Ilford Galerie

I have the opportunity to purchase some old 16" x 20" Ilford Galerie.
Supposedly stored in reasonable! conditions.
My experience with old Ilford RC paper has been good with only the odd package being fogged.
How much of a risk is old Galerie ?

It's a crap shoot. How old is old?

No idea of age ; the owner says it was stored in a darkroom until recently.
I have some 8x10 Galerie that is 20 years old that still prints well and has no obvious fog.
16 x20 Multigrade FB retails for $16 per sheet!!
Unbelievable.

The only way is to try. Get one box and if it's good get more.
You can still Lith if it's fogged with regular dev

I don't believe Galerie has an optical brightener in the emulsion, so if at room temperature, maybe. If the seller is local ask him if any of the sheets had been cut for test strips, if yes then ask for a strip for a test.

Paul Howell said:

I don't believe Galerie has an optical brightener in the emulsion

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How does this relate to the printing characteristics?

Optical brighter tend to fog paper quicker than papers without. As I recall from PE the last generation of Kodak Elite papers had optical brighteners and fogged soon after expiration date while I have found old packs of Kodabromide that were still printable 30 years after expiration.

Depends by what you mean as "old". Some Galerie Grade 3 was coated less than a decade ago. But if I was a betting man, I'd put the odds against the paper still being any good, unless you intend to "lith" print it.

"In the darkroom" is really the worst place to store your paper - damp and humid, with chemical fumes around,
unless your "wet side" and "dry side" truly are segregated into different rooms with different ventilation.

Paul Howell said:

Optical brighter tend to fog paper quicker than papers without.

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I was wondering if it would be about something along those lines. And I'm still wondering if that's really the case, or that there's a confounding variable at work. What we do know is that developer-incorporated papers expire fairly rapidly. I wonder whether there's a correlation between the introduction of those and changes in how or which OBA's were added to papers. Note that the addition of OBA's to photographic papers started around the 1950s: https://cool.culturalheritage.org/jaic/articles/jaic44-01-001.html

It's easy enough to verify whether a paper has OBA's added to it using a UV light source. I really wonder/doubt whether the OBA's have much to do with this. It's an n=1, but I just did some prints this week on very expired ORWO Universal BS1 paper I was gifted by a friend. The paper is absolutely pristine and free of any fog, but it must be decades old (IDK when Orwo stopped making this, but it must have been a while). And it's chock-full of OBA's, as evidenced by it lighting up like a Christmas tree under UV light. Yet, ages pretty well, it seems.

This still leaves the questions of (1) where in the paper any OBAs are (base, emulsion, PE lining on RC) and (2) what the chemical makeup of the OBAs is. Your remarks trigger these IMO interesting questions. Never thought about it; might be fun to look into.

In the day I don't think there a consensus about what effect optical brighteners had on paper, my understanding they are developers added to the emulsion. I don't remember how to test, expose a sheet to flash of white lite then put in tray of water, if the paper has an optical brightener the sheet will show some fog?

It is popular for galleries to display black and white prints under UV-rich track lighting because the brighteners fluoresce to a degree, and make the prints really "pop" (but also fade color prints). So that's a good way to check for brighteners in developed prints (which are nearly ubiquitous in b&w papers, with Galerie FB being a possible exception, if I recall correctly). That has nothing to do with any alleged self-incorporated developer additives.

As I understand it, optical brighteners are designed to affect the appearance of the print - essentially increase the DMax vs. DMin range.
Papers have trace amounts of developer-like chemicals in them in order to fine tune their speed and contrast behaviors, in order to assure batch to batch consistency in the product leaving the factory.
Two different and essentially un-related components.

Galerie FB used a different paper (no longer available) than their other papers. I've seen an awful lot of AA's later work printed on Galerie Graded (his favorite paper), and displayed under typical UV-inflected spotlights, and didn't notice any of that added white "pop". I should dig up one of my own Galerie prints to see how it responds; but I do my best to avoid UV-rich display bulbs - sunlight will do, however.

Paul Howell said:

In the day I don't think there a consensus about what effect optical brighteners had on paper, my understanding they are developers added to the emulsion.

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Those are two distinct topics. OBA's fluoresce under UV light. I don't think chemically they are reducing agents (like developers) as that would mean they'd be very unstable and therefore unfit for the purpose. Developing agents can be present in emulsions for several reasons AFAIK, but not as OBA's. See @MattKing's comment on this as well; I think developer-like compounds can be present in emulsions for other reasons as well, but IDK if that also happens in B&W papers or only in color chromogenic ones.

Paul Howell said:

I don't remember how to test, expose a sheet to flash of white lite then put in tray of water, if the paper has an optical brightener the sheet will show some fog?

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It's very easy; just shine UV light at a paper in an otherwise dim/dark room. If the paper lights up brightly, it has OBA's in it. The OBA's fluoresce at longer wavelengths than what they're being irradiated with; i.e. they effectively turn the invisible UV into blueish visible light. The paper doesn't have to be wet for this to happen.

MattKing said:

As I understand it, optical brighteners are designed to affect the appearance of the print - essentially increase the DMax vs. DMin range.

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Yeah, sort of; OBA's can make the Dmin appear lighter and shifted towards more cool hues. The measurable density difference is very slight; it's more of a psychological effect, making the paper seem 'whiter' by offsetting the natural off-white color towards blue.

DREW WILEY said:

I've seen an awful lot of AA's later work printed on Galerie Graded (his favorite paper), and displayed under typical UV-inflected spotlights, and didn't notice any of that added white "pop".

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IDK what paper was used to print the Adams example on this page, but it's a nice illustration nonetheless: https://www.aardenburg-imaging.com/optical-brighteners-obas/

OBA's are crucial in making Fuji's contemporary color papers seem white in daylight. It's painfully apparent that they rely on this effect if you view prints on Crystal Archive etc. under UV-free artificial light, as the paper is distinctly off-white under those conditions, especially when compared with a whiter sample.

That might be one of the prints AA made on Oriental Seagull instead around that time.

Off-white Crystal Archive paper (or PET base in the case of Flex) is a symptom of excessive aging prior to development. The humble CA cut paper product often gave the whitest margins because it sold off quicker. On my own walls, I even have 30x40 framed examples of fresher vs older Super C, where I use slightly different window mat "whites" to best match the exposed print margins. But it's all relative, since the maple picture frame themselves yellow over time (I use several types of hardwood, plus metal frames).

The current versions of Fujiflex, Maxima, and Super C (as US labeled) have a special premium coating to slow down pre-exposure yellowing. Their lesser papers do not.

This is distinct from that eventual yellowing due to residual couplers after development. I had a good conversation with Aardenburg about that once - a very helpful fellow.

DREW WILEY said:

Off-white Crystal Archive paper (or PET base in the case of Flex) is a symptom of excessive aging prior to development.

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No, it's inherent to the product. There's also no meaningful difference between the various Fuji color RC papers in this sense.

Take a factory fresh roll of DPII or Maxima, fix it out (avoiding any risk of brown stain from blix), wash, dry and evaluate. It seems white only until you compare it with an actually white paper (darkroom or inkjet). Then the difference is quite painfully clear.
Anyway, we digress. I'd rather not be responsible for a vicious bout of cognitive dissonance.

Edit: Maxima print from official Fuji sample kit (dark-stored) on top of generic RC inkjet paper.

Just read the respective spec sheets and official product updates, Koraks. No need to be argumentative and authoritative with me. Tell Fuji they are wrong in publishing the distinction. (Not counting the effect of sheen differences.)

But yes, if you want to be nitpicky, there is no such thing as an absolute white paper of any kind, or even white paint. Pure barium sulfite pigment comes almost as close as it gets - 98%. Most "whites" are below
90%. But yellowing due to either RC paper aging prior to exposure, or afterwards, is a different topic.

I have a box of Galerie grade 2 which is presumably 20+ years old. It lost just a bit of a contrast, and when compared to modern one looks a little yellowish, but otherwise show no fog. Its paper finish is much fancier than that of a modern one though.

I’m experienced with Galerie.

Only one old box I ever got has significant fog.

Next worst box has a slight fog that responds to potassium bromide.

But nearly all of the rest remains as good as the day it was new.

I haven’t tried Galerie in lith. @Guillaume Zuili tells me it doesn’t “lith” well and he sold me a couple boxes of 8x10 Galerie that’s fine in Dektol. If it worked for lith he’d have held onto it.

Optical brightening? Oh yeah Galerie has it. Side by side with Kodabromide F which as no brightener.

I would get that if the price was reasonable. Galerie was a great paper, a pity they discontinued it.

Whilst I was promised the paper the"Lady seller" sold it elsewhere!
FBS

Bill Burk said:

I’m experienced with Galerie.

Only one old box I ever got has significant fog.

Next worst box has a slight fog that responds to potassium bromide.

But nearly all of the rest remains as good as the day it was new.

I haven’t tried Galerie in lith. @Guillaume Zuili tells me it doesn’t “lith” well and he sold me a couple boxes of 8x10 Galerie that’s fine in Dektol. If it worked for lith he’d have held onto it.

Optical brightening? Oh yeah Galerie has it. Side by side with Kodabromide F which as no brightener.

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Earlier versions of Galerie did with but it was never a good Lith paper.
You can always try as a last resort.

Were any cold Bromide papers good at lith? Wouldn't seem so. Brilliant Bromide could "snatch" develop well; but that's not quite the same thing.

DREW WILEY said:

Were any cold Bromide papers good at lith? Wouldn't seem so. Brilliant Bromide could "snatch" develop well; but that's not quite the same thing.

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Definitely !