New ILFORD Silver Gelatin Products ( Laser )

[JBrunner]

Please,

First off I agree with Ryan 100% that Americans are totally and completely lazy, they all want the instant gratification factor, which is a total and complete insult to anyone that takes art seriously.

I disagree, American are not, by in large, lazy. Most of them are, however, ignorant, malleable, and boorishly lacking in taste.

 

[Simon R Galley]

Dear Peter et al,

As always passionate arguements on both sides, and I think on balance more people do think it is a good thing than a bad thing...I affirm I think it is good
thing, the difficulty comes when we talk about art, craft, tradition and creativity...can this product 'duplicate' it, I think not...but I do think the ability to reproduce images on monochrome silver gelatin, either RC or FB has to be a benefit, think of all the monochrome images stored in museums or libraries that are right now being printed out on demand on colour or inkjet...

If we want to defend the medium of archivally permanent fibre base monochrome ( toned ) prints, we must make it better known, we must show how much better it is, we must explain why people need it, we must promote the people who use it and care for it, and the people you make them... and we must continue to innovate...otherwise ( output wise ) everything will continue to move toward inkothermalcolourdigioutput...

Also, I think its going to be pretty difficult to produce in a darkroom a 50" by 100 foot black and white fibre base silver gelatin mono print, in one piece! thats one of the things that does excite me about this product, now that will be some landscape... and my guess someone will do it very soon.! probably Mr.Carnie....

Simon ILFORD Photo / HARMAN technology Limited :

 

[David A. Goldfarb]

Also, I think its going to be pretty difficult to produce in a darkroom a 50" by 100 foot black and white fibre base silver gelatin mono print, in one piece! thats one of the things that does excite me about this product, now that will be some landscape... and my guess someone will do it very soon.! probably Mr.Carnie....

Simon ILFORD Photo / HARMAN technology Limited :

Now wouldn't that be a fine advertisement hanging in Grand Central Terminal--"The Ilford Black-and-White-o-Rama."

I hope the Ilford reps are talking to Duggal about this product, since they do big display graphics (including digital output to carpeting) and mural printing regularly.

 

[livemoa]

Digital imaging exists solely to take market share from traditional photography, and to create an endless rapid cycle of needs and solutions for those who are foolish enough to think that the next camera or computer or program will make up for a lack of art and craft. It is a shimmering wasteland of marketing, technobabble, machinegun snapshooters, and hacks, with a myopic fixation on the process, and has very little to do with photography, except to attempt its destruction. It has no tradition whatsoever.

Hmmm, yes, but that is marketing. There are plenty of "gear heads" out there who are always looking for the magic bullet, and some use film, and the marketers rely on them to buy the latest lens, or filter. And there are lots of people with motordrives on their film cameras who blast of half a role in the hope of getting somethoing good.

I think that to say that no good art is being created by digital process (and John, this is not aimed at you) is as silly as saying that no good photography has happend since roll film came along (though some large format photogs would argue this). If tradition alone proscibes art then we have a problem. Lately I have seen some trully impresive digital art by young Chinese artists

Don't get me wrong, I shoot 100% film, from 35mm up to 10x8. My colour work gets printed traditionaly as does my black and white. No light jets as yet. I do scan and proof on an inkjet at home, cheaper and faster than waiting for the lab, sort of like doing a sketch on the back of an envelope. I have no darkroom, and am unlikely to have one in the near future so a solution like the Ilford paper is a God send to me. No more black and white machine prints on RC, the oppurtunity to have input into the final print via an intermediate stage is great, if time consuming. Good on Ilford for keeping on and developing new products.

 

[livemoa]

I disagree, American are not, by in large, lazy. Most of them are, however, ignorant, malleable, and boorishly lacking in taste.

Ahh sounds just like home....

 

[thefizz]

Don't get me wrong, I shoot 100% film, from 35mm up to 10x8. My colour work gets printed traditionaly as does my black and white. No light jets as yet. I do scan and proof on an inkjet at home, cheaper and faster than waiting for the lab, sort of like doing a sketch on the back of an envelope. I have no darkroom, and am unlikely to have one in the near future so a solution like the Ilford paper is a God send to me. No more black and white machine prints on RC, the oppurtunity to have input into the final print via an intermediate stage is great, if time consuming. Good on Ilford for keeping on and developing new products.

Hi David,

What would you call your prints if you used this new paper?

Peter

 

[David A. Goldfarb]

The appropriate museum and gallery term I've seen for LightJet/Lambda/Chromira prints on Fuji Crystal Archive is "Digital C-Print," so a print on this new paper should probably be called a "Digital Silver Gelatin (or gelatin silver if you prefer) Print."

 

[livemoa]

Hi David,

What would you call your prints if you used this new paper?

Peter

Not sure, black and white fibre light jets?

In my experiance the only people who care about what my work is printed on are musem currators and other photographers. Very few of the people who buy my work express any interest in the process by which I printed them.

And just for interest sake, the lab I use here in Hong Kong is called "Digital Force", great name for a lab that does a lot of analouge printing. They do a lot of digital stuff for advertising signs on a light jet. I am hopeing that they will be able to use this new paper, their printer is great, and he listens.

 

[Bruce Watson]

Anyone can push a button on a keyboard and use the mouse to modify the image with little or no skill at all.

Such anger. Such prejudice. Such nonsense. This "conversation" reminds me of an old saying:

Never try to teach a pig to sing. It wastes your time and annoys the pig. -- Anonymous

I've annoyed you. For that I apologize.

I continue to support Ilford's effort to bring new products to market, and for diversifying into markets not previously served.

And now, for the sake of everyone, I'll exit this thread.

 

[kjsphoto]

Hello Bruce,

You didnt annoy me as that is your opinion. I just dont agree with it....

I only use ilford film also but I still think the paper is not going to help the trditional process at all...

 

[livemoa]

Hello Bruce,

You didnt annoy me as that is your opinion. I just dont agree with it....

I only use ilford film also but I still think the paper is not going to help the trditional process at all...

Really, well it looks like its going to help me, big time.

 

[kjsphoto]

How? By taking digital images from a digital camera and trying to mimic what the traditional photographer does?

 

[livemoa]

How? By taking digital images from a digital camera and trying to mimic what the traditional photographer does?

No, go back and read my earlier post

 

[Bob Carnie]

100ft mural,* Only in Canada you say* mmmmm?

I think this paper is a direct result of the condition our photographic world is in today, Every photoschool that I am aware of are dumping their wet labs and all the future young photographers are walking out with their Cannon D1.s.
I have seen a complete reversal in client base over the last 10 years in the Toronto market.
I think part of the hope with this paper is to put these units in some of the schools and show the students the wet print process, even though the original capture is not film, the final output is silver with the attributes of our historical silver print.
We have been commissioned to produce some historical images that the familys of the artist will not release the original negative to anyone. The only record now is a high rez digital scan.
On a personal note this new product is creating an awareness of silver, and allows us the flexibility to show artists both traditional and digital print.
And yes the reverse happens , a lot of the young shooters decide to try film and do get hooked on the nuances that film will give one and also the creative expression using permanent processes that is possible in the darkroom that they were not aware of.
Yes I am biased as I have invested in this machine,but to think that the product is the end of photography as we know it is pretty much out there.
What I see is many doors opening *photographically * not shutting and my traditional print business has never been busier since we bought this new fangled machine. How is that possible?

 

[clay]

Wow, this thread is HOT!

A question: If a photo is printed on this new silver gelatin paper, and it looks like EXACTLY like traditionally processed silver gelatin, do we really think anybody will care what was involved in getting it to that point? I had a boss one time whose favorite phrase was "Don't tell me about the pain, show me the baby". Yeah, he was sort of politically incorrect. But the point is, short of videotaping yourself engaging in the whole process from hitting the shutter button to mounting the print, there will be no way for anyone to tell how in the hell you made the print.

I don't think it is fraudulent to call a silver gelatin print a silver gelatin print, even if it did start digitally. It is merely a description of the substrate the image exists on. And if it is indistinguishable from 'pure' print, why should a buyer care how much pain went into making it? The photo won't be any better just because the photographer suffered more in making it.

Weird times.

The digital photographer will outright lie by calling his work traditional even though it is not. The problem is that the end buyer will once again be lied to and sold work that is completely fraudulent as in how it is advertised. The art and mastery of photography will be lost, as the masses will embrace the lazy digital world. If this papers dose indeed take off, you will see less and less using film which means less demand = less product = higher cost = film no longer being manufactured which is exactly what the digital corporation want.

This paper will do more harm than good but to many have on blinders and cant see their foot in front of their face. They just don’t get it until it is gone, then as usual they will scream and yell where did it go? We will say, you saw it and did nothing to help stop it.

It really is a sad day for sure…

Maybe it is time to go back to the brush, canvas and oils…

 

[JBrunner]

Wow, this thread is HOT!

A question: If a photo is printed on this new silver gelatin paper, and it looks like EXACTLY like traditionally processed silver gelatin, do we really think anybody will care what was involved in getting it to that point? I had a boss one time whose favorite phrase was "Don't tell me about the pain, show me the baby". Yeah, he was sort of politically incorrect. But the point is, short of videotaping yourself engaging in the whole process from hitting the shutter button to mounting the print, there will be no way for anyone to tell how in the hell you made the print.

I don't think it is fraudulent to call a silver gelatin print a silver gelatin print, even if it did start digitally. It is merely a description of the substrate the image exists on. And if it is indistinguishable from 'pure' print, why should a buyer care how much pain went into making it? The photo won't be any better just because the photographer suffered more in making it.

Weird times.

So you would be happiest with which? A print a master made himself, in his darkroom? Or a computer generated print of the same image?? By your reasoning, they are the same.
That is the crux of the matter to me. There is an Epson 2400 sitting 3 feet from me. A lightjet print of one of my images is a phone call away, the profiles with my lab resolved long ago. Maybe soon with the new paper.
The end product of either action is a machine made facsimile, and needs to be openly represented as such. It may be tough for some to swallow, but machine made prints are not original photographs. I'm not saying don't use them. I use them myself from time to time. What I am saying is that to misrepresent the product of these methods is both self serving and fraudulant. I have a Jasper Johns litho, and it is worth quite allot of money. Nobody said a facsimile can't have value. It is not however, an origional JJ, it is a lithograph. Should I represent it as an origional hand done Jasper Johns? Or would that be more than a little dishonest?

 

[Sean]

I'll say again that I have no problems with this new paper, but I think Clay makes it crystal clear that those working in the 100% traditional work flow will be the ones left with the responsibility of educating buyers as to what they are purchasing. Clay proves that digital printers WILL call their end product non-digital traditional work, or conveniently not mention the digital part (I have a hard time comprehending why people will do this and definitely find it fraudulent). I surely would never call my hand made traditional prints "ink jet prints" even if ink jets became the ultimate pinnacle of imaging and what everyone wanted to buy. This mentality is different for some of the digital crowd though, so here we are caught up in a perplexing situation. I'll 100% respect anyone producing these prints and selling them as digital prints, but I can't respect anyone in the slightest using this method and passing it off as a traditionally made print. I will also not respect someone shooting an image on dslr, applying a watercolor filter in photoshop, outputting that image to watercolor paper using watercolor inks AND calling the final work a "Watercolor Painting".. and yes I've seen them for sale on ebay and they were called "Watercolor Paintings" -this is what Clay is saying that it IS a "watercolor painting" because it was output on watercolor paper using watercolor inks. Why let anyone know a computer did it?.. Watercolor paper, watercolor inks, it's a watercolor painting right?.. does that not wreak of fraudulent behavior? I think the analogy is identical with silver. Now had the person sold the image as a digital watercolor or some such description or described the process then I'd totally respect that..
*also, when are the gelatin based inkjet papers with 'silver' inksets coming? Those will be another type of "silver gelatin" prints for sale as well..

 

[Helen B]

There's already an inkjet paper with the unfortunate name of 'Silver Rag', though it contains no silver. There's also a genuine baryta-based inkjet paper - it's not very good, but it does smell right.

I can see valid points in both sides of the discussion about the necessity or otherwise to add 'digital' to the description of a print made on silver gelatin paper. Is it intended as a simple description of the material, or is the method important as well? (That's a summary of the opinions already expressed. No need to answer more than has already been said, I think) I wondered how Christies, for example, describe digitally-produced works.

Here is an example. Its digital origin is admitted. Here is another example, a 'digital image on photographic paper'.

On balance, and hearing the other side of the argument, it seems like a good idea to include 'digital' in the description of prints made using media that pre-existed digital processes. It doesn't matter to some of us, but it certainly matters to others, and what is wrong with respecting their values?

Best,
Helen

 

[isaacc7]

Digital imaging exists solely to take market share from traditional photography, and to create an endless rapid cycle of needs and solutions for those who are foolish enough to think that the next camera or computer or program will make up for a lack of art and craft. It is a shimmering wasteland of marketing, technobabble, machinegun snapshooters, and hacks, with a myopic fixation on the process, and has very little to do with photography, except to attempt its destruction. It has no tradition whatsoever.

Give me a break. Digital exists because people love it. Most digital photographers will never ever go back to film based photography because it has too many advantages for them. that includes, for many people, image quality. It has all of photography's history to fall back on as far as "tradition" goes, just like photographer's relied on painting and cinema relied on the stage. Things change, people do great work, even with new fangled things like a motion picture camera, acrylics, or dry plates.

Isaac

 

[isaacc7]

Originally Posted by kjsphoto
Please,

First off I agree with Ryan 100% that Americans are totally and completely lazy, they all want the instant gratification factor, which is a total and complete insult to anyone that takes art seriously.

Right, and I suppose that you cook all of your meals from scratch, fix your own car, do your own dentistry... if you do cook all of your own food I'm willing to bet that you don't grow and/or slaughter your own food... The fact is that one man's "lazy" is another's expediency. No one is in a position to question anyone else's use of time. I suppose Cartier-Bresson was "lazy" since he didn't sweat and labor to get prints to his shows. You're right, he was only after "instant gratification" and was an inveterate lazy person. Never mind that he was an admittedly awful technician, he was one hell of a photographer and dare I say it, an artist.

Isaac

 

[kjsphoto]

No, go back and read my earlier post

I did and so what is your point?

have no darkroom, and am unlikely to have one in the near future so a solution like the Ilford paper is a God send to me. No more black and white machine prints on RC, the oppurtunity to have input into the final print via an intermediate stage is great, if time consuming. Good on Ilford for keeping on and developing new products.

You are still making digital prints so how is this helping traditional photography? You will still scan, upload and make input and have a machine make your final print via a lab. No matter how you look at it, it is still digital.

Don’t see how this will help anyone that wants to continue down the path of traditional hand made silver gelatin prints.

The way I see with the responses read most of these propel will scrap film all other buy the next digi piece of crap and make false fiber prints via digital.

Which means film will be harder and harder to get in time.

 

[kjsphoto]

Originally Posted by kjsphoto
Please,

First off I agree with Ryan 100% that Americans are totally and completely lazy, they all want the instant gratification factor, which is a total and complete insult to anyone that takes art seriously.

Right, and I suppose that you cook all of your meals from scratch, fix your own car, do your own dentistry... if you do cook all of your own food I'm willing to bet that you don't grow and/or slaughter your own food... The fact is that one man's "lazy" is another's expediency. No one is in a position to question anyone else's use of time. I suppose Cartier-Bresson was "lazy" since he didn't sweat and labor to get prints to his shows. You're right, he was only after "instant gratification" and was an inveterate lazy person. Never mind that he was an admittedly awful technician, he was one hell of a photographer and dare I say it, an artist.

Isaac

You are really starting to annoy me with your tripe. First off I do make all my meals from scratch and those that has visited me can attest to it, secondly I do all my own densitometry as well, like that is hard or something? Oh wait I forgot you are probably one of those digital shills that can only figure out an exposure by looking on the back of your digital camera or by scanning your neg into photoshop to fix it because you are to incompetent in the first place to get the exposure right form the start or compose properly and figure you will later fix it in photoshop.


I admit it, I don’t fix my own car but I have a Mechanic do it and not a computer. Isn’t that something, who would have thought that a person using their own hands still works on cars. Amazing thought isn’t it.

You are so full of yourself that it is totally and completely pathetic. You will never get it until it is too late and personally I feel sorry for you and your kind of thinking, as it is people like you that will destroy everything for the sake of I want it now and cant work for it as it is to hard attitude.

Cartier-Bresson was a painter by trade and understood tradition better than any of us so what is your point? He used film and his prints were made without the need for photoshop of computers. So you point is still not valid. You also didn’t mention, as I am sure on purpose, that he studied painting under a master painter and composition, which most today don’t know the first thing about. Look at his work and then go study painting and you will see a ton of comparison in regard to form and rules of composition; such as golden spirals, triangle and mean. This is why he was in your terms a hell of a photographer.

He didn’t need Photoshop to fix his screw up as he got it right in the first place.

 

[michaelsalomon]

Kjsphoto - YOU are full of BS. Your ranting on these matters awlays come across as childish, why so upset? Is it becuase you dont get the recognition you deserve becuase you use traditonal methods? I mean, is the digital hack using photoshop and an epson printer going to destroy the hard work you put into perfecting your craft or make it worth less? Will that digital hack outsell you at the next craft fair? (Goddamn those people who fall for fake photographs claiming to be real ones, those pretty epson prints of Yosemite always have em' whipping out there wallets dont they?) Curse those "photographers" who dont have the desire to create handcrafted images and dare try to call something a photograph that they made without the hard work and toil YOU put into your images!!! Curse them! For any artist worthy would surely be as dedicated to the craft as YOU! Such an angry lil' fella! So threatened by the digital hacks who need to look at the back of their camera to check exposure! They are destroying the sacred integrity of images of burnt tree bark! Lordy, lordy! The walls of art are CRUMBLING all around us! Thank God its up to YOU to march onward spitting nastiness and silliness about what is ART and what isnt, about who the decievers are and the TRUE artists are! Because, I mean...you have done so much...right?

Oh, I'll save you some typing time. I still use film, print in a darkroom, test all my own films, develop them myself, I even hang my own prints to dry!!!

or, if it makes you happy you can just assume Im one of THOSE people who use digital cameras and dont know an exposure value from my a**hole - Do you know how annoying it is to have to check the monitor on my camera EVERY time I make a photo? God, I have to do it all the time becuase I never know how to work that light meter thing! Thank god for photoshop! Ha! and thank god for those suckers at the art fair who open their wallets to buy my epson ink jet computer made prints! Its the intense colors that always hook em in...I feel bad for the b/w photographers booth next to mine - he prints in a darkroom and NEVER sells anything!

Mr. Saitta,
You are a joke.

 

[kjsphoto]

Kjsphoto - YOU are full of BS. Your ranting on these matters awlays come across as childish, why so upset? Is it becuase you dont get the recognition you deserve becuase you use traditonal methods? I mean, is the digital hack using photoshop and an epson printer going to destroy the hard work you put into perfecting your craft or make it worth less? Will that digital hack outsell you at the next craft fair? (Goddamn those people who fall for fake photographs claiming to be real ones, those pretty epson prints of Yosemite always have em' whipping out there wallets dont they?) Curse those "photographers" who dont have the desire to create handcrafted images and dare try to call something a photograph that they made without the hard work and toil YOU put into your images!!! Curse them! For any artist worthy would surely be as dedicated to the craft as YOU! Such an angry lil' fella! So threatened by the digital hacks who need to look at the back of their camera to check exposure! They are destroying the sacred integrity of images of burnt tree bark! Lordy, lordy! The walls of art are CRUMBLING all around us! Thank God its up to YOU to march onward spitting nastiness and silliness about what is ART and what isnt, about who the decievers are and the TRUE artists are! Because, I mean...you have done so much...right?

Oh, I'll save you some typing time. I still use film, print in a darkroom, test all my own films, develop them myself, I even hang my own prints to dry!!!

or, if it makes you happy you can just assume Im one of THOSE people who use digital cameras and dont know an exposure value from my a**hole - Do you know how annoying it is to have to check the monitor on my camera EVERY time I make a photo? God, I have to do it all the time becuase I never know how to work that light meter thing! Thank god for photoshop! Ha! and thank god for those suckers at the art fair who open their wallets to buy my epson ink jet computer made prints! Its the intense colors that always hook em in...I feel bad for the b/w photographers booth next to mine - he prints in a darkroom and NEVER sells anything!

Mr. Saitta,
You are a joke.

Thanks,

I could care less if I get recognition, the fact of the matter is digital is pure and worthless crap. You do not get it nor will you ever. It s funny when anyone does not agree with the digital BS they are labeled as a joke, whiner, baby, etc.. but low and behold if anyone challenges and put down analog we must run with our tail between out legs and say nothing.

You just don’t get it and you wont. I will not cave into the propaganda of digital and I will continue to be loud and outspoken on the matter no matter how I am perceived.

I wont even waste my time, as you will never understand why I am so against digital and what it is doing to the art field.

As long as an image is printed with ink or manipulated with a computer IT IS NOT ART nor will it even be considered art. It is graphic deign at best and lacks mastery of a craft which is something you just do not or will not ever understand.

I may be a joke, but you are apparently blind to your surrounding in the analog world and what is happening to the art world on a while, so that I guess makes you an idiot.

 

[michaelsalomon]

Well, thank god there are people like you who define art for us. Idiots like me would truly be lost without you.