DIY Oil/Bromoil Ink - Pigment + ______?

[holmburgers]

Let's say, just hypothetically of course, that some one wants to make their own oily ink for inking up a swelled gelatin matrix.

Assuming you have an appropriate pigment, what kind of oil could you mix with it?

Mineral oil?

 

[Bob Carnie]

Mozollla

oopps wrong site

 

[David Hatton]

Linseed oil I think
David

 

[Gene_Laughter]

DYI Ink for Bromoil

I have made a bit of ink for bromoil. Mineral oil would be far too thin. I have used litho varnish with a tiny bit of Canada balsam mixed in for tack. But why bother to make it? Litho inks are available and can be stiffened to work for bromoil.

 

[holmburgers]

I knew I would receive the "why bother" question.

Basically, I can't afford to buy some new thing for every errant impulse I get (and I get a lot), and yet I've got some matrices lying around that I'd like to try inking up.

I'm trying to get a feel for what kind of viscosity we're talking about, and if I can walk into a grocery store or a Hobby-Lobby/Michaels and buy something, I'd prefer to do that.



Not sure what mozolla is (though I'm guessing it's somehow related to mozilla, and a suggestion that I should look online before asking)

 

[Bob Carnie]

Mozolla Oil and a girlfriend and you will figure it out.
much more fun than matrixes

I knew I would receive the "why bother" question.

Basically, I can't afford to buy some new thing for every errant impulse I get (and I get a lot), and yet I've got some matrices lying around that I'd like to try inking up.

I'm trying to get a feel for what kind of viscosity we're talking about, and if I can walk into a grocery store or a Hobby-Lobby/Michaels and buy something, I'd prefer to do that.



Not sure what mozolla is (though I'm guessing it's somehow related to mozilla, and a suggestion that I should look online before asking)

 

[Gene_Laughter]

Should you decide to give it a try, you'll find that it's a whale of a lot cheaper to buy a pound of litho ink than it is to put the ingredients together. Graphic Chemical and Ink Co. is your best source for litho varnish. Get the thickest they have in stock. The last time I checked it was available in 32 oz. cans. Canada Balsam "ain't" cheap and you won't find it at your neighborhood Hobby Lobby or supermarket! Good luck!

 

[holmburgers]

Ahh... do you mean Mazola oil Bob? You cheeky monkey!

Gene, you're probably absolutely right... but let's pretend for a moment that I'm stuck on a desert island, with a huge stash of matrices, pigment and everything else necessary to make oil prints except a dedicated lithographer's ink.. oh and a huge variety of different oils...

I mean, I have to prepare for such a situation!

 

[Gene_Laughter]

You already have a supply of matrices - bleached and tanned with the proper chemistry. Right? How were they exposed in the enlarger compared to normal and on what photo paper?

 

[holmburgers]

Well, they're more in line with "oil" matrices. It's plain gelatin coated on a clear support, then potassium-dichromate sensitized , exposed under a negative and etched, leaving a relief.

Actually, they are for dye-imbibition, but I thought it would be cool to dye up my rejects.

Bromoil sounds so much more involved than oil, I'm surprised more carbon printers don't experiment with this technique.

 

[holmburgers]

It occurred to me that this would produce a negative image, since the gelatin relief accounts for the shadows and this would imbibe water.

So oil/bromoil never has an 'etch' phase, does it? They're all planographic matrices, but have you ever tried anything with a relief matrix?

 

[Gene_Laughter]

A bromoil matrix does have relief - higher in the highlights and lower in the shadows. The highlight areas absorb water, thus repelling the greasy ink. The relief may be imperceptible or clearly seen, depending on the paper used.

 

[Whiteymorange]

All printing ink is remarkably similar- until you try to use it. There are differences between say, etching ink and litho ink that are imperceptible to most of us (and I have been a printmaker for over 30 years) but very important when it comes to things like tack, or wiping of metal plates. I have tried bromoil with etching ink- no good (your results of course, may vary.) While I am always in favor of experimentation, I must second the suggestion that buying a small can of litho ink will, in the long run, give you the best value for dollar. Prints that don't work due to technical difficulties with the ink are expensive in time and money, and keep you from getting much satisfaction from the process.

 

[holmburgers]

I'm sure you guys are right, and I will probably just buy a can and give it a go at some point.

However, is this ink's constitution quite complicated, or is it just some pigment in an oil carrier that has been designed for a specific viscosity? I mean.. they have to make their ink from scratch and I'm just quite curious at this point what they use.

Sorry for being stubborn... I guess you could say 'inquiring minds want to know!'

 

[Gene_Laughter]

Amen to Whitey's ink comments! In bromoil there are no magic 1-2-3, -- a,b,c answers re: ink. So much depends on the brushwork inking technique of each bromoilist. The stiffness and tack of the ink mixture varies for different individuals. Having taught a number of bromoil workshops, ink management is the most difficult part for many to comprehend. A "stiff" ink for one may be a "thin" ink for another. Experimentation is the key!!

 

[holmburgers]

Just for the sake of being comprehensive, I did end up finding some published instructions for a DIY bromoil ink.

http://web.archive.org/web/20021214143811/http://www.psa-photo.org/bromoil.htm

Who knows how well it works, but in case someone ever wants to know, here it is.

 

[Mustafa Umut Sarac]

archive org is an excellent resource. I listened many live concerts from village bar groups , sometimes its felt like analog photography because nothing mixer producer polished like 80s rock music. They are happy poor working musicians . I advice everyone have a try .

 

[Gene_Laughter]

I'm familar with Ralph Davis and have a few of his original bromoil prints in my collection. He was a master of the process.

 

[holmburgers]

You know... my band has quite a few recordings on archive.org, you could give us a listen.

It seems like a fun process that maybe not enough people are doing. Gene, I'm interested in doing oil without transferring the image. Any advice?

 

[Niall Bell]

For what it's worth, I read that you can make ink by thickening linseed oil. This is done by boiling/simmering the oil (!) and setting light to the vapours whch leaves a more viscous residue. (presumably an outdoors operation!)

I tried a pilot study but the flames from a small amount of burning linseed oil were staggering and I extinguished it. Will try again under more controlled conditions.

Pigment can be added to the cooled material.
For the pigment I collected the very fine soot from the solid fuel fire in the house; it forms extremely thin sheets which turn to powder in the hands.

I also added some of this directly to (un-boiled) linseed oil and tried making a few sketches. Seemed to work ok.

The plan is to make some bromoils with home made ink, and I'll persevere with that, but in meantime I bought a tub of lithographic ink just to play with. Expensive though.

Niall

 

[Whiteymorange]

Try sun-thickened linseed oil or stand oil, each sold to oil painters and used to make oil mediums, or even burnt plate oil, a somewhat lighter oil used by etchers to help control the viscosity of the printing ink. It saves all that boiling and burning.

Also, the fortunes of the Cabot family (famous here in Boston) are reputed to be based on a member of that clan finding a way to apply industrial scale to the scraping of soot from a glass plate held over a candle flame. This was the first reliable black pigment for paint- or so the story goes. Despite the caution in my previous post, I'm very interested in seeing what you get.

 

[holmburgers]

That's very interesting about soot manufacturing. "Scaling up" is an art, and if you can do it better than the next guy, it's a profitable one at that.

The main reason I asked how to make my own ink is that I got a hold of some industrial pigments that are suitable for tri-color printing. Sure I could get CMY litho ink, but I thought it would be fun to make my own.

I read a very amusing thing about tri-color bromoil in an old (1940ish) American Photography volume. The author was complaining about printing color photos for publication. He said that no matter how perfect your color separations were and no matter how ideally your carbro print showed what the final print should look like, by the time you handed these over to the printing house and the whole process was done by a multitude of people employed in various functions throughout the shop, the color balance was destroyed; taken far from the original "guide" print.

The excuse on the part of the printing house was always the same; that carbro uses totally different pigments and so what works for that won't necessarily work for color half-tone printing with ink. The author therefore encouraged the use of tri-color oil prints so that the very same inks used by the printer could be used by the photographer, and finally the blame would be undebatable!

Ahh.. to be a photographer in the 40's... such enviable problems they had... :joyful: