Haloid Contact Paper

[Harrigan]

You guys and gals might be interested in this, or not…...

I was given a box of Haloid contact printing paper 8x10.5 semi matt surface grade 3 recently. The box is dated Feb 1958 and was pulled from a rear storage room. Who knows how this was stored for all these years but its not been ideal for sure. Haloid is of course the original name of Xerox so I find it amusing that I am printing on Xerox paper. Its also neat that I grew up a short bike ride from the facility where this was made. I hear Weston used to print on the Haloid paper? Well it is pretty neat to print on some of the same papers he might have used as well.

Anyway I tried ektaflo dev with my first test of the paper, just to make sure it was still viable. As it made an image I did up a tray of amidol gaf 113. I know I should have saved the sample but I immediately noticed the amidol was much muddier in the highlights and the blacks were cooler yet not really blacker to me. I ended up going back to the warm tone ektaflo because I don’t like cold prints and it really was giving me more highlight separation, or so it seemed. Ektaflo also produces a very good dmax for a warm tone developer and I use it frequently on chloro-bromide papers.

Regardless I was able to get a decent prints out of the paper albeit a touch foggy in the white areas. I did not use any anti-fog agent because I don’t have any. Its very interesting to me that a paper expired for almost 50 years is still able to produce any image at all. Granted this print is a bit flatter than I normally print but its 50 years expired!

 

[Photo Engineer]

In 1959 and 1960 we used Haloid paper in 10x10 and 10x19 for contact printing our aerial photos.

PE

 

[PHOTOTONE]

If you do get some anti-fog, you could probably clear up any muddiness.

 

[bdial]

Thanks for posting this. I have about 4 boxes of Haloid that were part of an auction lot I purchased recently, that are similar vintage, all of them still sealed. I've not gotten around to trying it out, but your results are encouraging, maybe I'll crack one of these and see what happens.

Maybe this will be the "make prints on 50 year old paper" thread.

 

[David A. Goldfarb]

I have some from that era too, 10x10" grade 2. It's a foggy and has lost some contrast, but in Smith's Amidol I call it about a grade 1 compared to Azo grade 2--handy for negs that I've targeted more for albumen than for Azo.

 

[michael9793]

there is a defender's developer I got off this site or M&P site I can't remember, but it is for old papers and can be used on papers that fog and it keeps it from fogging. I have a box of 1972 kodabromide, but havn't used it yet. the guy I got it form says it works, if you are interested I can post it.

Mike A

 

[Photo Engineer]

Defender paper evolved into Dupont paper.

PE

 

[michael9793]

IT's a defender developer which from what your saying must have been a dupont developer. It uses Chlorohydroquinone (sp). very expensive and hard to fine.

 

[Photo Engineer]

Ok, the Defender product line became the Dupont line of products, just as Haloid evolved into Xerox over time. Chlorohydroquinone is no longer produced anywhere, AFAIK, due to difficulty in the synthesis and toxicity. I'm not sure of the details. My neighbor used to make it at EK.

PE

 

[michael9793]

I bought 100 grams just 6 months ago and it cost me about $60.00 for the jar.
This jar didn't look like it was produced recently

 

[chrisf]

Dead Link Removed

 

[psvensson]

Since it's probably a silver chloride paper, couldn't kosher cooking salt act as a restrainer, aka anti-fogging agent? Chemists, feel free to shoot it down.

I see Peckham Amidol uses sodium chloride, presumably as a restrainer:

http://unblinkingeye.com/Articles/Amidol/amidol.html

 

[Photo Engineer]

Sodium Chloride is a weak restrainer for silver chloride papers. It is no where near as effective as Sodium Bromide is for any paper.

In high concentration, it can cause a big speed loss and contrast increase due to its severe solvent effect on Silver Chloride itself.

PE

 

[eclarke]

How about benzotriazole??..EC

 

[Photo Engineer]

Benzotriazole is a strong restrainer for Silver Chloride papers. It works just fine. There may be a slight cooling in tone, depending on other addenda.

PE

 

[Harrigan]

I should add that the neg I printed was quite dense so the paper is clearly no longer a grade 3. Well that is to be expected of course with paper of this age.

How much sodium bromide and/or benzotriazole would one add to a developer to help the fog? The paper, to my eye has a little fog and lowered contrast. The posted scan is a litte off, its not quite as flat as that in the actual print but it could benefit from some anti fog agent. I wonder how much do you use?

 

[Photo Engineer]

Adding an antifoggant will not fix the apparent contrast problem AFAIK. It will give you white on gray instead of gray on darker gray.

Benzotriazole probably would be best. I would start at 1 mg/l and you could need to go up to 10 mg/l. I would test the paper after each incremental addition, so at 1 mg, 2 mg, 4 mg etc, and at some point the fog will vanish. Speed will also decrease. With this paper, you may even need to go higher.

Sometimes you are chasing your tail though. You add BTAZ and lose fog and speed so much you have to develop more and that gives fog, and etc....

PE

 

[Mark Layne]

Adding an antifoggant will not fix the apparent contrast problem AFAIK. It will give you white on gray instead of gray on darker gray.

Benzotriazole probably would be best. I would start at 1 mg/l and you could need to go up to 10 mg/l. I would test the paper after each incremental addition, so at 1 mg, 2 mg, 4 mg etc, and at some point the fog will vanish. Speed will also decrease. With this paper, you may even need to go higher.

Sometimes you are chasing your tail though. You add BTAZ and lose fog and speed so much you have to develop more and that gives fog, and etc....

PE

I have many boxes of 1984 SW Kodabromide 5x7 G3 which behaves like a beautiful G1.5. Incidentally no fog.
I have only found 2 workarounds.
1- Make a dense print, selenium tone heavily and then bleach back.

2- Develop in normal developer till a ghost image appears, brief water rinse, finish in dilute lith developer. A beautiful black can be had - with practice.
Mark

 

[Mark Layne]

If fog is a problem reversing the procedure might work, lith first then normal developer. This is somewhat similar to Moersch Polycrome procedure which might work with old Kodabromide as nothing will induce color in this paper.
Mark

 

[Photo Engineer]

I was looking again at that chlorohydroquinone post referenced in post #11 at Michael and Paula's web site. It seems to me that the large scale synthesis of that developer and one other were stopped about 10 - 20 years ago due to the toxicity of some of the intermediates if not the actual compound itself. I got this from a friend who used to make it. So, I'll have to follow up on this, but only if there is interest. I could also ask Grant Haist. There was no work done with this while I was at Kodak, but a lot of work had been done before I joined the company.

The other item rather amused me. Ryuji Suzuki is not a PhD yet. AFAIK, he is a graduate student in a track outside of chemistry or physics. He is quite knowledgable on both subjects however.

PE