diffuse light Vs Condensed light (aka "yesterday's lesson")

I knew that there was a difference between th two sources kinds, but never checked it by myself.

Yesterday evening I stared printing my postcards for rond 42, and did not want to dismiss the negative set in my LPL enlarger, so I decided I'd give the Opemus a try.

The negative printed fine, but I had some issues with its dirty back, so I reverted to the LPL, and foudn the print was very disappointing. Even after adding 1.5 grades (from G1.5 (Ilford filteres) to G3 (Multicontrast head) ) the print still looked muddy and lost details.

So I went back to careful negative cleaning, and understood a bit better the qualities of my lenses, the amount of details from the Planar on my Leica is absolutely amazing!!!

i guess it'd be worthwhile to run my own informal test!

Laurent said:

I knew that there was a difference between th two sources kinds, but never checked it by myself.

Yesterday evening I stared printing my postcards for rond 42, and did not want to dismiss the negative set in my LPL enlarger, so I decided I'd give the Opemus a try.

The negative printed fine, but I had some issues with its dirty back, so I reverted to the LPL, and foudn the print was very disappointing. Even after adding 1.5 grades (from G1.5 (Ilford filteres) to G3 (Multicontrast head) ) the print still looked muddy and lost details.

So I went back to careful negative cleaning, and understood a bit better the qualities of my lenses, the amount of details from the Planar on my Leica is absolutely amazing!!!

Click to expand...

Agree with you 110%! I learned on a condenser machine in school and was very happy with the prints as was the instructor. Years later, in my home, I started printing again with an old diffusion head (don't remember the brand) and was never happy with the result; same problem: dull, uninteresting muddy prints. I put the photography hobby on hold for a few years. Flash forward 10 years and I was given a Beseler 23CII and, wow, the prints were coming out much to my liking. A couple of years later I was given an Omega C760 (color diffusion head) and I did some comparisons. Just like you did,

Bottom line: I much prefer the contrast/detail/snap provided by the condenser head. Diffusion heads have their place but, in the end, I will always choose the condenser head for prints that please me.

In his excellent book Controls In Black-And-White Photography the author Richard J Henry investigates many 'common wisdomss' and myths. He found that if the negatives is developed to the appropriate gamma for the particular type of enlarger there is no difference in the contrast of the resulting prints. Obviously if a negative is developed to a lower gamma for a condenser enlarger it will not print well with a diffusion one.

I highly recommend this book.

Fred Picker also covered this. Negatives developed for cold lights or diffusion enlargers must be developed differently than those intended for condenser enlargers.

Adams preached the same sermon. Still, there are folks that have a preference for one over the other. I use diffusion, but I could use a condenser head just as well. This is just my experience, but I think to my eye the condenser made prints, developed for the same contrast as for a diffusion head, "seem" sharper. That's just me of course and you might end up thinking diffusion enlarged prints look sharper. I do know that the same negative on a diffusion enlarger doesn't show flaws like light scratches and other imperfections so that's kind of why I use diffusion for all my formats. That's just me of course.

When I try a new film/dev combo, I do my testing through to printing - make a still life, meter it, get every level of highlight and shadow detail in there, develop a strip, blow dry it, and go right to a 4x5 print on MGWT with a grade 3 filter (I just tend to like grade 3-ish for printing). I set my print exposure time based on max blacks through an unexposed frame or leader, and leave the enlarger and timer locked to those settings through the test. So my choice of ISO and development is all based on my final output (condenser for me) and max-black printing times. This has led me to pretty specific stuff, like bumping up my ISO for Rodinal to hold shadow detail, even learning what changes in developer dilution do to the tone curve. The only final adjustment I need to make is that agitation on a small strip of film is much more efficient than a whole roll, so my final times tend to 'dial in' across a couple real-world rolls.

I guess if I were to move to a diffusion enlarger, I might find my negs are too flat for easy printing? Hard to say but so far I'm really happy with the condenser look - lith printing with Rodinal negs gives me a real tactile sharpness I like. I have gotten really good at cleaning negs and carriers though, finding every last spot of dust and so on.

I recommend reading chapter 6 in Ctein's book available here:
http://ctein.com/PostExposure2ndIllustrated.pdf

Focomatter said:

I recommend reading chapter 6 in Ctein's book available here:
http://ctein.com/PostExposure2ndIllustrated.pdf

Click to expand...

Yes, I've read that over before, but just did it again in case I missed something. I do find what he says to be true since I have experienced the same thing when printing two like negatives, one made with HP5+ and the other with FP4+. Both shot within minutes apart on 120 and developed in Xtol. I did an enlargement of a cropped portion of each negative. It would roughly equal a 20" x 30" or so in print. Which one looked the sharpest to my eye? The HP5+ print. Why? Simply because the visible grain, which really was hard to see, seemed to make the edge sharpness stand out. This was on a diffusion enlarger. Now, if I had used a condenser enlarger maybe I wouldn't like the grain effect of the HP5+ negative?

Gerald C Koch said:

In his excellent book Controls In Black-And-White Photography the author Richard J Henry investigates many 'common wisdomss' and myths. He found that if the negatives is developed to the appropriate gamma for the particular type of enlarger there is no difference in the contrast of the resulting prints. Obviously if a negative is developed to a lower gamma for a condenser enlarger it will not print well with a diffusion one.

I highly recommend this book.

Click to expand...

Exactly correct. Boosting contrast in diffusion enlarger does not make up for lower contrast. My main two enlargers are Focomat 1C and focomat V35, but I have some double condenser enlargers also.

My findings are two identical prints from proper gamma negs that print on #2 paper are so close you need to put them side by side to see the difference. Condenser print has a bit more contrast in shadows, diffusion has slightly more highlight separation. The time difference is 10% in developer.

If you find otherwise, there is some other issue like a fogged enlarger lens or dirty condensers or a mixing box that is all yellow inside or low voltage going to the bulb.

I will repeat, the prints are so close they must be side by side to see a difference.