Ferrotype paper drying

Don_ih · Aug 13, 2022

Patrick Robert James said:
If you were the OP and read that without knowing you might just give up. That is what I am talking about. I guess that is just the internet though. I've seen it more and more here in the last few years though. Gotta wonder what "knowledge" is going to look like in another decade.

I agree, and that's why it's good that someone can contradict a wrong opinion (or assumption).

As for what knowledge will be: many assume that the internet will eventually be the repository of human knowledge, where the true answer to any question can be found instantaneously. Perhaps that is somewhat accurate. However, as seen in threads like this one, the internet doesn't fare so well with esoteric knowledge. An incorrect opinion can stand uncontested for a very long time about a subject where few count as authorities. That is a situation which will only get worse.

Ferrotyping is a good example of a different type of specialized knowledge. A great many people knew how to do it and could easily answer the question posed by this thread. But all of those people stopped doing it, never bothered to write down anything about it, and moved on. They're not here.

MattKing · Aug 13, 2022

Patrick Robert James said:
I mean you have gasbag above unequivocally telling the OP that plexi doesn't work.

Two requests:
1) kindly avoid the name calling - it just inflames the discussion;
2) if you are going to criticize a post or a poster, kindly identify which one!
There may be six people on this thread who think you are calling them a gasbag, and a seventh who probably doesn't, but whom you are actually referring to.

Patrick Robert James · Aug 13, 2022

MattKing said:
Two requests:
1) kindly avoid the name calling - it just inflames the discussion;
2) if you are going to criticize a post or a poster, kindly identify which one!
There may be six people on this thread who think you are calling them a gasbag, and a seventh who probably doesn't, but whom you are actually referring to.

I think everyone knows who I was referring to Matt... And yes, he probably doesn't get it. Lol.

Patrick Robert James · Aug 13, 2022

Don Heisz said:
I agree, and that's why it's good that someone can contradict a wrong opinion (or assumption).

As for what knowledge will be: many assume that the internet will eventually be the repository of human knowledge, where the true answer to any question can be found instantaneously. Perhaps that is somewhat accurate. However, as seen in threads like this one, the internet doesn't fare so well with esoteric knowledge. An incorrect opinion can stand uncontested for a very long time about a subject where few count as authorities. That is a situation which will only get worse.

Ferrotyping is a good example of a different type of specialized knowledge. A great many people knew how to do it and could easily answer the question posed by this thread. But all of those people stopped doing it, never bothered to write down anything about it, and moved on. They're not here.

Yup. I see that as a huge problem in the future. Used to be you would go to a library to find a book about what you needed to know. That meant the author had to go through gatekeepers before the book was published which at least most of the time meant the knowledge was pretty good. Of course we have Youtube these days... Lol. I think the world is moving towards superficial knowledge. You are right about esoteric knowledge too.

Back when I wanted to start ferrotyping prints, I dug deep. Found everything I could about it, asked people, whole nine yards. I think the old ways don't work as well now because the papers are all different. It is pretty common knowledge that emulsions have thinned and changed over the years. After all the things I tried the plexi ended up being the easiest and most consistent way to get the super glossy surface. If some other way had worked, then I would have just stuck with that and not tried the plexi. The only method I didn't try was one of those old roller drum dryers that pull the print through. I decided not to get one because I know from past experience that the print is the shape of the drum more or less when it comes out, so unless you use one of the huge models, you have to deal with flattening the print. Plexi leaves the print flat as a pancake. It was another factor that made it better.

koraks · Aug 13, 2022

I did a quick and very dirty experiment with a sheet of plexi and a print I had at hand yesterday. The result was promising, but still quite poor. Lots of zits and oyster shells. But in principle it looks like it should work; some areas actually ferrotyped and the print released with ease. I have different priorities in the darkroom now, but I'll be sure to revisit this when I'll be printing some fiber based again. Thanks for the suggestions; I feel I could probably get this to work.

As to the debate on knowledge and whether the internet made things better or not...I really don't know. Having spent the past two decades professionally on questions of what constitutes knowledge and how we acquire it, I feel there's just too much to be said about it than to try and flatten it the way it's being done here. I get the sentiment that the internet is every bit as quick and dirty as my ferrotyping experiment of yesterday, and to a greater or a lesser extent nearly all of us contribute to that in some way. It's the greatest weakness and at the same time the greatest strength of places like this.

I know I learned way more and way faster than I could have done if I had had only access to libraries, face to face interactions and my own experimentation. There might be a truckload of dung out there, but the number of gems is also simply fantastic. The other day I made a major improvement to my workflow in another area due to finding a text that I simply never would have been able to access or even know of had it not been for the internet.

Don_ih · Aug 13, 2022

koraks said:
I feel there's just too much to be said about it than to try and flatten it the way it's being done here.

If that's what you got from what was said, you missed the point.

mshchem · Aug 13, 2022

koraks said:
Thanks for the writeup. I might try this sometime. I tried plexiglass as well in the past and I also experimented with wax coatings, but I don't think I ever did exactly what you described. I certainly never soaked the prints in warm water, which will undoubtedly help swell the gelatin. I do think I tried a carbonate soak to achieve the same effect, but my memory is hazy. Thanks again, sounds nice.

Btw, evidently glass also works in principle. My dad used to ferrotype his snaps on the bathroom mirror back in the 1960s. I asked him for details a few years ago but it was too long ago for him to remember the specifics. All he said was that he didn't recall it being a particularly difficult thing to do and the prints would pop off the glass by themselves, so he would stick them to the mirror at night and collect the ferrotyped prints from the wash basin before brushing his teeth in the morning.

Did he use powdered fixer? All the old powdered fixers like Kodak F5 fixer had a hardener. I use a Pako drum dryer. I dry emulsion side away from the drum, towards the belt. When I tried Ilford Art 300 paper for the first time it stuck like crazy to the belt. I had stopped using hardener in my fix around the same time.

Hardener helps to keep papers from sticking to everything.

koraks · Aug 14, 2022

Don Heisz said:
you missed the point.

I don't think so, Don. But I won't to delve into it any deeper. It's a useful discussion in itself, but not here in this thread.

mshchem said:
Did he use powdered fixer?

There's a good chance he used plain hypo, i.e. sodium thiosulfate. But the problem is that he doesn't recall the details. This was the late 1960s and by the time I queried him about it, roughly half a century of life had happened. So I simply don't know if he used hardener, or even what paper he used. The prints haven't survived either, I'm afraid (the slides from that era fortunately have!)

Paul Howell · Aug 14, 2022

When in the Air Force in the early 70s FB paper was still the standard, prints were dried glossy on large commercial print dryers, standard hypo, if we used rapid fix we added hardener. I used a Peko dryer for several years, trick is the keep the canvas belt clean, polish the drum, but we did use Kodak print flatting solution. With a motorized drum and belt system you also need to make the heat is turned up so the dry is completely dry or it will stick the the belt. Today if I need a glossy print I use RC, I dry my FB prints on screens.

Sirius Glass · Aug 14, 2022

koraks said:
I don't think so, Don. But I won't to delve into it any deeper. It's a useful discussion in itself, but not here in this thread.

There's a good chance he used plain hypo, i.e. sodium thiosulfate. But the problem is that he doesn't recall the details. This was the late 1960s and by the time I queried him about it, roughly half a century of life had happened. So I simply don't know if he used hardener, or even what paper he used. The prints haven't survived either, I'm afraid (the slides from that era fortunately have!)

That was the time frame that I used ferrotyping and it worked with hardened fixers. It probably would not work with today's fixers. Hardeners are key as I recall.

Paul Howell · Aug 14, 2022

From Photographic Facts and Formulas by Wall and Jordan revised Carroll 1975

Glossy prints are dried on chromium plates. Plate glass polished rouge or sheets of celluloid are sometimes used instead of metal, plates, but they don't give as glossy a finish. Any scratches on the plate will be reproduced on the glossy surface of the print. Plates should be washed after using with warm water and mild soap sparingly applied. The plates are polished just before use with a commercially preparation made for the purpose. Apply the to the whole surface of the plate then polish with a soft cloth until no trace of it remains. The washed prints are placed, without draining, face down on the plate bending the paper backwards, held in place with a thumb while the rest of the print is laid down with a quick motion continuous motion to avoid air bells. An alternative way is to bring the paper and plate together underwater. The print is then blotted dry and squeegeed on with a flat or roller squeegee to drive out all the water under the print and leave it in perfect contact with the plate. The plate is left in a warm current of air until the prints drop off on their own accord.

mshchem · Aug 15, 2022

I think that you need to do all of the above-mentioned tricks to be successful. I had the good fortune to come onto an Ilford print dryer for RC paper. Using RC paper and the Ilford dryer comes extremely close to a perfectly executed ferrotyped fiber print. There's so many points for problems with old school ferrotype prints.

Photopathe · Aug 20, 2022

I finally made my last attempts yesterday with brand new clear plexiglass after soaking the prints in hot water and pressing it against the plexi with a hard plastic roller. Still unable to avoid the defects showing in my original post. Definitely giving up on this and of course it's not a big deal. Interestingly the method is giving all types of paper a very shiny look. Even the very matt Ilford Classic matt becomes super shiny. In fact all papers get the same level of gloss after drying against the plexiglass, none having more gloss than another. That was the one thing that interested me the most, the added flexibility of having the option to convert a print from matt to gloss. It's even possible to make the matt or semi-matt paper matt again by soaking in water and let it dry without "ferrotyping". Interesting but useless if it's so hard to avoid those defects. Thanks everyone for the inputs!

AgX · Aug 20, 2022

I hinted at this already, but got not reply: are the artefacts results of patches supercoat being ruptured off, and then thus sticking at the pane? Or are they the results of air-bells enclosed between paper and pane as typically assumed with these)
The shape of the patches make me think of the former.

koraks · Aug 20, 2022

AgX said:
The shape of the patches make me think of the former.

I don't think so. I've seen these patches on my own prints and saw no evidence of damage to the top coat,such as remnants sticking to the plexiglass.

Photopathe · Aug 20, 2022

Same here. Nothing sticking to the plexi. Also there was no air bubbles trapped when I left it to dry. I was able to confirm that since I used clear plexi in my last attempt. I guess some small parts of the paper won't remain in complete contact with the plexi during drying and some air gets back in.

AgX · Aug 20, 2022

Thank you, both.
Well, there must have been a minuscule amount of air trapped in.
Even if a spread of such patches of antiadhesive effect was there on the pane, such result would not have formed by that antiadhesiveness as such.

Maybe the cover foil for protecting the virgin pane was of effect still long after pulling it off.

koraks · Aug 20, 2022

AgX said:
Well, there must have been a minuscule amount of air trapped in.

Or something outgassed. Or the paper is permeable to air to a sufficient degree to let some in during drying. After squeegeeing, at least my attempt didn't show the kind of air that would result in the kind of mess I saw when the print had released.

AgX · Aug 20, 2022

A good theory and it could explain the shape of these patches better than air trapped from the start.

It even could be combined with the idea of antiadhesvie patches on the pane.

Paul Howell · Aug 20, 2022

You might want to try submerging the plate and water underwater and applying the paper underwater then rolling it with your roller.

Lachlan Young · Aug 20, 2022

AgX said:
I hinted at this already, but got not reply: are the artefacts results of patches supercoat being ruptured off, and then thus sticking at the pane? Or are they the results of air-bells enclosed between paper and pane as typically assumed with these)
The shape of the patches make me think of the former.

Quite possibly it's that the surface of the plate being used isn't smooth enough - and/ or the emulsion isn't swollen enough (today's emulsions are significantly more hardened compared to the era where ferrotype gloss on FB was commonplace) to make sufficient contact. And Tetenal Mirasol (for example) has two different dilutions for use as a wetting agent (1+200) or as a glazing aid (1+40) which would tend to support the emulsion swell hypothesis.

Nicholas Lindan · Aug 20, 2022

In the early-mid 60's I dried all my prints with a ferrotype plate. Placed the plate on the radiator in the winter. Never much in the way of problems. Tried it again with a rotary drier - gave up and put the dryer out on the curb come garbage day. They bought a proper (though used) double sided flip drier and some brand-new ferrotype plates. All sorts of cleaning, acetone, original Bon-Ami, carnuba wax, Pakosol - nothing seemed to help. Again, pretty lousy results compared to the good-ole'-days. The paper just isn't made for ferrotyping any more. Someone should ask Ilford. Maybe old school papers like Foma/Forte/Adox/... work better.

I now dry small FB prints in a blotter book. Large ones I damp-dry with a towel and lay face up on the carpet. I flatten them by drymounting them to mat board.

Ferrotype paper drying

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