How to dodge/burn with a sharp edge but no halo?

jlbruyelle said:

This sounds like the exact equivalent of making a single exposure while slightly moving the mask, isn't it? I don't quite get the point: what it the advantage of making ten 1s exposures over one 10s exposure with a moving mask? How would it help avoiding the halo?

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I don't know about Rudman, but I discovered this method on my own, out of necessity. Laying the mask on the paper produced a hard edge. Holding the mask close to the paper produced a halo (or bad registration). Finally I positioned the mask precisely and attached it to the easel board (just off the paper's edge) with tape. The tape acted as a hinge such that I could l raise and lower the mask and have it land in more or less the exact same spot on the paper each time. By lifting and dropping the mask and exposing multiple times as described, I got an edge much but a much softer one -- nothing I could have achieved by hand-holding the mask (but maybe you have steadier hands).

Or... expose so that the rock is where you want it, then burn in from the horizon line and up.

MattKing said:

One caution:
All the books recommended here are excellent. If you have multiple books, it can be confusing!
It is probably best to first pick one of those books, read it thoroughly and carefully and experiment with the suggestions that are in it until you feel confident that you understand it.
THEN
Read other books, to see if there are other approaches that improve your understanding or match better your thought processes.

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Sage advice. +1000

Here's an Imgur album I made showing darkroom sky replacement with litho masks. It's the most precise way I've found to do this - only special gear needed is an everyday three-hole paper punch and 2 silkscreen pins that match the hole sizes (from Ternes-Burton). It's less complex that you'd think and in many cases you can mask very fine detail with no haloes at all.

Time Rudmans "Master Printing Course" has some excellent and clearly explained techniques for this (though none will let you mask things like tree branches as well as litho film, which does require the right neg to really work well). My favorite printing book ever, too.

it's worked so well that I've started packing a blue filter for when I see a cool scene with a dead-blue sky, to give me a very light BG and allow for sky replacement masks. A big curse of Texas is the no-clouds-all-summer environment.

Litho masks are an excellent way to burn in tricky areas... and dodge, too. You can also make them "another way", but not allowed to discuss that here...

Thanks for that Imgur album, helpful to see the steps, but I'm not quite there yet with 11x14 film and such.

I ordered Way Beyond Monochrome, seems to be the easiest one to find.
Thanks again for all the advice.

Andrew O'Neill said:

Have you tried flashing the paper first?

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This has got to be the next and easiest step after the steps already tried that don't go far enough.