I came across an article in a BJP Almanac a couple of weeks ago about reviving heavily fogged paper. Essentially, it was bleached in a re-halogenating bleach, washed, then bathed in a bath to help increase sensitivity.I can't remember which year Almanac, if/when I find the article I'll scan it.
Ideally you'd need to use a Potassium Ferricyanide & Potassium Bromide bleach, wash well, then I'm fairly sure the sensitising bath was Sodium Sulphite, you could try a 1 or 2% solution for say 15 minutes then wash and dry. Quite easy and quick with RC paper.
Ian
That would certainly be interesting to see, Ian so thanks. Is this done done prior to exposure for printing? If so doesn't the time needed to do all of this mean that it is subject to exposure to safe-lighting for longer than may be safe, especially during the drying stage unless you have a hot-air drier. I have one of those( 3 close sides with racks and one open side) and it is very quick but when the heating element is on there is a red light inside which might light fog?I came across an article in a BJP Almanac a couple of weeks ago about reviving heavily fogged paper. Essentially, it was bleached in a re-halogenating bleach, washed, then bathed in a bath to help increase sensitivity.I can't remember which year Almanac, if/when I find the article I'll scan it.
Ideally you'd need to use a Potassium Ferricyanide & Potassium Bromide bleach, wash well, then I'm fairly sure the sensitising bath was Sodium Sulphite, you could try a 1 or 2% solution for say 15 minutes then wash and dry. Quite easy and quick with RC paper.
Ian
For clarity, paper manufacturers use very tiny amounts of developer-like additives to fine tune speed and contrast behavior in papers, in order to ensure batch to batch consistency.
This is fundamentally different than the developer incorporated papers that are designed for rapid production using activator chemistry - none of which are still being manufactured.
Those activation papers are/were relatively short lived. The papers with trace additives usually last much longer than their "develop before" dates before their performance is significantly impacted.
That would certainly be interesting to see, Ian so thanks. Is this done done prior to exposure for printing? If so doesn't the time needed to do all of this mean that it is subject to exposure to safe-lighting for longer than may be safe, especially during the drying stage unless you have a hot-air drier. I have one of those( 3 close sides with racks and one open side) and it is very quick but when the heating element is on there is a red light inside which might light fog?
There just seems to be quite a lot of difficulties associated wit that process but there may be ways round it I'll need to wait until you find the article
pentaxuser
Built in developer is a kiss of death for otherwise good papers, IMO.
It might be possible to treat the paper dry it and keep it in a box to use later after all the article was written long before RC papers, I need to find the article, but it's one of about 35 BJP Almanacs
The point of the article though was increasing the sensitivity.after just bleaching.
Ian
may I add, to my way of thinking life is too short for (1) wasting time on outdated printing paper in the hopes of saving a few cents while really burning up valuable time best spent doing better things, and (2) for bad wine. The former is hell in the darkroom but the latter makes all-night printing sessions bearable at my age. Long may it continue for all of us.
Don, what's the reason why fb papers are worth dealing with in terms of fogging? Is there a reason why they respond better to benzo and are more consistent?
Really guys, fogged paper is only good for drawing of painting over.
Pretty much. But you can determine how a particular box of paper behaves and use it appropriately. Many boxes of paper that would develop grey in Dektol will be perfect for lith prints, as an example. And lightly fogged paper is very useful for paper negatives, since it has built-in lower contrast. And fully fogged paper is just as good as new paper for chemigrams and lumen prints. And, of course, it all burns really well.
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