In a desperate ploy to avoid essay writing, I thought I'd kick of a thread based on the re-awoken discussion here:
http://filmwasters.com/forum/index.php?topic=47.0So here are the steps I took to make an expressive print of my WTCD '08 shot "Folkestone Pavement"
Camera/ Neg Details: Holga 120s, ILFORD HP5+ in a Catechol/Metol homebrew developer.
Final Print Details: Fomatone MG Matt Paper, ILFORD Bromophen 1:5 21 deg, warm Harman Selenium 1:7 until shadows turn rich brown.
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This is a flat neg scan with the levels set at just hitting the black and white points. I felt the most important contrast area was between the leaves and pavement in the middle area around the circular object. This printed best on this paper at grade 2 1/2. Sadly, I dont have a series of work prints to scan, so I've broken down all the steps of manipulation I used to get the final print:
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1. Base exposure was 9.24 seconds at Grade 2 1/2 with the shadow area indicated dodged for about 4 seconds (just under 1/2 stop) to keep a hint of shadow detail. I could have dropped contrast grade (to about 1 1/2) here instead of dodging the shadow, but that would have affected the local contrast in the pavement and leaves which I felt to be key to my interpretation of the print. If I'd followed the rule of selecting global contrast based upon the deepest shadow in the negative, this print would have ended up dull and flat.
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2. The indicated area received a graduated burn for about 5 seconds (1/2 stop) using a piece of matt black card. to darken the foreground and draw the eye in towards the centre.
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3. The indicated area received a graduated burn for about 7 seconds (2/3 stop) using a piece of matt black card. This was to give an emphasis on the horizontal ellipse of light and detail following the scatter of leaves which echoes the shape of the sphere's shadow.
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4. The indicated area received an overall burn for about 3 1/2 seconds (1/3 stop) using a piece of matt black card. This was to take the background to almost complete shadow with just a little detail showing through.
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5. The indicated area received an overall burn for about 5 seconds (1/2 stop) using a piece of matt black card with a hole in. I did this to bring down the brightness of the ball shape slightly so it wouldn't compete with the bright leaves.
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6. This time, I changed to grade 5 and burned the circular shape using a card with a hole in it for about 22 seconds (1 & 1/6 stops). The change of grade was to bring out the gritty texture on the ball shape.
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The final Print
I wanted to make the print very dark and gloomy, with the lit areas very much standing out from very deep shadows. As you can see from the neg scan, there is lots of detail in the neg leaving quite a bit of room for interpretation. I wanted to leave just a hint of detail coming from the background which is there in the print (I hope this shows) so that it is clear there is something there, but it needs a bit of exploration to see.
I use an F-stop printing timer as I find it more convenient to think in stops rather than seconds - the times above are approximate as the timer I have automatically adjusts for reciprocity failure in the paper - so whereas a base exposure is 10 seconds, an extra stop (eg 10 seconds) actually works out to be a bit more to make up for the loss of paper speed.
Leon
