Just a contact print

Still playing with my new (to me) Agfa 8x10 and PlusX Aero and AZO. I'm on both exposure and print # 8? (I'd have to check my log), so learning lots and having a pile of fun!

This was PlusX Aero at 3 stops overexposed based on an iso of 125. It was developed slightly harder (yes, harder) than normal, so I really abused this negative. I contact printed it onto gr#3 AZO and did normal development of the print ( 1 min in PolyMaxT ) followed by KRST at 1:19 for 5 minutes.



This is a church in Quyon Quebec. I'm quite happy to say that on my monitor, the scan looks (technically) exactly like the print as far as sharpness and tone. The clarity and size of the scans just don't measure up to the full size, real thing though.

cheers

Very nice John. Looks like everything fell into place just right.

John, is the extra exposure doing anything strange with respect to printing, other than extending times under the lamp? I'm curious, as I seem to remember a thread in which you stated that your exposure times on azo were very short. Is this "over exposure" and extended printing times better? tim

noseoil said:

John, is the extra exposure doing anything strange with respect to printing, other than extending times under the lamp? I'm curious, as I seem to remember a thread in which you stated that your exposure times on azo were very short. Is this "over exposure" and extended printing times better? tim

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Hi Tim,

The overexposure and overdevelopment are thickening up the negatives quite nicely and are extending the print times to a very acceptable level, possibly even making them too long for the lamp I'm using. Because the times I was getting were super short (as in 1-2 seconds in some cases), I started using a desk lamp with a 10 watt halogen bulb and placed it at about 36" above the paper (as high as I could get). This extended print times to about 30 seconds for a "normally" exposed and developed negative, which was much more controllable, but left very little time for doging and burning. This particular negative printed at 2 min - 15 sec, which is getting a little too long for anyone who's doing a number of prints (I'm not, so I don't really care). This negative though is a quite a bit overexposed as the blown out roof shows and could have stood a bit less development to retain the aluminum roofing detail. I'm going to go back and do it again, this time from a different angle so as to try and get rid of my old friends the power lines ! As far as doing anything else to the prints, I would say that I can't see anything that has changed other than lengthening the print times.

cheers

I was wondering about the development. Roof looks good in the shadow area, but the rest looks a bit blown out due to a lack of texture. Another shot should do it and looks as if the film is pretty forgiving based on your comments.

Did you try printing this one on grade 2 azo or "normal" graded paper just to see what is there? This shot seems to be pretty close to a decent grade two exposure.

Enjoying your work with the azo, keep posting, as it's nice to see progress in taming the azo beast. tim

There is mottling in the sky. If that's a scanning artifact, please forget I mentioned it.

One small point - if the roof is susceptible to polarization, you might try it. You can then print using the clouds as a higher zone to bring the rest of the tones up.

I love the church's stone's texture. Is it of a slightly red hue?

jimgalli said:

Very nice John. Looks like everything fell into place just right.

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Thank you Jim,

Having seen some of your own photo-posts makes the compliment even better ! This one is my best yet and I was pretty happy when I saw it come up in the developer.

Tim,

I printed this on gr#3 only as that is what I have for AZO and the only reason that I have that is because a friend had some in his attic that he was given probably 30 years ago and he didn't know what to so with it . When I print next time, I'll try it on some "matt" Ilford mg fibre that I have here - not too sure about the filtering though. I may try to rig up my enlarger to use for a contact lamp and use a #2 filter with the lens stopped wide open - how bad can it be :rolleyes: ?
I so much like the "look" of AZO that I'll have to buy some gr#2 when I run out of what I have - it's gonna' $ hurt

JJ,

You are correct - there is mottling in the sky areas and there has been on every print I've made. I find the mottling lessens with developer made the day I print, but this box of paper has some strange "artifacts" of its own anyway - almost like mould in the sheets. The box was sealed when I got it, but it had spent some time in a machine shop (was greasy - not unusual considering where I got it) had been damp (the outside of the box is mouldy) and has been very very warm (was retrieved from an old farmhouse attic under a steel roof on the day it was given to me ) so I'm surprised it works at all .
I can print a neg on one page and it's clear of "stuff" and then the next one has "stuff like this :
http://www3.sympatico.ca/oldrad/Photo/LargeFormat/Prints/AZO/Middleville001.jpg
This one was exposed at metered value and developed and printed normally. The first try at this print had NO stains and neither did the next one :confused:
Thank you for the suggestion re: polarisation - I'll have to rig up a holder as my lens is not thrreaded for filters - it's an old Ilex Paragon Anastigmat 12".
The stone is not red at all, infact it's about as WASP grey as you can get. I do like stone with red in it though and in Smith Falls (near here) is a building with some lovely dark red stone that is going to be a picture soon.

cheers eh?

I am surprised that this is Plus-X Aero...a film I know very little about. Looking at my monitor the response of this films seems to be an extremely close match to what I would expect from unfilteredTech Pan.

May you get satisfaction from your camera.