Gold Toner on negative?

ericdan

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I have a negative that I want to increase the contrast on. I’ve tried printing it with grade five and it’s still way too flat. I printed it lith and it looked OK but I have a hard time recreating the same result in lith. I noticed how much the contrast increases when I told tone prints. It should do the same to the negative I assume.
I use Tetenal Gold toner and the film is Tri-X developed in XTOL. thanks.
 

awty

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Although I have not tried myself, I have read selenium can give a slight contrast boost of around 1/2 a stop. You could try gold on a non important negative to see what happens.
With really flat negatives I use cold tone paper, a cold developer and then selenium, maybe a little bleach to improve the highlights.
 

adelorenzo

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Selenium or bleach sepia toners are good for increasing negative contrast. Gold should work too not sure how effective it will be compared to the other two.

Option B is to make a copy negative on film or paper. That will give you all the contrast you could ever want.
 

awty

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Yes option B works as well.
 
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ericdan

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Option B: Do I need ortho film for the copy neg?

I have Selenium, Sepia/bleach and Gold.
could try them all on test negatives.
 
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ericdan

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What does that do in terms of grain and sharpness to the image?
 

adelorenzo

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@ericdan Ortho film is much easier to work with but you can use regular film too but have to have everything set up in the dark. There is definitely some trial and error involved getting exposures down. You have to make an inter-positive first and then the copy negative. That's why you get such a big increase in contrast as you have to do it twice. I've read you can reversal process the film to make a positive in one step, although I have never tried that.

If it's a small negative (say 35mm) I enlarge it onto a piece of sheet film and then contact print that back onto another sheet of film.

I've mostly done this with ortho lith film and the sharpness and detail are maintained pretty well. With a paper negative you definitely get a softer image but it can be a really cool look depending on what you are going for.
 

mshchem

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Chromium intensifier? Not sure if you want to experiment on this negative. Gold works pretty slow at room temperature, slightly warming, 80F would help. I would consider selenium toner.
I use the Kodak Blue toner gold formula, definitely adds density.
 
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ericdan

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I see, grain and sharpness isn't an issue because I make the copy neg big and then contact print it.
I am planning on making a 5x7 print of this. The only ortho film I see is 4x5.
Probably going to be a special order.

Selenium makes shadows darker on prints.
That means it would make my highlights brighter on the print if I tone the negative.

Bleach and Gold toner work on highlights in my prints first. Meaning my shadows would go darker in my print if I tone the negative.

the benefit of bleach would be that I can redevelop it I guess if it goes to far. On 35mm however I think I won’t know that until after I print it again.
 

koraks

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Chromium intensifier. It's the only candidate that will give you the serious boost you likely need. Selenium or sepia will give a slight boost which may not be enough and then you're stuck. Chromium can be repeated to increase the effect.
Gold would be rather expensive and doubtfully effective for this situation.
 

Lachlan Young

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The most effective of the lot is a contrast boost mask - it's a negative of the negative (make contact positive, use this to make contact negative/ mask) - the only major issue is it has to be a sharp mask & therefore needs tight registration to the original.
 

MattKing

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All of the suggestions in this thread are reasonably effective with a negative that is low in contrast because it has been properly exposed and under-developed.
None of the suggestions in this thread are particularly effective with a negative that is low in contrast because it has been under-exposed and properly developed.
 

Mainecoonmaniac

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Another way to boost contrast without risking damaging your neg is to make a copy neg. There will be loss in sharpness.
 

Doremus Scudder

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It seems this topic comes up fairly regularly. There are several threads on it already, so search for negative intensification, increasing contrast, etc. for a lot more info.

Selenium toning of the negative can get you up to one Zone contrast increase. It is not reversible and won't allow further intensification of the negative, so if you are sure you need more contrast increase than this, don't use it first. Gold toning will likely do the same; I've never tried it on a negative.

Making copy negatives does the job without changing the original negative (as would scanning and printing a digital neg with more contrast... yes, I know: Blasphemy!!).

I tend to use bleach/redevelopment these days for the occasional negative that needs intensifying. Use a potassium ferricyanide and potassium bromide rehalogenating bleach to convert the silver in the negative image into silver bromide. Then redevelop the negative in a staining developer like PMK or Pyrocat. A staining developer is necessary to get a contrast increase. The image silver will return, this time with the addition of the stain, which adds the extra density and contrast. This method works gratifyingly on negatives that have been slightly underexposed, since the shadow detail gets a boost too.

I'll let you search for the details; both here and on the Large Format Forum.

Best,

Doremus
 

Mainecoonmaniac

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ericdan

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I got rollei ortho film and will try a copy negative first before I make any invasive changes to the negative.
When I contact print the positive and then the copy negative do I keep the films emulsion to emulsion?
 

Doremus Scudder

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ericdan said:
I got rollei ortho film and will try a copy negative first before I make any invasive changes to the negative.
When I contact print the positive and then the copy negative do I keep the films emulsion to emulsion?
Click to expand...

Emulsion to emulsion on both steps. The positive will be reversed and then will be re-reversed (i.e., corrected) for the final negative-image negative Good contact and proper exposure are important. You'll likely have to test multiple exposure times.

Best,

Doremus
 
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ericdan

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I can either use my contact printing glass plate or a smaller ANR glass piece from a negative carrier. Emulsions facing each other means the shiny side will touch the glass. Maybe the ANR is better.
 
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