Foggy About Fogged Paper

[Snapshot]

Hi All,

I have a questions about dealing with fogged paper. I understand Benzotriazole is primarily a restrainer and inhibits unexposed silver crystals from being developed. If used to deal with fogged paper, will it not only remove the fogging but some of the rest of the image as well?

Any comments?

 

[pdeeh]

It doesn't "remove" the image at all.

 

[Xmas]

^^^^^

It slows the image formation and may make it colder

KBr is sort of similar but may make it warmer

The simple rule is add restrainer redo test strip...

Add more restrainer redo test strip

be prepared to develop for longer dont snatch

Etc.

Adopting the AA (alcohol anonymity) approach

my name is Noel and I have not got a bin full of strips this week yet...

 

[Simon Howers]

Benzotriazole works just fine with fogged paper but its not an ideal way to work.
Just slowly increase the concentration until you get a clean test strip, then use that as your stock solution for that print run.

I'd recommend using old (fogged) paper for work you are not too concerned about, using fresh paper etc for what really matters.

 

[Snapshot]

Benzotriazole works just fine with fogged paper but its not an ideal way to work.
Just slowly increase the concentration until you get a clean test strip, then use that as your stock solution for that print run.

I'd recommend using old (fogged) paper for work you are not too concerned about, using fresh paper etc for what really matters.

I intended to use old paper for non-critical work. My concern was that some of the image would be suppressed as well by the benzotriazole.

 

[Xmas]

If it were too foggy you can use it for alternate printing, but Id suggest you try KBr rather than BZT...

Adding more KBr for each strip and also diluting the developer and increasing exposure with an MQ developer you may get nice warm tones as well as less fog depends on developer and paper.

If you do get toning the length of dev time may give different colours.

You could then try the BZT similarly.

So Id not regard the foggy paper as waste a nice warm tone print is just nice.

If you can mix...

http://www.lostlabours.co.uk/photography/formulae/developers/devID78.htm

or

http://www.lostlabours.co.uk/photography/formulae/developers/dev_cool_wam_tones.htm

 

[Gerald C Koch]

Anti-foggants/restrainers work by slowing the development of fog centers while leaving image centers in the emulsion relatively unaffected. Benzotriazole is usually used as a 1% solution in water while potassium bromide as a 10% solution. These relative concentrations are used since they produce a similar restraining action. Start with 2.5 ml per liter of developer using either solution and increase the amount by 2.5 ml until the fog is under control. The exact amount is not that critical. The idea is to use the least amount of restrainer as possible. There is no reason why both solutions cannot be used to maintain a papers neutral black tone. However if the paper is badly fogged then it is best to discard it.