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Pyrocat HD = low contrast?

EASmithV

Member
Joined
Aug 22, 2008
Messages
1,985
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Virginia
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Large Format
Well, I have noticed a definate trend in all the sheets I soup with Pyrocat. I've been to lazy to actually contact print them yet, but putting them on the light table, shooting with a dig**al and inverting in photoshop is rendering very low-grade results.

When I print them, will they still be as low contrast?
 

Who knows?

If your goal is to print the negatives in the darkroom, why not just do that and evaluate what you get?

If the goal is the scan the negatives and make digital inkjet prints, try that and see what you get.

Pyrocat-HD, when used with normally exposed negatives, should not yield low-grade results.

The best course of action is to try to get over your lazy habits and find out the answers to your questions for yourself.

Sandy King
 
Last edited by a moderator:
If they're processed correctly, they won't be hard to print. Pyrocat is not an inherently low-contrast developer.

I agree with Sandy though - the proof is in the printing.
 
Perhaps lazy was a poor choice of words, as I can't really set my darkroom up at 11:45 (I'll be up all night). I just wanted to know if I should go and pick up some multi contrast filters before I set up my darkroom tomorrow (my last set got wet and they smeared out), and your answer is no, I shouldn't need them.

Thanks
 
You need them. Not every negative you make is going to print on a contrast grade 2.

A dichroic enlarger is a lot more convenient, though.
 
just print them! There really is no other way.
 
If exposure and developing are correct, Pyrocat negatives are not low-contrast. Again, it depends on the what the exposure was and how it was developed, and to a degree the light within the scene that was photograhped.
 
I would ask at Hybrid Photo dot com. Folks there should know about such things as analog to digital conversion of Pyrocat-HD-souped films.
 
one should maybe mention the old story that pyro-negs have a tendency to look less dense/ contrasty than they actually print...
 
I'm not a scanning expert, but I've found that I end up with low contrast scans if I set it to automatic mode. All the info is there so the adjustments are fairly easy. If you developed them to print on a #2 paper, you should be able to at least proof them without filters. Proofing on real paper is so easy and fast, that I'd just as soon do it in the darkroom anyway. Regading the filters, I'd go ahead and get them. You're going to need to get them anyway
 
Staining developers produce negative that look low contrast to the eye and yet will print very well. If they did not, we would not be using them or discussing them now.

Steve
 
Wanting to know if you should pick up multi-contrast filters or if Pyro is low contrast are two completely seperate questions. Can't help you on that first one. Sorry
 
Note that some of the stains that you get with pyro developers will actually act as a bit of a contrast filter. With wd2d+ I have not seen this effect. Unfortunately, those who advocate pyro developers sometimes fail to mention that they do so for specialized reasons e.g. for alt printing or for scanning. For silver printing, some of the pyros are not advantageous at all IMHO. For general purpose silver printing and some of the other stuff (alt printing and scanning), wd2d+ is my poison.

...and yes, everybody's mileage seems to vary....
 
The Pyrocat staining will interact with the colors in the filters if you decide to use filters (and also the possible color in your enlarger's light source), and the resulting contrast number may not be the same as graded papers. You need to decide whether to print with graded or VC. You will need filters if VC.
As Sandy and others suggested, you need to print them, especially before making more negs with the same methods.
 

Huuuum, I could be one of those persons you refer to, i.e. who advocate pyro developers but print with alternative processes, or develop for scanning. But, to that I would add that before I ever used pyro or printed with alternative processes I had been involved with silver gelatin printing for almost two decades.

From my experience if there is stain there is added contrast for silver printing, and this is true of all staining developers. For the record, going from least to greatest contrast added would be 1) Pyrocat-HD, 2) WD2D, and 3) PMK. You can see the results of my testing of this in my article on pyro stianing developers at unblinkingeye.com.

Caveat is that the actual color and intensity of the stain can be influenced by water supply, so very little is absolute.

Sandy King
 
sanking said:
From my experience if there is stain there is added contrast for silver printing, and this is true of all staining developers.
Click to expand...

The link, for reference (N.b. I link to page most relevant to this discussion):

http://unblinkingeye.com/Articles/PCat/PCat3/pcat3.html

An excellent article, Sandy, of course. But the way I read it, you are saying that the different stains affect different parts of the tone curve in different ways, which is a bit of a conundrum for those using VC/MG paper...



Putting this together with your comment just now that the intensity of the stain is also a variable, I think the question is: why use VC/MG papers with the pyros at all? Why not just use graded papers and avoid this extra complication altogether?

As for my results with wd2d+, I used distilled water from my lab when mixing the developer.
 

Keith,

The reason to use a pyro developer for negatives that are to be printed on silver gelatin VC papers is because of the unique type of highlight compression that one gets. There is no way to replicate it with any other type of compensating developer.

I have described the reasons for this several times both on APUG and on the LF forum. It is rather complicated to describe and understand and I would do it again now, but am rather burdened by other issues at this time. Perhaps a search on pyro staining developers with VC papers here on APUG and on the LF forum would answer your questions.

Sandy King
 
When I look at the original post, I wonder if the path changed somewhere from low contrast of scanned negatives to contrast of prints on gelatine. I get different (and better) results by scanning a gelatine print from a Pyrocat negative than by scanning the negative directly. I doubt that the color response of the scanner is much like the color response of either graded or VC papers.
 
Actually, I don't think this discussion has been about scanning at all. I was merely raising the issue of the stain acting somewhat like a contrast filter when you print the negs optically on VC/MG paper. Sorry if my comment led to confusion. (The topic of scanning pyro negs is interesting in itself and has some nice surprises, but I suppose we would discuss that at hybridphoto...)

As everyone says, the original poster should simply print the negs and see what results.
 
I find that when I print pyrocat negs I generally only use "hard" filters as the negs already provide the "soft" filtration. Say a 3.5 or grade 4 using Ilford MC filters.
 
One of the major reasons to use pyro staining developers is because of the unique type of highlight compression that these developers give with variable contrast silver papers. Gordon Hutchins explains the reason for this in his book, and I do also in my article on staining devleopers at unblinkingeye.com.

Now, assuming that you are exposing your negatives in a high contrast situation where you want to take advantage of the unique highlight compression of pyro stained negatives, it is better to develop the negative to a fairly high average contrast and then reduce print contrast with VC filters of #2.5 or less. If you do the opposite, ie devleop the negative to a low contrast and increaes print contrat with VC filters or #3 or higer, you will lose the special compresson effect because as the magenta in the filter is increased it blocks the low contrast green sensitive part of the emulsion that gives the highlight compression on the print.



Sandy King
 
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