Kodak Register Punch and register pin bar.

Any of you guys know the use of this?
Is this piece of equipment worth anything?
//Uffe

This was probably for the dye transfer process, which required precise registration of separation negatives.

It could be used for any kind of masking process with large format negs or multilayer alt-process printing like 3-color gum bichromate, gum over platinum, etc.

Dry Transfer. I'd love to get get a set for trying color carbons.

That is the unit used to punch film without having pre-punched film. Matrix and Pan Matrix film came pre-punched or not, as the case may be, and both the unpunched Matrix film and the separation negatives required punching.

You need a vacuum register plate to go with it. It looks like a huge clipboard with pins for the punched holes and vacuum channels, as well as a connection for the hose. This holds the film down when you expose it.

Then you need a transfer blanket or a vacuum register board to attach the paper and then each Matrix to perform the individual transfers.

So, this is missing 2 parts from what I see, but is nevertheless valuable. I only have the vacuum register board. I rescued it from a trash bin when the dye transfer line was shut down, and was given permission to take it.

PE

A pretty good substitute for the punch is making 3/4" x 1.5" tabs out of scrap film, punching a 1/4" hole in the ends and taping them to the edge of a negative. An office paper punch works. I do not know if you can still buy individual pins from a printers supply.

I have a Kodak 11x14" spring-back frame with the register pins and matching punch, so that was another option.

The Kodak Register Punch was listed in the "Kodak 1981-82 Photographic Producte Reference Guide" for $300.00 to give you some idea of value a few years ago.

richard ide said:

A pretty good substitute for the punch is making 3/4" x 1.5" tabs out of scrap film, punching a 1/4" hole in the ends and taping them to the edge of a negative. An office paper punch works. I do not know if you can still buy individual pins from a printers supply.

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Yep, you can. You can also buy pins for the Kodak punches. I have the same punch. De Vere 504 carriers use these Kodak style pins, although they use only 2 of the three holes made by the punch. I have the same punch mounted on a thick acrylic board.

That is the large pin bar and punch which was used extensively in graphic arts work for all sorts of things. Pretty much not done these days.

For small vacuum frame work Kodak made the far better LP (Low Pin) register pin bar and punch system.

The LP miniature pin bar register is the set to have for vacuum frame use.

I have a set of these Cat 302 6994

Designed to work with film as small as 4x5".

Mick.

Hi there.

I've just been gooooogllllinnng for this and this forum popped up and I know that this post is years old but thought I'd tell you a little about my experience with this kind of Kodak punch system.

I first used it when I was starting off in the print world and worked as a youth training scheme slave for a graphic photographer and my job was basically general dogs body but in between the endless cups of tea I would make for everyone and the broom that was attached to the belt at the rear so that I could sweep as I go I did manage to learn a thing or two.

Using vertical graphic cameras along with very large enlargers that came with very large developing and fixing tanks to produce very large positive film sheets used by the silk screen industry which we would sometimes make the silk screen stencils from using an indirect method with metal halide lamps and stuff.

What I remember most about my job was going home in clothing that stank of the chemicals which I would manage to get myself covered in because all the developing and fixing was done by hand in large open tanks that you would need to agitate by hand back and forth but never remembering just how much agitation to use would see me wide eyed (under a red light mostly) at what comes back at you once you've rocked the chemicals away from you... Tsunami would be an understatement. Funny thing is that as I type and remember this I can almost smell the fix!

I also adored the degreasing agent that we used to clean the silk screens... you didn't know it was burning into your flesh until it was burning into your flesh and it always seemed to find it's way in between your gloves and the cuffs of your overalls. Bliss!

This punch system was used by us to punch the film negative to align it on to the also punched plate for litho printing but I'm currently on the look out for this type of system so as to have a go at old school type animation but with a little cheating to be had. The idea involves real life footage of something being pumped through my ipad with the pin bar part attached to the screen so I can then apply sheets of trace paper to it all registered and then just draw away. Then photograph it, pop it into photoshop to create the digital animation and then export maybe to Premiere Pro (may even go with Procreate) and then with Logic to combine the footage with the audio and music.

In a nutshell.

My life... as it is now!

Cheers

Brian.

Thanks for the reminisces. I can almost smell them, given your description.

There are all kinds of pin bar and punch combinations out there, even customized options from current makers like Ternes Burton or Olec Stoesser. On EBay, look under industrial printing equipment rather than photographic.

The old Kodak system was elementary; and their pan matrix version of dye transfer film was pre-punched to match their own pin bar (that was a rather uncommon version of DT for sake of exposing color neg film directly to the matrix film). The really poor man's method was a Boston 3-hole paper punch (better made than current office supply punches), along with quarter inch registration tabs.

I am looking for a small Olec Stoesser system punch if anyone knows where to find on , I have one for very large work but would love one for small work, as I am now into making portfolio Box sets of my work and a smaller punch would be excellent.

Funny, some time ago I picked up a Kodak punch similar to the one in #1. Only the punching pattern is different:

Unfortunately, no pin bar came with it. I made some pins with a 3D printer and taped them to a semi-rigid support. This works to an extent, but it's not ideal. Still need to figure out something better. I did at some point have a look at Ternes Burton and Stoesser, but didn't find any pins to match this punch.

Btw, when I got that punch above, it was in a very, very sorry state; for one thing, it didn't work. Heavily corroded and evidently kept in a humid shed or something for decades. It cleaned up quite nicely though, and with a bit of lube, it punches like new!

koraks said:

Only the punching pattern is different

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It isn't, the main difference (I think) is that one is Eastman Kodak and the other Kodak Ltd (and there are others from Billows Protocol etc on the same spacing). They all punch on the same 3-pin spacing with remarkable accuracy from punch to punch (highly consistent manufacturing and carbide tipped punches, unlike the small operations such as Condit whose punches and register frames etc had to be matched sets). The longer pin bars aren't hard to find (but the short ones are much rarer), and if you know anyone who worked in the offset industry up until the 1990s, they may have loose pins kicking around. Some of the other pin manufacturers don't seem to like making Kodak spec pins (from what I was told, it's due to their shape and demanding specifications).

I have used the Billows Protocol system but it was much larger and had some automation if I remember correctly. A foot control for the punching part. Used for B1 sized plates for very large 7 colour machines and mostly for SRA1 sheets but also B1.

Had an Opticopy system too which had it's own punch mechanism. Don't miss this machine very much at all as at the time the company bought it we were all ready well into digital imposition and when you consider what I had to shoot on this machine (all the A4 runout copy for the government census back in the 90's) it was a ton of repetitive punching and loading on to a vac board individual pages (again on register pins) to impose 8 pages to view on film.

Sooooo Labourious zzzzzzzzz!

Miss the smell of that ink from the press hall though!

Also seem to remember that with regards to the larger Kodak pin bars. We cut them down to use with the shorter punch system so we had both high and low profile depending on whether it was for bench film registration (mostly four colour planning) or in the vac frame for exposing to plate.

Lachlan Young said:

It isn't, the main difference (I think) is that one is Eastman Kodak and the other Kodak Ltd (and there are others from Billows Protocol etc on the same spacing).

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Thanks for the info; I didn't realize that. Interesting to hear the punch-to-punch tolerances were so tightly controlled. This punch does feel very nice and solid and despite the derelict condition it arrived in, it's as smooth as butter now. Fashioning some kind of registration system using this punch is on my to do list, specifically for carbon transfer printing. One day I'll think of a satisfactory way to get hold of or make a bunch of appropriate pins.

Depends on how small you need to go, Bob. All my own micro-pin sheet film-sized (up to 8X10) registration gear was either made by Condit or myself. My mid sized gear came from Ternes Burton in the US Midwest - excellent service. They can also make pin bars for almost any punch system if you submit them a dimensionally stable punched sample, preferably on thin brass shim stock, or else thick mylar.

Larger diam. punch patterns generally have a combination of round and oval indexing pins, anywhere from 3 to 12 or more. Generally, tolerances need to be within .002 inch. But certain processes, like gum printing, simply can't hold that tightness of detail anyway.

DREW WILEY said:

Depends on how small you need to go, Bob. All my own micro-pin sheet film-sized (up to 8X10) registration gear was either made by Condit or myself. My mid sized gear came from Ternes Burton in the US Midwest - excellent service. They can also make pin bars for almost any punch system if you submit them a dimensionally stable punched sample, preferably on thin brass shim stock, or else thick mylar.

Larger diam. punch patterns generally have a combination of round and oval indexing pins, anywhere from 3 to 12 or more. Generally, tolerances need to be within .002 inch. But certain processes, like gum printing, simply can't hold that tightness of detail anyway.

Click to expand...

Hi Drew- we tried approaching Ternes Burton recently I like the circular pin for middle and two oblong outsides but they seem to only have the circulars now, kind of strange.

koraks said:

One day I'll think of a satisfactory way to get hold of or make a bunch of appropriate pins

Click to expand...

Polymetaal would be as good a first port-of-call as any. The Kodak punches were in the backs of a great many process cameras over the years (and in many cases binned with them).

Theb said:

I have used the Billows Protocol system but it was much larger and had some automation if I remember correctly. A foot control for the punching part. Used for B1 sized plates for very large 7 colour machines and mostly for SRA1 sheets but also B1.

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Compared to a B1 plate punch, the Billows punch I've got is very small in comparison, maybe B3-ish. Built like a tank though.

The main use for such a punch that I've read about is for masking: combining a negative and a positive film in the enlarger. This is done for several purposes: unsharp masking (thereby improving the impression of sharpness in the print), contrast reduction, dodge and/or burn. It requires the negative and the positive the be in perfect register. Ideally, the negative carrier has matching register pins.

Lachlan Young said:

Polymetaal would be as good a first port-of-call as any.

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Well, it's not something I think they've ever listed on their website. I've been purchasing paper from them for >10 years.

Ron789 said:

The main use for such a punch that I've read about is for masking: combining a negative and a positive film in the enlarger.

Click to expand...

For that purpose, you'd ideally use a negative carrier with in-built registration system and the accompanying punch. The kind of Kodak punch I've got here seems more suited for assembly of layered prints; work like dye transfer etc.

koraks said:

Well, it's not something I think they've ever listed on their website.

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I'd still ask them. Most of the Kodak pins & pin bars I've found came from printmakers (they were/ are quite widely used for various printmaking procedures)/ print industry people. Printers' engineers like Polymetaal will be quite capable of making a pin-bar if needed. One of the UK equivalents of Polymetaal is capable of making punches too (for a price commensurate with the work involved) and gave some helpful advice as to where to look for surplus parts, after stating their regret that they hadn't recovered the Kodak punches off all the process cameras they'd scrapped in the digital shift in the 1990s.

koraks said:

For that purpose, you'd ideally use a negative carrier with in-built registration system and the accompanying punch. The kind of Kodak punch I've got here seems more suited for assembly of layered prints; work like dye transfer etc.

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Lots of manufacturers offered Kodak pin system carriers for 4x5 and up. I've got a 5108 De Vere with factory pin reg (from asking them, they did them for the 504 upwards), have a pile of HK carriers with the full glass carriers all pin-reg, and have seen Omega's 4x5 pin-reg carrier. They require taping a leader to your original negative (but so does the Condit small-pin 4x5 carrier - some of the touted 'advantages' of their system only seem to kick in at 5x7 and above, but on the other hand it adapts to a De Vere 504 very easily). Durst's Mivalo punch system was small pin and the requisite carrier and receiver do crop up now and then (most often for the 138 from what I've seen). Making a decent enough pinned Kodak-system carrier for something like a Durst 138 is easier today than 60 years ago.

Lachlan Young said:

I'd still ask them.

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I might, although I don't expect I will anytime soon. I have to admit that my willingness to pay would be less than what I paid for the punch. I don't think it's realistic to expect anyone to do a custom job at that rate, so for now I'm mostly interested in DIY solutions.

The micro-pin system had a distinct advantage for typical camera sheet film sizes (4x5, 5X7, 8x10) because the margin of the film can be punched without intruding into the image area. Smaller roll film sizes can be accommodated by taping on a leader strip. Condit was the leading maker of those. Durst Milvalo punches are almost impossible to find. I even modified my Durst registration carriers to match my Condit punches.

Lachlan - there were quite a few Condit punch options. My smaller version is set up for 4x5 and 5x7 sheet film - those are the most common; no leader needed except for smaller roll film. My larger linear punch & register Condit system is for 8X10. I also have one 4x5 diagonal punch completely unused, received in a "horse trade" swap, but no matching pin glasses for it, which I could make myself if I ever needed to.

Condit gear frequently turns up for sale used, but unfortunately, not alway in matched sets. The micro-pins are designed in an offset barrel pattern, so that they can be slightly rotated to fine-tune the spacing, then re-cemented back in. But I won't explain details of the procedure here. Whatever happened to all of the leftover inventory of that when the person who bought out Condit himself died remains a
mystery.

However, a registered carrier is not needed for basic masking applications. The mask and the original film can simply be taped together in register on the pins, then used as a sandwich in an ordinary full-glass carrier. Where registered carriers come into play is in the projection and enlargement of sequential color separation negatives.

Heiland seems to have a subcontract arrangement with someone willing to make punches and register frames for them. Those don't appear equal to Condit in quality, but should be fine for certain purposes.

In the overall picture, the Kodak system itself was just an outlier, replaced long ago by better systems.

Koraks, I could be quite wrong about this, but I think I have a miniature register pin bar, brand new, that will fit the two close spaced punch holes of your punch. If this is incorrect, then anyone who knows, let us know.

I've had this for somewhere around 38 years as we moved a complete graphic arts house from the centre of the city to slightly out of the centre in 1977. From memory there were a box of these that were never really used as we had slightly recessed vacuum mats inside our Nu-Arc double sided swinging vacuum frames that enabled use of the standard height pins. The box containing these were being thrown out, so quite a few of us took one each. I always thought I would one day find a use for this, but it hasn't happened and with life progressing somewhat, I don't see myself ever using it.

I can give you more precise measurements, if you are interested?