“Flat” prints

Hi, I’m new to darkroom printing, and I’m finding that my prints have “flat” color. The contrast and vibrancy aren’t what I think they should be.

Using fresh Kodak Ektacolor Prime SP, and Fujicolor Crystal Archive Type 2. Darkroom is completely dark.

Anyone ever have experience with this?

What kind of negatives are you printing? What film, subject matter & lighting conditions? The thing with RA4 printing is that this kind of stuff really matters - a lot. Whereas you can pretty much feign any look when scanning color negatives, printing optically of course gives a more 'direct' rendition.

koraks said:

What kind of negatives are you printing? What film, subject matter & lighting conditions? The thing with RA4 printing is that this kind of stuff really matters - a lot. Whereas you can pretty much feign any look when scanning color negatives, printing optically of course gives a more 'direct' rendition.

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Thanks for your reply.
Printing off Kodak Ultramax 400 negs from the State Fair in the morning.
So, is making color prints with more "pop" not a thing in darkroom printing?

blee2541 said:

Thanks for your reply.
Printing off Kodak Ultramax 400 negs from the State Fair in the morning.
So, is making color prints with more "pop" not a thing in darkroom printing?

Click to expand...

Your question is key in the sense of what are you comparing these flat prints with? . There may be things with your printing in the darkroom that can be done to rectify what you perceive as flat prints but we won't know until we see what kinds of print you regard as not having the contrast, vibrancy and "pop" you expected

So can you show us examples of flat prints and describe what it is that is missing? I am conscious of an Australian member a few years ago who was convinced he wasn't getting what he expected in his prints and yet as I recall most who saw them could not see what was wrong

This may not be the case with you and your prints but examples would be a good place to start.

Thanks

pentaxuser

blee2541 said:

So, is making color prints with more "pop" not a thing in darkroom printing?

Click to expand...

Oh yes, but materials count. Try printing Ektar negatives onto Kodak Premier Endura paper. Plenty of 'pop'! Especially with subject matter that's particularly vibrant.
Otherwise you'll have to resort to things like modified film processing (e.g. longer development for more contrast) or selective masking.

Crystal Archive II is perfectly capable of rather brilliant saturated prints, but you might need to use a more saturated film to begin with, like Ektar, to get there. It's also dependent on the degree of enlargement. Anything more than 8X will begin to get a bit washed out. Then there is the issue of whether or not the dichroic coatings on your colorhead filters are still in good shape or not. There is a way to moderately increase contrast using what is called contrast increase masking, but that's a specialized skill. There are also more saturated versions of Crystal Archive media, but they only come in large roll fashion.

This is great. So much to learn! Thanks for the advice!