Contact sheets: MCP 312 without filter.

I have made contact sheets of 35mm negs with base exposure of 20.2 seconds @f/11 without Filter.

Paper: MCP 312 semi-matte

Developer: Adotol NE - 1 min.

Enlarger: Focomat Ic.

Film: APX 100 and Fomapan 100 developed with Rodinal 1+50.

Contact sheets gave an overall idea about the print exposures and as well as neg exposures(APX is lossy compared to Fomapan).

Now I am curious about the effect of filters(atleast Grade 3) before I burn some more paper.

One thing for sure is it will affect the contrast but I wonder whether it will effect the base exposure too...if so, how much? Provided the height, the lens opening and other variables are kept constant.

> effect of filters(atleast Grade 3).

Usually you wish the contact sheets to bee flat - to see what is in the negative.

No reason ever to expose multigrade paper without any filter. Contact sheets always show less information than contained in the negatives. I find their utility questionable.

We all do it differently. I find soft grade contacts pointless, because they tell everything and nothing. I prefer to do it as Barry Thornton suggested in his article: Dead Link Removed

From the article, I understood as follows

* Make test strips of film base + fog and find the minimum time for maximum black. For 35mm with Grade 3 filter.
* Make contact sheet with minimum time.
* Shadows will tell how much correction is required in the exposure.
* Highlights will teach about the development times.

** I conclude that overexposed and under developed will print with good tonal seperation.

Do I miss anything...

baachitraka said:

Do I miss anything...

Click to expand...

No, I don't think you did miss anything. I came to the same conclusions as you. The only issue I can see is that contacts of 135 negs are so small that you might need a magnifying glass/loupe to check if shadows and highlights are as they should be. 1x1.5 inches isn't much of an area for a good examination.

pentaxuser

I try to print that at-least impresses my wife. Everytime I show her something and she goes like 'Well, you can take to a lab for printing...in indian accent'

:-(