Wet printing and Enlargers

[Hlop]

Hi,

I'm thinking to have some fun with film and wet printing. I have very good experience in B&W but have never tried Colour wet printing myself.

What is the difference between colour and B&W printing (except chemicals and papers, of course )? Is it too much complicated? What's the difference between enlargers? Why some of them dedicated for colour printing and some for B&W? Could you recommend budget but good enough enlarger?

Really appretiate for any info

[Antsl]

Colour printing is done in a totally dark darkroom as the materials are panchromatic ... following that the papers are put through chemistry that typically includes a deveoper and a bleach ... the key thing within the process is the temperature, it needs to be kept consistent otherwise you will be spending all your time trying to get the exposure and colour looking right.

[avkomp]

can be a bit of dicking around doing colour at home.

as for getting the temp right, I remember seeing a home kit a few years ago that was basically a rectangular plastic bin into which you put water which was kept constant with a small heater and thermostat.
your containers of mixed chemistry sat in that to keep temp.

As for total darkness, you may or may not find that harder than working with b/w
although after you make the exposure on the print paper, you put it in a drum which is very similar to the film developing tank and has a light trap.
you can work in room light then pouring chemicals into the top.
some home kits came with a little roller assembly that kept the drum rolling. think this used to sit in the plastic bin do the chemicals inside kept constant.

Much easier using the labs automated processing machine!!
just put the exposed paper thru the slot and a finished print comes out the other end !!

home kits may have changed in the 20 plus years since I last messed with it though.

Steve

[avkomp]

forgot to mention that colour enlargers have a filter drawer or similar method for adding colour filters in order to get colour balance correct.
you could make test exposures to get it right and keep doing so til it is correct or have a gizmo called a colour analyser
again this was over 20 years ago.
so may be easier these days.

Steve

[Hlop]

Wow! I've never thought it's that different!

Is there some links on the web you could recommend to read about colour printing process for dummies/beginners?

Accordingly to enlargers ... can i still use colour enlargers for B&W printing? And, BTW, can I make B&W prints from colour films?

[avkomp]

colour enlargers can certainly be used for b/w printing

just dont use any filters in the draw or dialed up.

cant say I ever tried b/w from colour negs

been out of doing any wet work for 20 plus years so couldnt recommend anywhere on the net go get info.

they may have simpler chemistry these days though so it may not be as daunting.

cant be any further help than that though.

Steve

[big pix]

Wow! I've never thought it's that different!

Is there some links on the web you could recommend to read about colour printing process for dummies/beginners?

Accordingly to enlargers ... can i still use colour enlargers for B&W printing? And, BTW, can I make B&W prints from colour films?

Yes.......and yes.......you use multi grade stock and the filters in the colour head to give you different grades ie: grade 0 to 5 .......grade 0 being the soft paper stock with little contrast and 5 having the greatest contrast........colour negs are easy to produce B&W prints they are done the same way.........

[Hlop]

Thanks a lot for your answers! Yeah, Now I have to think twice about colour printing at home ... B&W is easy and fun ... but should I make my life more complicated?

I have negative scanner (CanoScan 5200F) but I don't like the quality and somehow I think even better scanners won't make decent images close to wet prints .... And high quality images from lab on CD would be $54 for 12 6x6 frames on 120 film ($6 for development and $4 for each frame). That's why I'm thinking about printing them myself ... Am I right or wrong?

[avkomp]

in my experience with scanners, the scan you get from the film attachment of an a4 scanner comes nowhere near the quality you get from a dedicated film scanner that only takes slides and or film strips.

I dont know if any of your colleagues has one but if you give one of those a go, you may well be very happy with the output from it. perhaps take a film strip to someone like hardly normal and get a test (maybe they sell em?)

maybe if you had a big bunch of scans to do then guy one.

I would definitely take one for a test drive first though.

learning to do colour wet prints will take a good while, need more gear.
take longer. ( no developer, stop, fix anymore)

Steve

[Hlop]

maybe if you had a big bunch of scans to do then guy one.

I would definitely take one for a test drive first though.

learning to do colour wet prints will take a good while, need more gear.
take longer. ( no developer, stop, fix anymore)

On the one hand I don't have a big bunch of scans. On the other hand, if one 120 film will cost me 54 dollars in high quality scans on CD, 20 films will be a grand. And 20 films by 12 frames each is easy thing ....

I think I have to find a good scanner to give it a try .... or return to wet printing idea

[gstark]

Steve,

colour enlargers can certainly be used for b/w printing

just dont use any filters in the draw or dialed up.

That would depend upon the paper in use. Multigrades demand the use of filters to soften or harden the paper.

Wet processing can be fun, but colour is best done using a tank or a processor.

[Hlop]

Wet processing can be fun, but colour is best done using a tank or a processor.

Hi Gary,

Could you give a bit more details on those? What's involved?

[avkomp]

the tank gary is talking about is the drum device which looks similar to the developing tank you use for processing your film

I am assuming the processor he is talking about is the machine like the one at the lab I used to do my colour stuff at, this one at least was almost like a large thin photocopier. you filled it up with the chemistry and had an input slot at one end where you put an exposed sheet of paper off the enlarger and
a basket at the other end to collect the prints.

Steve

[phillipb]

Steve,
You will need a colour analyser, a colour enlarger, a drum roller & drum, colour chemicals, colour paper (lots of it, there will be a lot of wastage)
By the time you will have bought all those, you will be close to the same price as a good negative scanner.

Over 20 years ago I had a colour darkroom set up but even then I mainly used it for cibachrome (printing from slides) or the odd 8x10 that I wanted to manipulate, otherwise it was cheaper to send the film to a lab.

[Hlop]

Over 20 years ago I had a colour darkroom set up but even then I mainly used it for cibachrome (printing from slides) or the odd 8x10 that I wanted to manipulate, otherwise it was cheaper to send the film to a lab.

Even considering a price of $54 per 120 film of 12 frames I mentioned above?

[gstark]

Mikhail,

What Steve said.

For drum processing, you would get a cylindrical drum that would hold either 1 8x10, or 1 16x20 (4 8x10s could be processed) and you would have a motorised base that would be used for agitiation.


You'd expose your images in total darkness, then place the exposed paper, emulsion side facing inwards, into the drum.

You'd keep your chemicals at the prescribed temperature in a water bath, and pour them into the drum (it had a light baffle similar to what a film tank has) and then have the drum rotate on the motorised base.

As well as controlling the temperature, timing was important too, and you'd be swapping chems after a few minutes, just as you would for B&W.

You can also buy small home based roller processors; we used to have a Durst RCP20 and RCP40. The 40 was just a larger version of the 20, permitting us to turn out 16x20s very easily.

It was a three bath roller processor, being dev, stop, and blix, IIRC. You'd place your print in at one end and close the lid; the processor would keep the chems at the correct temperature and automatically transport the paper through the machine, from one bath to the next to the next, dropping a completed print ready for washing out the other end.

Great for doing lots of prints, but overkill for just a play.

[Hlop]

Thanks Gary! That's getting even more complicated ....

[gstark]

Over 20 years ago I had a colour darkroom set up but even then I mainly used it for cibachrome (printing from slides) or the odd 8x10 that I wanted to manipulate, otherwise it was cheaper to send the film to a lab.

Even considering a price of $54 per 120 film of 12 frames I mentioned above?

Cibachrome was never cheap - it was a very expensive, very high quality reversal process for getting prints directly from trannies.

And was a very caustic process; I don't think it's available these days.

$54 for 12 from 120 roll film? While it's been a long time since I've done this, those numbers sound high. You can buy a C41 process kit (chems only) for maybe 20-30, but a film tank will probably cost around $50 or so; you'll need to buy a dual 35mm tank to be able to process 120 film, and of course you'll need some mesuring containers, thermometers, funnels, and a wather bath for temperature control.

[gstark]

Here's a reference for you on Photo.net.

http://www.photo.net/learn/darkroom/color-darkroom

[big pix]

at 54 dollars it is cheap.........it will cost more in chemicals and photographic paper without the extra equipment.........

[Hlop]

Thanks a lot EVERYONE!

$54 for 12 from 120 roll film? While it's been a long time since I've done this, those numbers sound high.

OK, you can just print them, it'll cost $6.50 for developing, plus, $1.20 for each print = $21.90. I didn't ask but I assume it's a smallest standard size. Probably, if you shoot 6x6, it'll be 10x10 square on 10x15 paper. Another option is medium quality lpegs, 72DPI, 6Mb file - $2 each frame = $30.50. And what I'm talking about is high quality jepegs, 72DPI, 20Mb file - $4 each frame = $54.50

So, as I see another option is to buy a scanner and spend only for development in the future. As mentioned above, with 20 films I'll reach the price of average film scanner pretty soon