I'm relatively new to film, having been shooting 4x5 B&W for only about a year now. I've really not been very systematic about exposure or development; I try to put the important shadows in zone III and highlights in zone VII or VIII during exposure, do some standard development, and fix the rest in printing. I have a couple of fantastic prints and a good number of not so hot ones.
I've dabbled with van dyke but it's been very hit or miss for me. I want to start getting really serious about it (and perhaps move to other, more contrast-controlled processes like kallitype), but I need to get a handle on getting the right negatives first. I'm thinking of now making two exposures if I think I'll want both photo-paper and van dyke prints out of a shot, then using different developments for each.
What kind of development should I go for? Any particular developer that's especially good for high contrast negatives with lots of nice subtle intermediate tonalities? Any development regime I should be following? Thus far I've been using ID-11 and more recently tried some Ilfosol S, with FP4+ and a bit of kodak HIE, rotary processing in a unicolour drum at about 10% less than the recommended times on the Massive Development Chart at digitaltruth, but like I said it's been very hit or miss.
What do you do when you want a nice van dyke negative under sort of typical outdoor late afternoon / evening lighting?
Is there a good comprehensive bible for alt processes? I'm sure I heard of one some time ago but can't remember the author / title.
I've dabbled with van dyke but it's been very hit or miss for me. I want to start getting really serious about it (and perhaps move to other, more contrast-controlled processes like kallitype), but I need to get a handle on getting the right negatives first. I'm thinking of now making two exposures if I think I'll want both photo-paper and van dyke prints out of a shot, then using different developments for each.
What kind of development should I go for? Any particular developer that's especially good for high contrast negatives with lots of nice subtle intermediate tonalities? Any development regime I should be following? Thus far I've been using ID-11 and more recently tried some Ilfosol S, with FP4+ and a bit of kodak HIE, rotary processing in a unicolour drum at about 10% less than the recommended times on the Massive Development Chart at digitaltruth, but like I said it's been very hit or miss.
What do you do when you want a nice van dyke negative under sort of typical outdoor late afternoon / evening lighting?
Is there a good comprehensive bible for alt processes? I'm sure I heard of one some time ago but can't remember the author / title.
Last edited by a moderator:
