Filters in Contact Printing

[Anthony Cronin]

I an wondering what others people thoughts on this are, I use a standard Paterson contact printed for both 35mm and MF.

I generally print contact sheets with the contrast set to 2 on the multi-grade head or if using hand held filters I hold a 2 filter under lens. my logic is i tend to print 80% of my stuff at this grade.

Does this make a difference through the glass ? am i just wasting energy ? does anyone else do this? thoughts please

 

[JBrunner]

I an wondering what others people thoughts on this are, I use a standard Paterson contact printed for both 35mm and MF.

I generally print contact sheets with the contrast set to 2 on the multi-grade head or if using hand held filters I hold a 2 filter under lens. my logic is i tend to print 80% of my stuff at this grade.

Does this make a difference through the glass ? am i just wasting energy ? does anyone else do this? thoughts please

Yes, you are getting the contrast grade you are printing to through the glass. I vary contrast with VC paper all the time while contact printing 8x10. If the glass has a bit of a tint I suppose it could have some effect by slightly shifting the wavelength with VC paper, but it would be very minor.

 

[fschifano]

I an wondering what others people thoughts on this are, I use a standard Paterson contact printed for both 35mm and MF.

I generally print contact sheets with the contrast set to 2 on the multi-grade head or if using hand held filters I hold a 2 filter under lens. my logic is i tend to print 80% of my stuff at this grade.

Does this make a difference through the glass ? am i just wasting energy ? does anyone else do this? thoughts please

Not enough to make a difference. I see maybe about 1/3 stop of light loss from the glass, but I'm using plain old window glass without any AR coating.