11x14 G2 Kodak AZO on Ebay...

[mark]

I knew whoever bought that master role made a hack of a business decision.

Anyone want to start a pool on how long it will take Lodima o hit the streets?

 

[Harrigan]

Whoever bought the master roll is probably not selling it.

Lodima is probably proving harder to make than anticipated. It doesn't surprise me and matching azo has got to be difficult. I look for lodima to end up being its own paper and hope to see it and use it one day.

 

[Michael A. Smith]

It is not that it was Azo that is important. It is that Azo is a silver chloride paper. When Adams made contact prints in the 1930s and 1940s he always used silver chloride paper. And those contact prints are exquisite! And Edward Weston always used silver chloride paper. So did Brett when he nade contact prints. Silver chloride paper simply has a longer, smoother tonal scale than enlarging papers.

If one cares only about the subject then it does not matter what paper a photograph is printed on. If one cares about the photograph as object, then the "presence" of that object is important. And, to my eyes, mind, and heart, the photographs printed on silver chloride paper have a more powerful presence then photographs printed on other papers. That is not to say that photographs printed on other papers cannot be good. Of course they can. And there are thousands of photographs that prove that. But the "presence" of photographs on silver chloride paper is just something very special, which is why Paula and I, and obviously others (to judge by the insane prices Azo sells for on Ebay), value it.

And it is why we are going to have a new paper made--and not just for ourselves. Even if we were rich enough to buy the whole run ourselves we would still make the paper available to others. It is not the paper that makes any photograph an excellent one, but the photographer's vision. But still, given the vision, a well-printed contact print on silver chloride paper will always (well, almost always--I can think of a few exceptions) have more presence than a paper printed on a chloro-bromide or a bromide paper. And that's what it is all about from my perspective: beautiful objects--ones that have an emotional power.

Lodima paper will be a silver chloride paper.

Unfortunately for me and Paula we do not have a lifetime supply of Azo. So we, too, need the new paper--and the sooner the better. We are working on it. Maybe someday I will write about the whole saga.

Someone said it right about our getting advance orders: it was to judge the interest and to have the money to pay for the paper when it was ready. We had hoped we would have had paper before now, but we do not. We are aware that many checks are no longer good. When the time comes when we need to actually pay for a real product we will ask for replacements.

Anymore, I rarely have a chance to get to the Forums here. If anyone has questions, best to email me directly. I try to be prompt with answers if at all possible.

Michael A. Smith

 

[John Z.]

Well said Michael. Thanks for your efforts, and we look forward to the new Lodima paper.

 

[RoBBo]

Curiousity. Is there any issue with using a Silver Chloride paper for enlargements?

 

[Michael A. Smith]

One can use a silver chloride paper to make enlargements, but the paper is very slow and the exposures would be extremely long--up to a half hour. But a light head was invented on which to enlarge onto silver chloride paper and the inventor, against our wishes, annointed me and Paula the distributors of this light head. It fits on 4x6 Beseler and Omega enlargers. It is not available right now because we do not want to sell any until we know there is paper on which to use it. When we do, there will be an announcement about the light head on our web site.

For more information about this and other things related to Azo paper see the Azo Forum at www.michaelandpaula.com

Michael A. Smith