Is there really no way to do ilfachrome/cibachrome printing anymore?

Gerald C Koch · Jun 27, 2017

Dead as a Norwegian Blue.

tomfrh · Jun 27, 2017

There's still a couple of people who do it, and have their own personal stock in storage. I've looked a having prints done and it's generally upwards of $50 for a very small print; sometime with minimum $500 order or thereabouts.

In my opinion RA-4 and inkjet isn't the same. Scanning a slide leaves you with a soulless imitation.

DREW WILEY · Jul 1, 2017

I still have a frozen box of 20x24 Cibachr plus the P3 chem, but wonder if I'll ever thaw it since I'm now getting such good results from RA4. But over the years I did make quite a number of precision 8x10 reduced-contrast dupes from 8x10 chrome originals, which were intended for Cibachr printing, but now are proving excellent for generating Porta internegatives. Too bad 8x10 color film has gotten so obscenely expensive, but I've got a frozen stash of that too.

vero307 · Jul 12, 2017

dE fENDER said:
There is the way still.
Last batch of Ilfochrome paper and chemistry was produced specially for owners Moscow Gallery of Classic Photography at 2015 year. Expiration date is may/july 2016. They still sell paper on ebay, and, perhaps will sell you some chemistry kit. If not - ask PE, he knows how to develop it or simply search the forum.

Some of my photos in DIY chemistry at fresh paper. (flowers was spoiled during incorrect film developing)

Hi! Well, I'm from Spain and here we're trying to buy Cibachrome chemicals... but we don't find anything! Could you tell me the ebay page you talked about? Thanks in advance!

PD: Beautiful work!

dE fENDER · Jul 14, 2017

vero307 said:
Hi! Well, I'm from Spain and here we're trying to buy Cibachrome chemicals... but we don't find anything! Could you tell me the ebay page you talked about? Thanks in advance!

PD: Beautiful work!

It seems its unavailable for now, but it's possible, that the seller is just on a summer vacation. You also may try to google Moscow Classic gallery and write a letter for them. As far as I know they still do cibachrome printing.

vero307 · Jul 16, 2017

I'll write them a letter and let's see what happens! Thank you so much for your help!

railwayman3 · Jul 16, 2017

About 7 or 8 years ago, I sorted out a selection of my own favorite slides (all technically spot-on, if not great artistic works ! ) for printing by a so-called "professional" Ciba specialist lab here in the UK (now no longer in business). The results were hopeless (and I mean hopeless, as in unusable, not just disappointing ! ), and, having done darkroom color for many years, I think I was able to judge.

I lost all interest in Ciba at that time. Modern C-41 is far better, either darkroom or scanned prints....IMHO, Ciba was of its time and has been long superceded, best not to waste time and money on it.

Berri · Jul 17, 2017

flavio81 said:
And finally, if you want prints... why not negatives?:

Totally agree. If you want a print, you have to shoot colour negative. Ektar is an amazing film if optically printed on ra4 paper! Find the paper you like best and give it a go! I like Kodak Endura premier Glossy (F)

Prof_Pixel · Jul 17, 2017

oldtimermetoo said:
As I remember, Printon was an opaque plastic coated with an AnscoColor emulsion. In those days, Kodak made a similar type color print when you sent slides to Kodak Processing for printing. Is my memory correct?......Regards!

Yes, it's correct on both counts.

DREW WILEY · Jul 17, 2017

Calling Cibachr a poor medium due to the ineptitude of some lab klutz is like calling a Porsche a lousy car because an aardvark can't drive it! I got magnificent prints with it. RA4 is a different medium, that's all. But for all practical purposes, Cibachr is extinct, so no sense arguing about this.

railwayman3 · Jul 18, 2017

DREW WILEY said:
Calling Cibachr a poor medium due to the ineptitude of some lab klutz is like calling a Porsche a lousy car because an aardvark can't drive it! I got magnificent prints with it. RA4 is a different medium, that's all. But for all practical purposes, Cibachr is extinct, so no sense arguing about this.

I didn't actually call Ciba a poor medium, I'd seen many excellent prints which was why I spent (wasted) money withe a so-called "professional Cibachrome-approved" lab in the hope of having some magnificent prints to put on my wall. If I'd have sent the slides to some back-street cheapo lab run by monkeys, I'd have probably not been surprised with the results.

I guess that, if I had the money to buy a Porsche, I would also be disappointed if some "specialist professional Porsche approved" garage couldn't service it properly.

DREW WILEY · Jul 18, 2017

Good point. Long ago I sold equipment to import car dealers - they were all crooked. More recently, a backpacking pal of mine was a service underwriter for Porsche. He quit with disgust. Then he went to Mercedes. Even worse. My point is, if you want something done right, do it yourself.

railwayman3 · Jul 18, 2017

Slightly OT, but I also went off Kodachrome (another, unarguably quality product) for several years after a spate of blue spots, scratches and wonky mounting, by Kodak factory processing, UK.

Other members of my local Photo Club at that time also moved to other makes for the same reason. Several switched to DIY E6 processing. Somehow one can accept the occasional hiccup when there's no one else involved or to blame !

mshchem · Jul 19, 2017

ChrisBCS said:
Thanks everyone. This is depressing as all get out. I've actually never printed from a color negative... In fact, the only color film I've ever done my own darkroom work on has been Velvia 50. So, barring doing internegatives, what are the full analog color neg alternatives that get closest? Most saturated, fine-grained negative color film? Most vivid, eye popping print paper/process?

I feel like I just found a forum full of kindred spirits.

Yeah, I got so damn good at printing my Dad's old Kodachrome ASA 10 slides and 6x9 Fuji and Ektachrome. I took a few years away and came back to the horror. Never seen blacker blacks, super gloss, it looks liquid, like you can dive in. RA-4, especially a OPTICAL print from a MF negative is easier and really quite good. But it's different. One thing I have found is I get great gloss on RA-4 using a Ilford 1050 RC print drier, much higher gloss, literally (according to the experts) melt the gelatin a bit so it flows and levels like a baked paint finish. I still shoot some chrome, but Im no damn good with scanners, but 6x6 Fujichrome slides LOOK awesome projected.

God I hate the 21st century.
Best Mike

mhanc · Jul 19, 2017

mshchem said:
God I hate the 21st century.

+1

DREW WILEY · Jul 19, 2017

If you want the true deep gloss of Cibachr in RA4, use Fuji Supergloss. Ya gotta buy it in big rolls. And some negatives might Ned a contrast-increase mask, whereas with Cibachr it was routinely contrast-decrease masking. Never mind Stinkjet; that's for sissies.

Berri · Jul 19, 2017

DREW WILEY said:
And some negatives might Ned a contrast-increase mask

what do you mean by contrast mask? How do you do that?

Lachlan Young · Jul 19, 2017

Berri said:
what do you mean by contrast mask? How do you do that?

Essentially you make a pos copy of your neg, then copy that pos back to a negative. At its most basic, lets you adjust the contrast up in the opposite way to how a USM lets you bring the contrast down. Needs to be accurately pin registered. Ctein's 'Post Exposure' book is a good place to get a basic outline, then move on to Lynn Radeka or similar.

DREW WILEY · Jul 19, 2017

Correct. I make a low contrast interposive emulsion-to-emulsion interpositive, then take that plus a sheet of frosted Mylar to generate the unsharp contrast-increase mask. This is taped in register to the original color negative for printing. Of course, there are a lot of minor details to do this well, and practice. But once your technique is dialed in, it's easy.

bvy · Jul 20, 2017

I wonder why no one's petitioning Ilford to bring back Ilfochrome the way they're petitioning Kodak about Kodachrome, Fuji about pack film, etc. This seems to come up a lot lately.

Berri · Jul 20, 2017

bvy said:
I wonder why no one's petitioning Ilford to bring back Ilfochrome the way they're petitioning Kodak about Kodachrome, Fuji about pack film, etc. This seems to come up a lot lately.

because ILFORD doesn't have a chemical division anymore, they only sell ink jet paper now and one of them it is called ilfochrome. Harman Technology doesn't own the ilfochrome brand, and probably they wouldn't have the equipment to produce that material

http://ilford.com/products/ilfochrome/platinum-super-gloss-metal

Lachlan Young · Jul 20, 2017

Berri said:
because ILFORD doesn't have a chemical division anymore, they only sell ink jet paper now and one of them it is called ilfochrome. Harman Technology doesn't own the ilfochrome brand, and probably they wouldn't have the equipment to produce that material

http://ilford.com/products/ilfochrome/platinum-super-gloss-metal

Adox owns the Ciba/ Ilfochrome test coating plant in Marly, theoretically they could coat it, but it's a hugely complex material to make involving multiple passes through the coating machine and a difficult to coat set of direct positive emulsions. As I understand it, it's harder to make than C-41 or E6. There's quite a few threads on here about the challenges of making colour silver dye bleach direct pos materials with good archival properties.

Photo Engineer · Jul 20, 2017

Ilfochrome uses standard emulsions, not direct positive emulsions.

Lachlan Young · Jul 20, 2017

Photo Engineer said:
Ilfochrome uses standard emulsions, not direct positive emulsions.

OK, that was me making assumptions given that the Harman DPP was a Marly product initially - that & the lack of a reversal step in the P-3 process. I'm probably missing something vital about how silver dye bleach enables pos-pos printing?

DREW WILEY · Jul 20, 2017

Remember, it required a special base too. Otherwise, it got very expensive compared to newer options. The sulfuric acid bleach was highly corrosive to both lungs and lab equip, and often had significant hazmat and maint implications for volume labs. The color balance shifted.quickly once the paper was thawed, and toward the end, the US distributor had monkeys in their warehouse shipping out damaged boxes. Then inkjet gradually became realistic for the masses. I just left the darkroom for lunch, where I was printing Ektar onto Fuji CAIi, so one learns what they need to and moves on.

Is there really no way to do ilfachrome/cibachrome printing anymore?

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