• Welcome to Photrio!
    Registration is fast and free. Join today to unlock search, see fewer ads, and access all forum features.
    Click here to sign up

Contact sheet printing setup

Jeff Searust

Member
Allowing Ads
Joined
Sep 6, 2007
Messages
360
Location
Texas
Format
Med. Format Pan
Ok -- I have printed plenty of contact sheets in my day, but I want to finally find out how everyone else does it. I am afraid that my method may be a little less of the "proper" way to do this. One issue is that I broke my old light meter and my new one seems to see things a little differently. Let me quickly describe how I used to do it.

A-- set up the enlarger to a specific f-stop, a specific height, and with a specific carrier in it, I would focus the light to a fine edge around the contact frame. I also set my light meter to iso100--10s and indicated ev4.5.

B-- I was then able to regularly print contact sheets with a light exposure of 12 second-- everything the same every time.

My new light meter when I set things up the same way gives a different EV --- so forgetting that-- I am interested if everyone else has a regular way to set things up or is this more of a crap shoot? I want to start from scratch here and want a scientific and regular plan to do this. :confused:
 
Last edited by a moderator:
What's the point in the light meter? You set all the other items the same the exposure is going to be locked in.
It's not rocket science, I've done contact prints using a flashlight for a light source and got acceptable results.
 
Jeff,

I follow Fred Picker's "Proper Proof" technique. It is explained in his book Zone VI Workshop, and his newsletters. Simple, accurate and repeatable. Takes just a little time to determine your "Proper Proof" exposure.

Good Luck!
 
Lay a piece of glass down, against a marked height and known aperture on the enlarger, dial in a lowish grade to give me detail (rather than a "mini-print") and expose for a middle of the road time. If the negs are too dark or too light, I adjust and redo but it only takes about 2 sheets max.

Since I test-print all prints anyways, I'd rather the contact represent the content of the negatives rather than the condition of their exposure (which is why I vary the time and/or grade to give me detail rather than an unchanging base-line time and grade no matter what).
 
10 seconds, f8, grade 4.

I find that if I standardise the contact stage, I save paper making a print as I can read a lot from the contact print. I've also standardised on one film one developer and one paper, that also helps.
 
Jerevan said:
Just wondering: why such a hard grade? I agree on having a standard setup, it makes my life easier.
Click to expand...

Purely because I like how my prints look at grade 4. Having a contact sheet at the same grade I print at helps me to judge the negative.
 
perkeleellinen said:
Purely because I like how my prints look at grade 4. Having a contact sheet at the same grade I print at helps me to judge the negative.
Click to expand...

But don't you think perceived contrast for a contact (assuming 135 size) at grade 4 is more like grade 5 in an average size enlargement (8x10)?
 
perkeleellinen said:
Purely because I like how my prints look at grade 4. Having a contact sheet at the same grade I print at helps me to judge the negative.
Click to expand...

Same thing for me, except I use grade 2-3. Always interesting to know how other people do things.
 
clayne said:
But don't you think perceived contrast for a contact (assuming 135 size) at grade 4 is more like grade 5 in an average size enlargement (8x10)?
Click to expand...

Hmm, I hadn't heard about this before. Just checking a contact sheet here with a print (5x7) and there's not a great deal of difference between the two. I'm using a Meopta Opemus 6a with the Meograde head and a 50mm Nikkor onto MGIV.
 
Jeff Searust said:
Ok -- I have printed plenty of contact sheets in my day, :confused:
Click to expand...

It might help if you told us what size negatives you are printing. Some of us who shoot 35mm may be responding about printing a group of negatives on one sheet, others may be thinking a large format negative in a contact print frame being printed on a sheet.

John Powers
 
jgjbowen said:
Bellows extension factor???
Click to expand...

Not really. If you measure the light at the baseboard and you know how to correlate that number with the exposure time needed for a "correctly exposed" contact sheet it shouldn't matter at all. Here's the way I do it. I use an enlarging meter that's calibrated to the paper I'm printing with. The calibration is set so that I get 1/3 stop under maximum black no matter what. Knowing that, I place a strip of negatives in the carrier and measure the light hitting the baseboard that passes through the clear space between the frames and use the time indicated by the meter plus 1/3 stop. Because some of the light is lost to the cover glass on the contact sheet "sandwich" the extra 1/3 stop really isn't an extra 1/3 stop. I figure the cover glass at about 10% light loss. I do not use filters with VC papers for contact sheets. To make the exposure, I remove the negatives from the carrier, set up the "sandwich" and make the exposure. Works every time.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Menu
Log in
Register