Masking paper borders when tea/coffee toning

logan2z · Monday at 6:57 PM

I've been thinking about trying to tone/stain some prints using tea or coffee, but I print with borders and want those to remain unstained.

Can anyone recommend the best way to mask the borders so they are not affected by the stain? Hoping to find something that can be applied/removed easily without damaging the paper surface.

pentaxuser · Monday at 7:04 PM

Isn't Frisket the usual way. It forms a kind of a PVC mask by painting it on, thus preventing the tea from staining the border

pentaxuser

logan2z · Monday at 7:36 PM

pentaxuser said:
Isn't Frisket the usual way.

I don’t know or I wouldn’t have asked

Have you ever tried it on glossy fiber paper?

darkroommike · Monday at 7:40 PM

Technically what you are doing is staining not toning. And staining show up best on white borders (or white dress shirts). You could try frisket, a liquid rubber cement like material (or rubber cement I suppose) or masking off the borders with blue masking tape. Fiber paper adds a layer of complication since the base is permeable to the staining agent. Dick Blick Supply would be one source.

pentaxuser · 2025-09-23T09:31:34-0400

logan2z said:
I don’t know or I wouldn’t have asked

Have you ever tried it on glossy fiber paper?

No I have never tried the stuff at all because I have never tried masking but it is mentioned by a good number of people in posts, such as darkroommike, and I have seen it used on videos where it seems to work just fine

John Finch uses it in a video with fibre paper and it worked fine. Was it Glossy? Again I cannot recall but I see no reason why Glossy should make any difference

You must excuse my British diffidence or lack of assertion when answering posts by saying "Isn't Frisket the usual way?"

pentaxuser

jeffreyg · 2025-09-23T12:10:55-0400

Check blue masking tape because it can be too sticky and mess up the paper. You might try drafting tape which is not so sticky. I have never done what you are trying to do but I have used it on paper before as masking for pvs cement when making hand made books.

Andrew O'Neill · 2025-09-23T12:54:38-0400

I found it easier to just trim off the borders, them mount on matt board.

Patrick Robert James · 2025-09-23T15:55:44-0400

Friskit works fine for toning, but I doubt tea staining wouldn't bleed under the Friskit. It might not bleed far enough to be noticeable depending on print size. I've never tried Friskit with staining. I usually just let the borders do whatever since I mat up to them.

I don't know if it is still made but there used to be sheet Friskit that could be used like tape.

There also used to be a red photo Friskit that was fantastic but that hasn't been made for a couple decades at least now. I used to use the red stuff back in the 90s when I split toned prints.

DREW WILEY · 2025-09-23T16:24:21-0400

Not blue masking tape. Dkrm solutions can soak through those. I have successfully used what's described as a black Premium Archival masking tape, which I can't find under that specific description anymore. I don't know if anything at Blick corresponds to that; they offer several different black masking tapes, and I'd have to test them. I suspect that the actual manufacturer is Intertape; but since I still have half a roll left, I've been a bit lazy doing my homework going forward.

But in the case of FB black and white prints, I always trim the borders off anyway in conjunction with drymounting.

pentaxuser · 2025-09-23T16:24:34-0400

Patrick Robert James said:
Friskit works fine for toning, but I doubt tea staining wouldn't bleed under the Friskit. It might not bleed far enough to be noticeable depending on print size. I've never tried Friskit with staining. I usually just let the borders do whatever since I mat up to them.

Why would tea toning bleed under the Frisket any more than other toners such sepia?

Thanks

pentaxuser

jeffreyg · 2025-09-23T16:50:31-0400

Good drafting tape is acid free. I don’t recall the brand. I would have to check my supplies.

DREW WILEY · 2025-09-23T16:59:11-0400

Not acid-free drafting tape either. It's not the acid-free feature that counts in this case, but a difference in the thickness and permeability of the tape itself. But I don't think any kind of tape will produce a completely hard edge with FB paper, since a bit of solution can potentially sink below it. I never tried Frog Tape, even when I had a roll of it laying around.

MARTIE · 2025-09-23T17:40:13-0400

I really don't see the point of masking FB paper since the staining will simply come through the back of the print anyway. Or even seep from the unmasked part of the print into and under the masked off area's of the print.
Simple capillary action, surely?

DREW WILEY · 2025-09-23T17:48:32-0400

Current FB papers are especially open-weave. Masking edges works a lot better with RC and PET bases instead.

logan2z · 2025-09-23T20:35:58-0400

Andrew O'Neill said:
I found it easier to just trim off the borders, them mount on matt board.

DREW WILEY said:
But in the case of FB black and white prints, I always trim the borders off anyway in conjunction with drymounting.

I always corner mount my prints, I never dry mount them. Of course matting up to the edge of the printed image will hide the stained borders, but I wanted to keep the borders unstained for a 'clean' look when viewing the loose print.

I'll give Friskit a try and just live with stained borders if that doesn't work effectively.

Thanks for all the responses.

DREW WILEY · 2025-09-23T20:39:49-0400

Corner mounting only works for small prints; but if that's what you're doing, like for sake of album presentation, I understand your objective of keeping the borders clear. Good luck with your experiments in that regard.

mshchem · 2025-09-23T20:46:14-0400

You could go old school and use abrasive to remove the emulsion. Of course this is equally difficult to control. Sounds impossible to me, at least to my skill set.

logan2z · 2025-09-23T21:01:24-0400

DREW WILEY said:
Corner mounting only works for small prints

I guess it depends on what you mean by 'small'. I corner mount 8x10 and 11x14 fiber prints without any issue. I guess by today's standards those are small, but I think they're juuuust right

DREW WILEY · 2025-09-23T21:30:19-0400

Without any issue? What if you encounter cyclical diurnal humidity changes, or display the prints in a problematic humid climate? Keep that in mind if you ship them somewhere else. Paper is not dimensionally stable. But staying small does lessen the risk somewhat, not entirely.

mshchem · 2025-09-23T23:12:05-0400

The only flat prints I have are dry mounted. Of course RC prints lay flat. I have a strategic reserve of Kodak Print Flattening solution. Pretty sure that stuff was intended for glossy single weight mass production. I've never had the nerve to try it.

logan2z · 2025-09-23T23:19:08-0400

mshchem said:
The only flat prints I have are dry mounted.

I use a dry mount press to flatten my fiber prints. That usually gets them about 80-90% of the way there. Then they're flattened under heavy books for a few days which gets out the last bit of 'wave'. The only part of the print that usually remains less than flat is the very edge, which often has a bit of frilling. But that doesn't seem to cause any real problem when matting/framing.

mshchem · 2025-09-23T23:27:59-0400

logan2z said:
I use a dry mount press to flatten my fiber prints. That usually gets them about 80-90% of the way there. Then they're flattened under heavy books for a few days which gets out the last bit of 'wave'. The only part of the print that usually remains less than flat is the very edge, which often has a bit of frilling. But that doesn't seem to cause any real problem when matting/framing.

My wife the professional curator/director, insisted on hinge mounting a quite flat print, probably 20 years. Like Drew mentioned just relative humidity has gotten to it. I'm a better printer today, I'm going to reprint and dry mount it

Masking paper borders when tea/coffee toning

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