Great video: Ctein making a dye transfer print

[villagephotog]

Just a heads-up for anyone interested: there's a great video of Ctein going through the process of making a dye transfer print in his darkroom that's now available for anyone to watch.

It's at The Online Photographer blog, linked in this post: https://tinyurl.com/tbppfxd

There's actually two videos in the post, but it's the second one where the camera goes into the darkroom with Ctein. The videos were made 15 years ago by Michael Reichmann of the Luminous Landscape web site and were previously available only to subscribers to his video journal. One of the most enjoyable things related to photography that I've seen in quite some time.

Ctein has also been writing a series of posts for The Online Photographer about his history with the dye transfer process; those posts can be found from the blog's main page.

 

[Tom Kershaw]

I had thought Ctein had fallen out with 'The Online Photographer'?

 

[villagephotog]

I had thought Ctein had fallen out with 'The Online Photographer'?

He started contributing to TOP again a few months ago, so they seem to be going strong again.

 

[mike c]

Thanks villagephotog, that is a very interesting and informative interview.

 

[Andrew O'Neill]

I have one of his dye transfer prints.

 

[Alan9940]

I have one of his dye transfer prints.

Me, too, and it's lovely!!

 

[DREW WILEY]

Thanks for linking these. I haven't visited him for a quite awhile. He exited dye transfer printing when his supplies of pan matrix fllm started running low. It's a material and process for making dye prints directly from color negatives rather than the more common process from chromes via b&w separation negs. I bought some of his leftover dyes, but basically modernized the old Eastman wash-off relief method predating Dye Transfer, which in my opinion seems superior in certain practical respects, provided one is not on a production schedule. But I've never found time yet to fine-tune the process. Lots of other projects. Good dye prints have a lively transparency or purity to the hues that you just don't get with opaque inks.

 

[CMoore]

I am watching them now... Thank You..!!!

A few things come to mind.
1. It dawns on me that i know almost nothing about printing.
What can i say.?

2. Not sure how or why i would know, but..... i had no idea that he did a lot of printing for Jim Marshall.

3. I looked but did not see the info... what kind of a name is Ctein.? Is it his first name.?

Thanks Again

 

[Andrew O'Neill]

My favourite part was when he was peeling the final film backing away from the print... reminded me of tri-colour carbon transfer printing.

 

[MattKing]

3. I looked but did not see the info... what kind of a name is Ctein.? Is it his first name.?

It is his only name.
He changed his name legally to it.

 

[CMoore]

It is his only name.
He changed his name legally to it.

Does it mean something.?
What was his name.?

 

[MattKing]

I doubt it.
I don't know, and as I understand it he prefers that his privacy be respected and that those who do know it not share it.
I like Mike Johnston's (The Online Photographer) description for him - a "Jewish Gnome".
I once sent a request to him to use some of his published material in a talk I was doing on the subject of "sharpness". He was very helpful and approachable.

 

[Mick Fagan]

Matt, I know someone who approached Ctein around 20 years ago in order to get permission for a photographic demonstration using a method he had pioneered. Back then he was very gracious, and, as you say, approachable.

As for being perhaps the last person doing dye transfer, there is at least one other, Bettina Haneke in Germany. As far as I know does dye transfer prints, from her studio in Berlin. Kathrin Linkersdorff a photographer in Berlin shows dye transfer prints, which I'm led to believe are processed by Bettina Haneke.

By the by, really good video.

Mick.

 

[Mike Crawford]

Jean Curran is a London based Irish artist who has learnt the process to work on images of Hitchcock's Vertigo. There's quite a bit online on her work, but this article has some details of her research and other people working with the process. We both use the same (traditional) retoucher in London and saw some of the work at his place. Looked great.
https://www.ft.com/content/3f25ddce-5316-11e8-b24e-cad6aa67e23e
I work as a BW photographic printer and remember meeting the last commercial dye transfer printer in London in the early 90s as we were both printing for the same photgorapher at the time. (Simon.........? Must look up his name.) Really beautiful prints, but remember thinking how complicated they must be to make when he explained the process.

 

[DREW WILEY]

Statistics are hard to come by, but there might be as many as 200 people still doing dye transfer worldwide, at least intermittently, but maybe only 3 as an ongoing commercial service. Bettina and her husband financed an entire new run of paper and matrix film, but customized to their hybrid process. Their color separations are made directly onto the three respective matrices using blue laser exposure. Their website explains it.

 

[CMoore]

Wow..... to everything and everybody.
What an interesting eye-opener this thread has been.