Agfa photo-paper blast from the past!

250swb · 2025-12-14T03:23:31-0500

Lachlan Young said:
Given that it was a Kodak Ltd paper (i.e. made in Harrow for the UK market), I'm a bit perplexed by your statement that it wasn't as easily available in the UK as Agfa papers. It may have been that the Kodak material was more readily available through the professional supply channels rather than high street shops.

I have got some in to-be-lithed pile, along with a chunk of Record Rapid. The other main Kodak Ltd papers were Bromide (not Kodabromide) and Royal Bromesko. Royal Bromesko looks like it was being aimed at Portriga.

Bromesko was phased out in the early 80s but Record Rapid lasted nearly until the 2000s so at some point Bromesko was harder to find as stocks dwindled. I think I must have tried it about the same time it was being phased out.

Ian Grant · 2025-12-14T07:37:02-0500

Lachlan Young said:
The Cd misnomer is a convenient excuse but it probably had a lot more to do with a more complex sequence of changes. The change to washed emulsions (so that they could be coated on RC) and the removal of Cd happened in the 1970s, along with some emulsion structural changes (and the loss of some emulsions that could not be conveniently re-engineered with the technology of the time) - the real cause of death of some warmtone emulsions seems to have been their use of lead salts in the initial precipitation step (to produce a favourable crystal habit) and sales levels that were too low (by late 1990s standards) to accommodate the re-engineering of the emulsion using modern emulsion crystal growth technology. Changes in anti-oxidants and other components to enhance the batch-to-batch consistency also seem to have had effects on processes that require the creative misuse of particular papers.

Agfa removed Cadmium from their warm tone papers in the late 1980s. I began using Record Rapid around 1987 and was disappointed when they reformulated with no Cadmium, it no longer had the same range of image tones/colour, extremes of warmth, but it was still an excellent paper. It was discontinued and replaced by Agfa MCC in about early 1994.

After that the only major paper still incorporating Cadmium (here in the UK) was Kodak Ektalure, but this was old stock made long before the ban.

In the late 1970s, and particularly the 1980s, there were concerns of toxic metals building up in the Great Lakes and particularly Lake Ontario, due to discharges by Eastman Kodak, This included Cadmium, and led to the EEC/EU bringing in its own regulations.

Ian

Carnie Bob · 2025-12-14T09:17:11-0500

Ian Grant said:
Agfa removed Cadmium from their warm tone papers in the late 1980s. I began using Record Rapid around 1987 and was disappointed when they reformulated with no Cadmium, it no longer had the same range of image tones/colour, extremes of warmth, but it was still an excellent paper. It was discontinued and replaced by Agfa MCC in about early 1994.

After that the only major paper still incorporating Cadmium (here in the UK) was Kodak Ektalure, but this was old stock made long before the ban.

In the late 1970s, and particularly the 1980s, there were concerns of toxic metals building up in the Great Lakes and particularly Lake Ontario, due to discharges by Eastman Kodak, This included Cadmium, and led to the EEC/EU bringing in its own regulations.

Ian

Rotten Canadians, spoiled it all for us diehard printers.

Sharktooth · 2025-12-14T11:51:21-0500

In the late 70's I settled with Portriga Rapid developed in Kodak Selectol as my favorites for B&W printing, but I focused almost exclusively on color by the mid 80's. When Portriga Rapid disappeared I was definitely sad to see it go, but hadn't been using it for many years.

This thread brings back those fond memories, but it also raises a couple of questions. There's been a lot of mention about "Portriga" as well as "Portriga Rapid". Are those the same thing, or are these different variants. I only remember Portriga Rapid, so maybe plain Portriga was an older slower version. Please enlighten me. The second question is about cadmium. You can still buy NiCd batteries at dollar stores, so Cd can't be banned for all uses. There must be more to it for it's reason to be dropped from photo paper.

DREW WILEY · 2025-12-14T11:57:55-0500

That's the absurdity of it. Cadmium is nasty stuff. It's banned in tiny amounts in all kinds of usages - and thankfully now long banned in yellow house and school bus paints. But it's massively used in the battery industry, and even worse, inevitably abused due to that in third world recycling operations.

Ian Grant · 2025-12-14T13:22:03-0500

Carnie Bob said:
Rotten Canadians, spoiled it all for us diehard printers.

I seem to remember a short UK ban on North Atlantic tinned Tuna due to Cadmium in the 11980s, while Cadmium levels in Tuna was properly assessed.
Record Rapid without Cadmium did not keep well.

Sharktooth said:
In the late 70's I settled with Portriga Rapid developed in Kodak Selectol as my favorites for B&W printing, but I focused almost exclusively on color by the mid 80's. When Portriga Rapid disappeared I was definitely sad to see it go, but hadn't been using it for many years.

Agfa used slightly different names in North America and Europe.

Here in the UK/Europe, Portriga Speed was the RC version of Record Rapid (Gloss FB), and Portriga was a Pearl/Satin not quite Matte FB paper. It was nor uncommon for products exported to North American to have slightly different names. It was about preventing Grey imports.

In the late 1970s I experimented with a Cadmium Toner, this gave White tones, you would ask why . . . . What about an emulsion on a black surface. at the time I had a business applying emulsion to painted surfaces, usually cars, vans, etc, for advertising. This was before Vinyl transfers.

Ian

Sharktooth · 2025-12-14T14:28:03-0500

Ian Grant said:
I seem to remember a short UK ban on North Atlantic tinned Tuna due to Cadmium in the 11980s, while Cadmium levels in Tuna was properly assessed.
Record Rapid without Cadmium did not keep well.

Agfa used slightly different names in North America and Europe.

Here in the UK/Europe, Portriga Speed was the RC version of Record Rapid (Gloss FB), and Portriga was a Pearl/Satin not quite Matte FB paper. It was nor uncommon for products exported to North American to have slightly different names. It was about preventing Grey imports.

In the late 1970s I experimented with a Cadmium Toner, this gave White tones, you would ask why . . . . What about an emulsion on a black surface. at the time I had a business applying emulsion to painted surfaces, usually cars, vans, etc, for advertising. This was before Vinyl transfers.

Ian

Thanks for the feedback about Portriga. I'm in Canada, so I'm assuming we had similar products to the U.S., but that may not have been true. It makes sense that Europe would have different names and packaging, due to the different languages. The Portriga Rapid that I used to use was a single grade fiber based paper. No RC coating, and no variable contrast by filtering.

I come from the automobile industry, and cadmium used to be used in plating processes since it provided excellent corrosion protection. It's possible that the tuna cans may have had Cd plating which would protect the can from corrosion, but would contaminate the tuna. Cadmium was banned from the auto industry long ago, but Drew's right in saying it's absurd to keep using it in batteries.

MattKing · 2025-12-14T17:17:17-0500

Sharktooth said:
hanks for the feedback about Portriga. I'm in Canada, so I'm assuming we had similar products to the U.S., but that may not have been true.

Any differences would be more about labelling and different distribution realities than actual manufacture. The need for bilingual labelling was probably the biggest reason that Canada didn't get a lot of products that were available in the USA, but I would be surprised if any of the European sources would be phased by that.

Agfa photo-paper blast from the past!

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