom Better Photography magazine. Some images are missing from this article.

In the last couple of issues we have spoken about the magic of the darkroom and setting one up. It appears that there is growing interest in this process that had been earmarked for the grave not that long ago. Admittedly it will never return to the halcyon days of the past, but most seem to be over that now and believe it or not some of those who have stuck at it have created a niche in the photography world for their creation of darkroom printed images.

Needless to say, like before, not all that is produced should be seen. As much as we try to consistently produce a high standard of work, some of the ordinary ones do slip through. I am sure this is intentional so as to make the previous print look good and the next print fantastic.

If you are still dilly dallying about whether or not to “go digital” or stay with traditional may I suggest that you do both for there is plenty of room to embrace both capture mediums and use them successfully. As a professional photographer who has to stay alive, I realize that this is possible and even preferable for some jobs at some times. I actually thought my learning days were over and I was moving into my “refining period”. Oh well!

In the last article I mentioned that there were pretty much 4 types of enlargers to make black and white prints. Colour head enlargers, VCCE head enlargers, cold light heads and condenser or point light source enlarger heads. With a colour head you use the yellow filtration for low contrast (grade 0 to 1 3/4) no filtration or white light for grade 2 and the magenta for high contrast (grade 2 1/4 to 5). You can even use a combination of both which is advocated by some, but I have found it easier to use one or the other when

printing. Alternatively you can use the filter system below the lens and so just use the white light as a light source and put in the filter you require.

VCCE or Variable Contrast Constant Exposure, is a dedicated black and white head that allows you to just dial in the grade you want. It is set up in such a way that along with the yellow and magenta filters within the head system there is also a neutral density filter that works in conjunction with the other filters and so gives you the luxury of keeping the same exposure time (most times) when changing grades. With a VCCE head, as with a colour head, there is an innumerable number of settings available to you.

Cold light heads work on a fluorescent lighting system but are lousy/difficult/not the best for printing with VC papers mainly because they are loaded with a blue light source which makes it difficult to print lower grades. I would suggest using the filter system below or above the lens if thatʼs all you have. For VC papers they are not the first choice for any printer. If you still print with graded papers then this type of enlarger is great, but it doesnʼt give you the flexibility of the other systems.

A good enlarger to consider for 35 mm to 6 x 7 cm is the LPL C7700 or for 35 mm to 4 x 5”, sorry 10 x 13cm, (just doesnʼt sound the same does it) is the LPL 7452. Still being made and they do pop up on eBay only occasionally now. Also any of the good Devere, Durst or Omega enlargers are fine also.

Depending on the negative size you print will determine the enlarger lens you require. Usually a 50 mm for 35 mm, 80 mm for 6 x 6 cm, 105 mm for 6 x7 cm and 135 mm (but better 150 mm) for 4” x 5”. Although it is worth considering the next lens up from the standard to give better illumination coverage.

With your darkroom setup, then the next thing is to make a print. Assuming you have already contact printed your negatives and chosen one to print then letʼs get started. I always contact print at about grade 1 or yellow 20 if you are using a colour head. I look at the image that has been made and if I feel that the contrast level at that grade is good then that is where I begin. If not then I go up or down accordingly. This is really a matter of choice and no one can tell you where you should start to print your own negative. It is really a feeling or a response to the negative or a recollection of the moment when you made the photograph and now you are trying to recreate that emotion or response.

Choosing a working aperture once again is your choice, but I would suggest you avoid wide open. Sharpness and possible light fall off has to be considered and safety first suggests that you stop down the lens one or two stops. In fact you can test your lens quality by doing the following. Using a grain focuser, focus the image on the base board

using the widest aperture, then stop the lens down one stop, check the grain, stop down again, check and do so till the grain of the negative begins to go out of focus. When it does then you will know that all the apertures prior to that one are usable. (Although try to avoid wide open if you can) I have a lens that is pretty good at wide open at F5.6, terrific at F8, F11 and at F16, but at F22 is starting to loose interest so I never stop down past F16. Most times I always use F11 or F8. Also with the grain focuser donʼt forget to check the grain on the sides and top and bottom as well. If the negative, lens and base board arenʼt parallel, you may have problems.

Letʼs say we have chosen a negative, focused it for an 8 x 10 print at grade 2 using an aperture of F11. The next step (for me, but not for some) is to make a test strip using half a sheet of paper, although for the article I have used a full sheet for demonstration purposes. Tiny test strips are useless when working with a new negative and will not give you enough information in many areas of the print.

The image “Little Horn, Cradle Mountain, Tasmania” (figure 1, 1a & 1b) is a straight forward image to print as you will see. I have made the strips at 4 second intervals. I set my timer for 4 seconds and then made an exposure over the whole sheet, then I covered a small section and made another exposure of 4 seconds and so on up to as far as I run out of paper. I always try to find an exposure somewhere between 12 and 20 seconds if I can. This usually allows me time to “do things” if I have to. In this case I have used the full range so as you can see what is happening at either end.

In figure #1 the test strip gives us a lot of information for both the foreground and the sky. Not only does it tell us what exposure time is good it also confirms that our choice of grade is either correct or should be altered.

At 12 seconds the foreground looks okay and at 16 perhaps a little too dark. The sky area is a little washed out at 12 seconds, better at 16 and for me even better at 20, but the ground area is too dark at both those times. So I decide on an exposure of 12 seconds for the overall print with extra for the sky.

But first I make a straight print(#1a) at 12 seconds to see how everything else looks. As you can see the sky is too light and the rock area to the middle left of the print is also too light and the shadow area of the same rock is perhaps a little dark. I also know by burning the sky a little I am going to make “Little Horn” that protrudes into the sky too dark so that will have to be addressed as well.

Figure 1b goes like this. An overall exposure of 12 seconds is given to the print and during this time the shadow area of the rock to the left and “Little Horn” are dodged for 2 and 3

seconds respectively. Then the sky is given a 3 to 10 second burn (3 seconds into the horn) and the bright area on the rock at left is given a 7 second burn. Thatʼs it.

In figure #2 this print is a little more complex in its making. The test strip reveals we have quite a high contrast situation. From experience I know that simple burning in of areas will not be enough for those areas and if done has the potential of creating tell tale “burn signs”. So a few more “darkroom tricks” are required to eek out the information that is obtained on the negative.

As you can see in the test strip, which goes from 16 to 36 seconds @F11 (at F8 the times would have been 8, 10 12, 14, 16 sec), 24 is starting to look reasonable, but not for the shadow area of the rock and also the water is too light. At 28 seconds the water is starting to look better as is the shadow area below the towers, but most of the rock in the front is way too dark. If I wanted to stick to my 12 to 20 seconds I could do so by opening up from F11 to F8. This would make my 28 seconds reduced to 14 seconds. As you can see in the straight print at 28 seconds that we are close, but there are several areas that require attention. Sounds like my personality.

A lot of areas are going to need extensive burning to retrieve some tone. To get around this there is a technique called flashing or pre exposure of paper that I have spoken about many times before in BP articles. It is a technique that helps out the high and mid tone values of a print, but has very little effect on the low values, so it is possible to cross over into the low values with out doing too much damage. Briefly, pre exposure of paper is where you exposure the paper to non image light to bring it up to the threshold of the paper or where tone begins. (You need to do a separate test for this which is very simple). Then the paper is exposed in the normal way with the image, and you will see that the high values are more controlled and can be helped much easier. Meaning that you may have to burn them for only a few seconds rather that 20 to 30 in order to get better detail in that area.

In figure #2 hereʼs what I did. Knowing the threshold of my paper/enlarger/developer combination, I give the whole sheet 50% of the threshold time, then I give the sky area a further 50% exposure and also the bottom right hand corner 50%. The image is then added to the paper for a time of 28 seconds @F11(or 14 seconds @F8) which is what I thought best. During this exposure time I dodge the foreground dark rock area for 8 to 10 seconds and the entire dark area below the towers for 6 seconds, both times continually moving the dodger. Then I burn the sky for 10 - 15 seconds and the bottom left hand corner for 10 seconds. Changing to grade 1/2 I give the bright rock area in the middle a 10 second burn and the bottom right corner bright rock 10 seconds. Changing to grade 1/2 allows me to lap over into the dark areas without affecting them too much.

Thats it, and you can see the difference it makes from the straight print.

Who said the darkroom couldnʼt be fun! Cheers till next time.

Richard White lives in the North East of Victoria. His main subject matter is the Landscape and people in their environment. He is a Double Master of Photography with the AIPP and in 2003 won the Landscape section of the Victorian Professional Photography Awards and also was awarded a Victorian Art Council Grant for overseas study. He conducts photographic workshops around the state, interstate and also overseas such as Scotland in October 2008. For more information or a current illustrated brochure on these workshops write to Richard at P.O. Box 425, Mansfield, Vic 3722, phone / fax 03 5776 9533 or Email: richard@richardwhite.com.au Alternatively fill out the reader information card and circle the appropriate number. Richard’s web site is www.richardwhite.com.au