Lodima Fine Art Toners

chrisf

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I read in the thread about developers for Lodima some don't tone because they are concerned about losing the beautiful tone of this new paper.

I follow Michael's formula for toning and can say the paper looks beautiful when toned using this method. For some subject matter I use twice the amount of Kbr that is in his formula. This warms the print slightly.

I would like to open a discussion on different toning methods to achieve a different color in the final print. Has anyone used gold or other toners and what effects do they have?
 

jovo

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chrisf

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John,

Yes, I was looking for experiences with Lodima. I realize Lodima is new so there might not be much experimentation done but I thought I would ask.

cf
 

vet173

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I've probably used at least 10 sheets just for 4x5 21 step tablets for toning. Tim will be able to write a whole new chapter on what you can do with this paper. I've toned with thiocarbimide, selenium and gold. I have been able to get tri-tone prints. My only recomendation is to do gold first. It works from the top down and the others from the bottom up. Trying to pull warm back to cool really wants to lead to pink most of the time. 2 min in gold @ 75 will go down to upper mids. Then selenium 50:1 for one min to lock in D-max tone. 10 seconds in cold bleach at a ( 1% ) not 10 percent, I usually only want to skim the top end. Thiocarbimide till I like it and a bleach pullback maybe if I feel like it. Toning at 90f. One thing I think might be a problem is when toning under the fan for the stove. ( Wolf gas stove, big suck required ) I would not be too generous with the light. especially on a bleach pullback. I got mud real quick. I now only use the room lights without the hoodlight. I hope what little I know about it was of some help.
 
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chrisf

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vet173, thanks, it was helpful. I purchased Tim Rudman's book about toning.

I have only done Selenium so far, 32:1 was too strong so I cut that back to 64:1 and compared a print I made on Azo Grade 3 and on Lodima Grade 3. The Lodima is slightly warmer than Azo. I used the recommended amount of Kbr but I've increased the amount of Amidol to 10g because after filtering there is at least a gram worth of sludge. I remember reading somewhere Michael talking about increasing the Amidol to (cool?) the print; I can't remember and couldn't find it.

I have some prints I will try the bleach and Thiocarbimide method on, I'm looking to change the color of the very top end slightly in these prints.

All in all I'm excited about this new paper and have made some prints I like very much.
 

c6h6o3

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chrisf said:
I have only done Selenium so far, 32:1 was too strong so I cut that back to 64:1 and compared a print I made on Azo Grade 3 and on Lodima Grade 3. The Lodima is slightly warmer than Azo.
Click to expand...

The operative word here is "slightly", aka "perfect". I've always toned Azo at 1:64 and sometimes got the tone I wanted, sometimes not. I'm delighted to see that selenium toner doesn't change the color of Lodima (that I can notice) and it's gorgeous.

Why in the world would you want to change it?
 

Shawn Dougherty

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Because different people have different tastes... =)

I change the color of mine by greatly increasing the KBR in my amidol and selenium toning at 1:50 for about 3 minutes. A beautiful, FLEXIBLE paper in every sense.

Shawn
 

c6h6o3

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Shawn Dougherty said:
Because different people have different tastes... =)

I change the color of mine by greatly increasing the KBR in my amidol and selenium toning at 1:50 for about 3 minutes. A beautiful, FLEXIBLE paper in every sense.

Shawn
Click to expand...

sounds like you like it even warmer than i do
 

Mahler_one

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I would second the suggestion to get in touch with Michael and Paula. Forty plus years of working with Azo type papers yields experience that cannot be duplicated.

Ed
 

Shawn Dougherty

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c6h6o3 said:
sounds like you like it even warmer than i do
Click to expand...

Indeed, Jim, I do like it warm. I print mostly 4x5 so when I mix 500ml of amidol I'm adding a full 3 grams of KBR directly (not in a solution) to the mix. This seems to balance out the slight purple of the selenium toning and ends up with a nice warm rusty look.

It really is a lovely colored paper straight up though. By far the nicest color of any silver chloride paper I've used - through my experience is admittedly limited.
 

c6h6o3

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Shawn Dougherty said:
I print mostly 4x5 so when I mix 500ml of amidol I'm adding a full 3 grams of KBR directly (not in a solution) to the mix.
Click to expand...

It warms the cockles of my heart to hear that another contact printer is making lots of small prints. Almost all the prints I showed at Steve's weekend this year were 4x5. People seemed to respond well to the intimacy of them.

As to the restrainer in your formula: by my reckoning your concentration of KBr is 20 times that which Michael Smith uses. Doesn't that restrain your developer, like...overly?

(The arithmetic: 10% solution is 10gr KBr in 100ml of water. Therefore a 30ml measure of 10% solution would contribute 3gr of solid KBr, which is what you use. Since MAS adds 3ml of 10% solution to 1 liter of amidol working solution and you're only using 1/2 liter of working solution, you end up with 20 times the concentration of KBr that he does. Wow.)
 

c6h6o3

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Shawn Dougherty said:
By far the nicest color of any silver chloride paper I've used
Click to expand...

and consistent. I've gotten the same color with Azo but only sometimes. This stuff seems to render it under all conditions. Go figure.
 

Shawn Dougherty

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Jim,
something about those 4x5 contacts..... Love em! Looking forward to seeing your work again soon!

I'd imagine there is some effect upon development though I'm no scientist.... I should mention I started using 5 grams of Amidol to make 500ml of developer. I did this to compensate for what I viewed as a loss of amidol because I was running the Chinese powder through a coffee filter. Maybe in actuality I'm compensating for the KBR? I'm still using a developing time of 1 minute at room temp. Prints are definitely fully developed and the water bath works as always.

Consistent indeed, though, all my experience thus far has been with the initial test batch.

P.S. I've also been working on a series of 2 1/4 contacts!
 
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chrisf

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Shawn,

I was filtering my Amidol through a coffee filter too until I read on M&P's site someone suggested a cotton ball in the funnel. I tried it and it worked faster than the coffee filter. So that is how I'm filtering it from now on.

I add extra Chinese Amidol because of the loss of sludge, ten grams per liter.
 

Shawn Dougherty

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I am using a #2 cone shaped coffee filter in a Melitta plastic conical single cup coffee brewer. I think that is the KEY. Works far better than the cotton ball in the funnel method (at least it has for me).

I've added a small pic of the Melitta product.
 

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jgjbowen

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Me thinks Shawn likes his coffee BLACK!!!! Sorry, I couldn't resist.
Thanks for the info
 
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chrisf

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Okay, I have done some testing with some toner recipes from Tim Rudman's book. I made two different bleach formulas (B1, B3) and the toner T3. Using this method I gave varying times in the bleach and then toned. The results were interesting but a little too yellow, which is what I was looking for, just not that much.

Next I used the bleach B1 with a different recipe for the toner. Stock B1 was made into a working solution of 1:9 and the test strips were bleached for 10, 15, 30 and 60 seconds. The toner I mixed was a stock solution of Thiorea and a stock solution of Sodium Hydroxide. I mixed the stock Thiorea 1:9 with 1 part stock solution of Sodium Hydroxide to make my working solution of toner.

After evaluating the strips I decided to try a print that had been Selenium toned and dried. I soaked the print in water a few minutes and then into the bleach for 10 seconds, into a wash for 30 and then into the toner for a minute. The tone this time was warm, very light brown, not too much yellow. I like very much the results I got with this print and toner combination.
 
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