Efke Emaks G4/J&C Nuance Hard/Maco-Cachet Expo G4

Does anyone else find that this paper is vastly different from Grades 2 and 3 (in J&C's packaging "Soft" and "Medium") of the same paper?

I'd noticed in the past that Emaks G4 was about two stops faster than G2 and G3. I don't need G4 for many negatives, but I was working on a soft focus image yesterday, and those usually need some extra contrast somewhere to work--hard light for portraits, red filter for landscapes, longer development time, or harder paper grade. At the end of the session I noticed that my G4 prints had high base fog compared to my G2 and G3 prints using Michael Smith's amidol formula for enlarging papers, which I usually use with Emaks. I doubled the amount of benzotriazole and that cleaned up my grey borders, but caused other problems (generally low contrast). I'll have to mix a new batch and split the difference on the benzotriazole, but that would be kind of annoying if I had to change the chemistry between G2/3 and G4.

Anyone else use Emaks G4 and observe anything like this, or is it that my G4 is just old (and it is a few years old, since I don't use it much), and it doesn't age as gracefully as the softer grades?

Never tried G4, but G3 is by far the slowest paper I have. For lith printing I get a good tone with a normal neg (grade 2 for normal printing) in one minute at f/5.6 and a 1-2s preflash. With G2 I get good tone in about half that time without preflash.
Now I want to try G4! (And I will be interested to see what others have to say).
It really is gorgeous paper!
- Thomas

David A. Goldfarb said:

I doubled the amount of benzotriazole and that cleaned up my grey borders, but caused other problems (generally low contrast).

Click to expand...

Hi David,

I haven't tried the EMAKS G4 yet but will be ordering 25 sheets next time I make an order for G3. Your experience with increasing the Benzotriazole in the developer is the opposite of mine (with Galerie G2 and G3 and Dektol). That is I see increased contrast with increased BTAZ due to needing to increase the exposure time because the BTAZ works more to slow the highlights than the shadows.

Now that you know how much BTAZ to add to get rid of the fog, why not try adding more to see if you get the contrast back. Your exposure times will need to be adjusted as the highlight regions will slow but the shadows will be getting a lot more exposure.

I have a new package of Emaks G4. I didn't notice any fogging of borders or low contrast, although I've only used it for one or two images (for which the negatives were soft).

I'm going to order some more and see how it looks. What developer were you using (since different developers can produce different levels of base fog density with certain papers)?

Meanwhile, I tried the same neg with Ansco 130 last night and got a better result, but still a little base fog.

Just as an aside, I also tried Emaks G2 in Ansco 130, and it looks really good.

David...

According to my notes I used LPD and Ansco 130 with the Emaks.

Thanks.

Now I only use Grade 4 and it shines. With Ansco 130 or Lith. It's this one that gives me the blacks I want.

Guillaume - what times do you get for enlarger exposure when you use Emaks G4 with lith? (I think you use the AristaLith but I can't recall for sure, but dilution would be handy).
As a comparison, when I use Varycon, my base exposure is in the realm of 20-30s at f/8. With Emaks G3 it's more like 60s at f/5.6 or even f/4. If G4 is any slower, I'll run into reciprocity problems with paper. I tried flashing, and it helps a little bit.

- Thomas

Thomas,
AristaLith 100 + 100 for 3 liters. I just expose the hell out of it. Wide open. Starting point 120 sec for 11x14. Way more on 16x20
With regular dev I don't see Grade 4 as a very slow paper. In my memory Forte was slow...
Hope that helps.
G.

Thanks, G!
- Thomas