Mounting with fluid techniques

[sperera]

So i have to get into fluid mounting cos i successfully mounted up a strip of negs the other day and the difference was amazing....no newton rings, no dust etc.....but then i tried to mount all of 9 negs under a sheet of A4 mylar the next day and i made a real mess!!!!!! absolute nightmare.....

so, could people come in with techniques for mounting with fluid without the mounting stations.....

im thinking of cutting strips of mylar for every 3 frames as opposed to an A4 sheet covering all 9 negs for example.....i need to find a way to contain the mounting fluid with is not as thick as I thought it would be but rather watery

 

[williamtheis]

i don't have a mounting station and don't really feel I need one. I use Kammi (from Aztek) and squirt it right on the flatbed scanners' glass (Creo Eversmart Pro2), plop the film down, squirt more kammi to cover, add a mylar sheet (also from Aztek) and wipe it down with micro fiber cloth taking care to remove all bubbles. What is it that you want to know exactly?

 

[sperera]

I have a drum scanner and im not nailing a tecnique to do it yet....im making big mess and wasting liuquid!!!!

Im using Kami SXL 2001 and you? its nearly like water so a nightmare to control........i was hoping someone could point me to a video link or something that shows how to mount without a mounting station on a drum scanner.....

i don't have a mounting station and don't really feel I need one. I use Kammi (from Aztek) and squirt it right on the flatbed scanners' glass (Creo Eversmart Pro2), plop the film down, squirt more kammi to cover, add a mylar sheet (also from Aztek) and wipe it down with micro fiber cloth taking care to remove all bubbles. What is it that you want to know exactly?

 

[Bruce Watson]

I have a drum scanner and im not nailing a tecnique to do it yet....im making big mess and wasting liuquid!!!!

Im using Kami SXL 2001 and you? its nearly like water so a nightmare to control........i was hoping someone could point me to a video link or something that shows how to mount without a mounting station on a drum scanner.....

There are videos on the Aztek website on their Kami page. Lower left corner. There's also a file in the files section of the Yahoo ScanHi-End group called something like "mounting 101" by Chris Brown that's an excellent step-by-step guide. The technique I use is based on Mr. Brown's method. It works pretty well for me.

Note too -- you are going to waste some fluid. It's considerably better to use too much and waste some than to use too little and screw up a scan. Then you have to tear down the drum, clean it up, and remount it all -- and you waste much more fluid than if you'd been liberal with it the first time through. And another sheet of mylar, and more tape. My personal theory is, if it's not dripping off the bottom of your drum while you're pulling the mylar tight just before taping the free edge down, you're probably doing something wrong.

You are doing this with a mounting station that's sitting on a light table, yes? If not, you should be. If fluid drips on the light table, who cares? It'll evaporate very quickly and it won't hurt anything.

 

[sperera]

thanks Bruce
as you know I'm getting the Linotype-Hell Tango with 2 drums a mounting station and the mac to run it all for 300 euros....will that mounting station help????? at the moment i dont have a mounting station and its all a bit impossible....i just cant think of a good way to do this successfully....i managed to do one strip of 3 negs the other day and the result made me KNOW wet mounting is the best way to scan bar none.....

There are videos on the Aztek website on their Kami page. Lower left corner. There's also a file in the files section of the Yahoo ScanHi-End group called something like "mounting 101" by Chris Brown that's an excellent step-by-step guide. The technique I use is based on Mr. Brown's method. It works pretty well for me.

Note too -- you are going to waste some fluid. It's considerably better to use too much and waste some than to use too little and screw up a scan. Then you have to tear down the drum, clean it up, and remount it all -- and you waste much more fluid than if you'd been liberal with it the first time through. And another sheet of mylar, and more tape. My personal theory is, if it's not dripping off the bottom of your drum while you're pulling the mylar tight just before taping the free edge down, you're probably doing something wrong.

You are doing this with a mounting station that's sitting on a light table, yes? If not, you should be. If fluid drips on the light table, who cares? It'll evaporate very quickly and it won't hurt anything.

 

[Bruce Watson]

thanks Bruce
as you know I'm getting the Linotype-Hell Tango with 2 drums a mounting station and the mac to run it all for 300 euros....will that mounting station help?????

A mounting station is usually the difference between a good solid mount and insanity in the world of drum scanning. Will it help? Oh yeah.

 

[sperera]

good, cos i tried again today and made another mess....it was so frustrating....normally im adept at this sort of thing.....the Helidelberg mouinting station will be a welcome addititon!!

A mounting station is usually the difference between a good solid mount and insanity in the world of drum scanning. Will it help? Oh yeah.

 

[Bruce Watson]

good, cos i tried again today and made another mess....it was so frustrating....normally im adept at this sort of thing.....the Helidelberg mouinting station will be a welcome addititon!!

On more time -- use the mounting station on a light table. You want the light table so that you can see through the drum and through the film. This will help you line everything up. Most importantly, this will help you see bubbles and things that you can push out (put some drum cleaner on a wipe (so you don't risk scratching the overlay) and push the bubble to the edge of the film, then off the film -- takes some practice but at that stage, what else do you have to d0? It's either that or tear it all down and start over).

 

[Bob Carnie]

Bruce

Quick queston on mounting negs or trans.

If I mount multiple images wet, and then do batch scanning , how long, or how do you take advantage of pre mounting a lot of images , BEFORE the fluid, gel becomes problematic.

Can you have a mounted drum sit over a couple of days ? and if so are there any tips on keeping the setup intact and ready to mount to the scanner.

I am planning on large volumne projects that will involve hundreds of scans.

any help would be appreciated

 

[Bruce Watson]

If I mount multiple images wet, and then do batch scanning , how long, or how do you take advantage of pre mounting a lot of images , BEFORE the fluid, gel becomes problematic.

Can you have a mounted drum sit over a couple of days ? and if so are there any tips on keeping the setup intact and ready to mount to the scanner.

I'm hardly an expert. It'll take a Tim Vitale or equivalent to tell you about the archival aspects of it with any authority. I can only talk with authority about my own experience, not the actual science of it.

Drum scanner mounting fluid is designed for the job. It therefore is harmless to the film, and to the drum. If you clean the film with film cleaner after scanning, it's usually cleaner (and therefore more archival) than when it was first handed to you. If you clean the drum with drum cleaner (*not* film cleaner, which will destroy a drum fairly quickly) you'll get everything off the drum without much problem.

The thing that will limit how long you can keep a drum mount active is the tape -- the scanner mounting fluid dissolves the adhesive. It's pretty slow, but it does happen. That's what drum cleaner is really good for -- cleaning the tape residue off the drum.

So think about what happens when the adhesive is completely dissolved along some part of the tape. There's two things that happen there. First, if you spin it, you can spin out some of the mounting fluid -- might form bubbles which ruin the scan. Second, the fluid can evaporate out that hole, same problem, or you start to develop Newton's Rings in places because of the lack of fluid.

I've never had a problem with letting mounted film sit on the drum for a couple of days. It's useful to do that sometimes -- working too late at night is a recipe for a less-than-your-best scan, so letting a drum sit overnight so you can setup and scan in the morning when you are fresh is sometimes the right thing to do.

The longest I think I had film mounted on a drum is like four days. I was doing some testing, scanning the same film over and over and trying to figure out what was happening. Took several days, then I took a couple of days off (thinking I'd torn down that mount). When I discovered it I torn it down immediately. All I found was that a fair amount of the fluid had evaporated. Didn't hurt the film. Didn't hurt the drum.

I try not to make a habit out of it. But I don't worry too much about it either. But of course, using different chems, different drums, different films, etc. means that YMMV.

 

[Bob Carnie]

Thanks Bruce

 

[erikhatt]

I use SDS drum cleaner and film cleaner. SDS mounting oil or SDS mounting gel.
What are you folks using? Is there products that can compare to SDS? I tested Kami, but that ruined one of my drums, so no i use Kami for igniting the coal in my barberque in the garden.