Latest RA4 printing

So this was my final print from a day in my darkroom this week. Would love some feedback on my print as I’m still not confident as I’m completely teaching myself, never printed b&w and just went for colour because I mainly shoot colour (only been doing photography a little over a year). Oh and a wee bonus, I made my first ever contact prints.

Flesh tones look right. Nice work!
BTW, what software did you use to reverse the scans?

Mark Overton

albada said:

Flesh tones look right. Nice work!
BTW, what software did you use to reverse the scans?

Mark Overton

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Thank you! What do you mean to reverse them? I scanned the prints with my epson v850 on silverfast Ai.

Looks very good on my mobile phone. Vibrant red, clean whites, deep blacks and nice skin tones. Perhaps you could try to get some texture from the shirt but it is good already.

Can you give some additional details about the printing? Paper, chemistry, processor...

I used my jobo cpe2 (kindly donated to my darkroom) to process the print. I use Bellini Ra4 chemicals, Fuji matte paper and the print went through my 2 enlargers.

Robbie said:

Thank you! What do you mean to reverse them? I scanned the prints with my epson v850 on silverfast Ai.

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I think the previous poster missed your comment about making a contact sheet or didn’t realize that’s what you posted a scan of. Many people will scan negatives and reverse the color and remove the orange mask in software. While good for quick looks at your results, back when I did color printing I found contact sheets invaluable as starting points for color balancing any shots on the roll under significantly different lighting.

Roger Cole said:

I think the previous poster missed your comment about making a contact sheet or didn’t realize that’s what you posted a scan of. Many people will scan negatives and reverse the color and remove the orange mask in software. While good for quick looks at your results, back when I did color printing I found contact sheets invaluable as starting points for color balancing any shots on the roll under significantly different lighting.

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Yeah I’m definitely with you on that one. They don’t take long to make and I much prefer doing that than scanning negatives. I prefer to keep the whole process analogue until the very end, doing it all by hand keeps me excited and dialled in for the duration.

Robbie said:

I’m still not confident as I’m completely teaching myself

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Looks like it's about time to let go of that attitude
Your print looks great! Of course, judging prints on a computer screen isn't ideal. There seems to be two bands of lower density along the long edges that you might want to look into. Probably it's just a scanning artifact, but if the actual print shows them as well, it seems like you have a coverage issue in your enlarger or something partially blocking the light path.

koraks said:

Looks like it's about time to let go of that attitude
Your print looks great! Of course, judging prints on a computer screen isn't ideal. There seems to be two bands of lower density along the long edges that you might want to look into. Probably it's just a scanning artifact, but if the actual print shows them as well, it seems like you have a coverage issue in your enlarger or something partially blocking the light path.

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Thank you. So, I use a second enlarger and have a set of pre flash settings test strips if I want a certain look. It adds depth and density bit the paper was cut at rapid eye in London and it’s a bit curved, when I put it in the first enlarger it’s just on the base board so the middle has sat a bit higher, that’ll be why it’s slightly less effective at the sides. At least, I think that’ll be the reason.

Ok, sounds like that could be it. I wouldn't exclude the possibility of a lens coverage issue in either enlarger either. Something to check I suppose.

Robbie, you're on the money! Keep doing whatever you are doing.

The frame that you enlarged is extremely well done. The only thing possible is for minuscule improvements; if that.

The colour of her nails, colour of her rings various and colour of her skin is spot on. Bearing in mind I am looking on an uncalibrated little laptop, but it is very well done.

The only changes I would be thinking of doing, are density differences. The cream coloured top is a bit light looking, but one can certain;ly live with that. If you printed it with a bit more density, say 1/8 to 1/4 of a stop more density (darker), then watching her face to ensure you don't darken it too much. You may find that the wonderful highlights on her face may just enhance the whole image slightly more.

The contact sheet tells me that you didn't change your exposure between frames in both situations, the group with the trees are obviously more dense negatives, but are all the same density, same as for the red roller door group. Doing camera exposures like that will make your job in the darkroom easier as once you have dialled in one frame in a series, you can use your contact sheet for density reference in the darkroom for the minor adjustments in a group of frames.

Magenta and green are dialled in via the magenta filter, yellow and blue are dialled in via the yellow filter, Cyan and Red are dialled in via exposure. That is how you control very fine colour negative printing.

With regard to cyan and red, if you make your perfect colour print darker, then it will start to go reddish, if you pull the time and make it lighter, then the print will go cyanish. The effects are often not noticeable, but if you start out with this knowledge in your (presumably) overworked brain; it may help.

Robbie said:

Thank you. So, I use a second enlarger and have a set of pre flash settings test strips if I want a certain look. It adds depth and density bit the paper was cut at rapid eye in London and it’s a bit curved, when I put it in the first enlarger it’s just on the base board so the middle has sat a bit higher, that’ll be why it’s slightly less effective at the sides. At least, I think that’ll be the reason.

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Did you only get the paper from Rapid Eye, or have you tried other of their services?
Really well balanced print btw!

Frederik Robbie has not been here for 2 months. You might try to start a private conversation with him. It's all I can think of

pentaxuser

pentaxuser said:

Frederik Robbie has not been here for 2 months. You might try to start a private conversation with him. It's all I can think of

pentaxuser

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Ah, I see - thank you very much for the heads up!