Resurrection of MCC progressing

[Mackinaw]

Just got mine about five minutes ago via Fed Ex. Hope to make a few prints this weekend of a recent trip to California.

Jim Bielecki

 

[Matthew Gorringe]

I tried printing with some last night and am very impressed. I think it looks better than the original 111 with its whiter base. The shadows look very similar to the Agfa paper but the highlights really benefit from the bright base; there's a greater impression of contrast which is aided by the incredibly rich blacks. I'm using Dektol 1:3 and was surprised by the blacks, it's been a long time since I last had any 111.

I've used two sheets so far and will try another negative tonight.

I'm really looking forward to being able to order some in 12x16" Mirko!

 

[catem]

Have had my sample for a few weeks but life has conspired to keep me out of the darkroom - have hopes for later this week or early next week - feel v.hopeful of & looking forward to pleasing results after reading this thread...Will fill in and send back form as soon as done.

 

[Andrew Moxom]

Mine arrived while on the MN APUG trip up north. I hope to start souping flm from that trip this week and prints will be done on both MCC111 and Adox111 for comparison. I'm looking forward to it!

 

[Matthew Gorringe]

When evaluating this paper with a second negative I found it appears to have a fairly long toe and might benefit from pre-exposure, with only 5 sheets I didn't get to try this myself.

I'm interested to know whether others agree with this assessment and if anyone tries pre/post-exposing their samples.

 

[aldevo]

When evaluating this paper with a second negative I found it appears to have a farily long toe and might benefit from pre-exposure, with only 5 sheets I didn't get to try this myself.

I'm interested to know whether others agree with this assessment and if anyone tries pre/post-exposing their samples.

Interesting. I found AgfaPhoto MCC to have the shortest toe of any paper still available at the time of its discontinuance when AgfaPhoto folded. I would rate it even shorter than that of Kentmere FinePrint and almost as short as Kodak PC III. I later read in PhotoTechniqueues that they, too, found it to be short-toed.

Curiously, Agfa's own data sheets showed a characterisitc curve that appeared to include a rather long toe, much as you describe.

 

[Matthew Gorringe]

Interesting. I found AgfaPhoto MCC to have the shortest toe of any paper still available at the time of its discontinuance when AgfaPhoto folded. I would rate it even shorter than that of Kentmere FinePrint and almost as short as Kodak PC III. I later read in PhotoTechniqueues that they, too, found it to be short-toed.

Curiously, Agfa's own data sheets showed a characterisitc curve that appeared to include a rather long toe, much as you describe.

I too remember that Agfa 111 had a short toe when I was using it. I needed pre-exposure less often and in smaller amounts when using it than when using Gallerie or MG FB.

I have to stress that I haven't performed any objective tests, other than printing a fairly challenging neg, on the ADOX 111 so I may well be mistaken. I'm just keen to see what others think and, if anyone does try prexposure, how that works for them.

 

[Mick Fagan]

I have finally gotten around to testing the new ADOX B&W fibre based printing paper called “MCC® 111” and labelled Premium. The sample paper is a glossy surface.

According to the field study product evaluation sheet, which accompanied the beta stage samples I received, there is only one difference to the manufacturing process that has been carried out by former Agfa employees and former Agfa equipment in the manufacture of this new paper. The difference apparently, is the paper base of the ADOX MCC paper being a more brilliant white than the original Agfa MCC paper.

With this apparent difference in mind I selected a negative that was reminiscent of negatives I had printed years ago using Agfa MCC 111 glossy surface paper. I also pulled out my last unopened 25 sheet box of Agfa MCC glossy fibre paper, for a more direct comparison.

The idea was that I would have previous pictures on hand to compare with the new product, whilst the new, but old, box of Agfa paper, should be able to give me a realistic side by side comparison of the base whiteness of the paper. Sadly this was not to be, the Agfa paper had suffered from fog and was a lesson in not keeping sensitive materials long past their normal use by date.

I took three sessions in the darkroom to arrive at my final conclusions and prints. The reason was to ensure I could test the paper with the best possible print I could achieve, using the 5 sheets of 8x10” paper I had been given. The first session saw me cutting up one piece of paper into 4, 4x5” sheets. From these, I was able to deduce density and paper grade selection. These test pieces were force dried with a hair dryer, I used up three of the 4x5” sheets to decide how to expose my first full sheet. I then exposed my second sheet and gave it a non archival wash of about 5 minutes, then hung it up to dry from a clothes peg, just like in the movies. End of the first session!

The next day I carefully inspected the print and made some minor adjustments to density and paper grade, figuring I would be close if not on the money with this print. Viewing the second print in the light of a new day and with a fresh set of eyes, it was apparent I wasn’t on the money, close but not there.

In the third session, I exposed the last two sheets with a difference only of 1/16 of a stop difference in density. The final two prints are ever so slightly different in the highlights, whilst they are different; they are equal in the satisfaction department, as far as I am concerned!

The question of whether this paper has a brighter base whiteness I cannot answer, as I don’t have anything remotely similar to compare. My Agfa MCC prints are close to 10 years old and as such, I cannot be 100% sure that they have not gone a bit off.

What I can say though, is the new ADOX paper is brilliant in it’s overall rendition of tones. The paper has the ability to have good contrast, or a snap type of feature, yet not lose the subtle gradation in the highlights one often wishes to hold in a print.

Paper colour is often determined or can be changed by different developers, for this test I used Agfa Neutol Liquid NE at 1 + 7 dilution, developing for 2 minutes at approximately 21C. The colour of the print is slightly warm, which I prefer to a neutral or cool colour. The base whiteness is really very nice and bright and it probably is whiter than the Agfa product it is replacing, but I cannot be sure of that.

The contrast of this paper changes quite quickly, at least it did on my enlarger, which is a DeVere 504 with a diffused dichroic colour head. The quickness of the contrast change caught me out slightly. I normally change settings in ¼ grade contrast changes and sort of work around the halfway mark between grade zero through to grade five.

This negative with this paper was pretty much in the middle; I started at grade 2 ½, and then moved onto grade 2 ¾ a final filtration change of an additional 1/8 of a grade was required for my final two prints. The subtle contrast changes I made in the enlarger head are not unusual, what I found different, was the speed that the paper changed. It is as though the contrast grades have been compressed. A slight change in the enlarger head was producing a greater change in the paper contrast, than I have come to expect.

Agfa MCC, was previously a paper for portraits in my darkroom, this new ADOX MCC Premium looks like it will be used for a lot of my portrait prints in the future.

The negative I chose for this test was a (close cropped in camera) portrait, which basically encompassed the head, neck and some of the shoulders. For me, portrait paper must have the ability to portray skin, hair and clothing detail; this paper has done this for me.

This may appear as a bit of a ramble, but there has been a serious effort in producing beta samples, posting them around the world and this all in an environment where it is normal to pull products. As a result I took the offer of a beta sample seriously.

Mick.

 

[George Papantoniou]

It seems to me (I might be mistaken, of course) that if a paper has a short toe then it would need pre-exposure more often. The long toe sounds like a attribute of a photographic material that gives softer highlights and, therefore, will need pre-exposure less often...

Multigrade papers usually need pre-exposure more often than graded ones because of the fact that they are made out of two (or more) hard emulsions (with different spectral sensitivities) and the gradation is made up by the superimposition of two hard emulsion curves (one of them will be underexposed in case we print with a soft - yellow - filter). The problem is that the change occurs mainly in the middle tones and the shadows, leaving the highlights as they were (they are not affected that much from the underexposure), that is hard. This is a general rule for variable contrast papers, although many manufacturers have tried to solve it with various degrees of success (Ilford has made a good job out of it). I think that the new paper might suffer a LITTLE bit more from this VC-paper syndrome than the old, and this might be caused by the whiter base and not by a difference in the papers formula.

Anyway, I think that whoever might need a paper with a really good response to smooth highlight gradation has to opt for a graded one...

 

[Mick Fagan]

Anyway, I think that whoever might need a paper with a really good response to smooth highlight gradation has to opt for a graded one...

George, that may have been your findings but in my case I didn't have any problem with highlights not being smooth in their gradation. In my limited experience with this paper, I had beautiful highlight gradations.

If you click on my gallery, you will see the actual final print I made for the ADOX test.

I scanned it this morning and not less than two hours ago, the model saw this actual print and asked if we could do the rest of the prints from that session on this paper. The brilliance of the subtle changes in the highlights have made the ADOX MCC 111 print superior to the others I have made, the model saw this and went, "wow, I like this print, what did you do?"

I realise that different subjects and different film paper combinations in different darkrooms, can and do make the world of difference. For me though, this paper will, in the future, have a place in my range of printing possibilities. I just hope it will be available in this country and if it is, at a price I can afford.

Mick.

 

[George Papantoniou]

Hi Mick,

I certainly agree with you that - for a variable contrast paper - the new MCC 111 has smooth highlight gradation... graded papers belong to a different category, as I explained in my previous post.

 

[Mick Fagan]

George, I see the error in my ways.

I carefully re-read your post, I now know you were not talking specifically about this paper. I had the actual ADOX prints on my desk when I read your post, referred to them and just started writing.

Mick.

 

[aldevo]

Has anybody tried to tone this new ADOX 111 yet?

I recall Agfa MCC as being very receptive to taking on a nice brown tone with bleach/sepia or polysulfide toning, but it's response to selenium was minimal. In selenium there was very little improvement in the blacks (though MCC blacks were always excellent to start with...they didn't need any help)! and the overall tone shifted negligibly.

I'd be curious as to whether that's changed at all..

 

[Matthew Gorringe]

It seems to me (I might be mistaken, of course) that if a paper has a short toe then it would need pre-exposure more often. The long toe sounds like a attribute of a photographic material that gives softer highlights and, therefore, will need pre-exposure less often...

Multigrade papers usually need pre-exposure more often than graded ones because of the fact that they are made out of two (or more) hard emulsions (with different spectral sensitivities) and the gradation is made up by the superimposition of two hard emulsion curves (one of them will be underexposed in case we print with a soft - yellow - filter). The problem is that the change occurs mainly in the middle tones and the shadows, leaving the highlights as they were (they are not affected that much from the underexposure), that is hard. This is a general rule for variable contrast papers, although many manufacturers have tried to solve it with various degrees of success (Ilford has made a good job out of it). I think that the new paper might suffer a LITTLE bit more from this VC-paper syndrome than the old, and this might be caused by the whiter base and not by a difference in the papers formula.

Anyway, I think that whoever might need a paper with a really good response to smooth highlight gradation has to opt for a graded one...

Yes maybe I have my terms mixed up George, I should have described exactly what I was seeing. My experience with this paper is that there isn't a lot of contrast in the highlights. That is a largish density change on the negative doesn't result in a correspondingly large change in visible density in the highlights. This is what I mean when I say it has a long toe.

The reason I mentioned it at all was only because I remember the old Agfa paper behaved differently in the highlights. I agree that the new whiter base might be the reason for this, or it may have to do with my old cold light source. I'm not suggesting that this is a negative thing either, just that it seems different and I was wondering if others were finding the same thing.

I have attached scans of the two prints that I made to test this paper. In the one with the buildings there are two important areas for the highlights. The sunlit building needs to be separated from the sky immediately to its left and the buildings on the distant horizon to the right also need to be well differentiated. At the same time the main face of sunlit building needs just the tiniest bit of tone. I chose this neg because I knew it would be a good test of highlight response. It is usually printed on Gallerie grade 3, I used a no.2 filter here. You can see that I probably did need a pre-exposure to get what I wanted from this print. That's no big deal and not unecpected with many papers. My memory is that I did not need one when I first made a print on Agfa MCC111 about 3 years ago which is why I mentioed it in the first place.

The other neg (of the wall and tree) was selected to test shadow response, which I thought was the real strength of this new paper. In this case I found the highlight response an advantage in keeping the sunlight rocks light and increasing the overall effect of contrast. This was printed with a no. 2.5 filter. I didn't ever achieve as good a print as this from this neg on Agfa MCC111.

 

[Matthew Gorringe]

I just hope it will be available in this country and if it is, at a price I can afford.
Mick.

I think we might have to organise a group purchase from OS Mick. Getting a distributor involved will only make it more expensive.

 

[George Papantoniou]

Dear Matt,

I see what you mean, however I still think that what you're saying is that this paper has HIGHER highlight contrast and not the contrary. You see, when a paper cannot render fine detail in the highlights (the tones seem to blend to a uniform white) that means that the local contrast is high, not low.

Anyway, your point is now clear. I have to suggest that if you have printed on the new paper using a different enlarger head, this could very easily lead to a change in highlight (or shadow) contrast - I am not sure about which of the two it would be...

To all you guys down under wanting to use the paper, I would recommend ordering directly from Mirko, his company is really reliable, the guys and girls working there very kind and the service really quick.

 

[mikeg]

Has anybody tried to tone this new ADOX 111 yet?

I recall Agfa MCC as being very receptive to taking on a nice brown tone with bleach/sepia or polysulfide toning, but it's response to selenium was minimal.

I've still got a couple boxes of Agfa MCC left, which I'm using as my standard fibre paper. So I exposed a couple of images using my Agfa MCC times and filtration values on both papers. The image on the Adox paper seemed to come up much faster than the Agfa one in the developer (Ilford Warmtone) -- not sure why. Other than that, the two papers behaved identically. The exposure and filtration for both seemed identical.

The paper base is much brighter and whiter than the old Agfa one. This means that the image appears slightly colder to me. I think I preferred the old base, but a quick very weak sepia tone will bring some of that back.

I tried selenium toning the Adox paper and like the Agfa one, there was minimal response. I left it in selenium 1+10 for a good 20 minutes and no discernable colour change. So if you want plummy, aubergine colours then it'll have to be something else like Ilford Warmtone.

Haven't tried sepia yet.

In conclusion though I really like it. It still has the excellent tonality of the old Agfa paper that I like. Well done Mirko and everyone. Now all you have to do is get it into production and importantly get the pricing right and I'm sure you've got a winner on your hands.

Many thanks for letting us test it.

Mike

 

[jstraw]

I'll have scans to post soon but here's my initial impression...

I made two prints...to the extent that's doable with 5 sheets. The second print I duplicated as closely as possible with Kentmere (my primary paper) to the nearest 1/4 stop for soft and hard exposures.

The MCC seems about 1/2 grade softer and 3/4 stop slower. Wet, it seemed to hace richer, cooler blacks and the paper base seemed to be of comparable brilliance.

They toned completely differently. I use Selenium 1:3 for 6 minutes on Kentemere for permanance and to cool the blacks a bit more. That time/dilution shifted the MCC well over to the warm/eggplant realm. This only signifies that I'd need to develop a different toning regime for the MCC.

I'm not able to report anything about drydown from the sample.

I like the paper. I don't know it well enough to love it. I'd have to know it well enough to love it in order to decide to buy it, rather than the Kentmere as my staple. I'd also need to know how the price will compare and what sizes it will come in. I plan to start printing the Kentmere 12x16 and the availability of the MCC in that size would factor into my purchasing plans. Having my 12x16 in the same emulsion as my 8x10 and 11x14 is a big plus for me.

 

[Uncle Bill]

I have not seen my package of MC111 yet. So I can't comment.

 

[sienarot]

Mine just arrived this afternoon, so atleast we know it's making its way into Canada!

Can't wait to try it out.

 

[Nick Zentena]

Is FreeStyle sending the stuff out?

I haven't received mine either but my film order from Freestyle took about 2weeks or so. Felt longer.

 

[RoBBo]

Any news yet as to when this will be readily available?
I'm just finishing out my last box of MCC.

 

[ADOX Fotoimpex]

Answers

First of all I would like to thank all of you for the very helpfull and competent answers and feedback.
We have not received one answer which we would consider beeing not helpfull.

While we are still evaluating the feedback you gave, I would like to answer to the most common questions in advance.

Question: When will MCP *new* be available ?
Answer: Hopefully in about 4 weeks.

Question: When will MCC *new* be available ?
Answer: About in July 2008.

Question: Why do you make MCP first even though the whole world goes crazy about MCC ?
Answer: Because coating fibre products is a messy job. The dust gets all over the coating line and is extremely cost intensive to clean. The production line which we rent in order to make MCP is not available to us for making MCC.

Question: So how do you plan to make the fibre base paper then ?
Answer: We have a preferred coating line in consideration which will be available to us from June next year on. On this line we can make fibe based products.

Question: Who will sell the product in the US and Canada ?
Answer: We are negotiating with a major US supplier for a distribution which will also enable local resellers to obtain and sell the product.

Question: How expensive will MCC be ?
Answer: We will carefully evaluate the market conditions and price the product acordingly. Our goal is to stay in business with this project and do not follow the path of Agfaphoto. Thus the product will not be as cheap as Agfa was on certain markets but also not outrageously expensive.
Ilford´s current price level is a good guideline.

Question: Will there be different surfaces available ?
Answer: Not in the first production run because this is already in preparation. The first MCC available will be glossy. Later on we will introduce a matt surface.

Question: Why did you change the image tone of the base ?
Answer: Because we wanted to improove the paper and acording to our market studies undertaken before the majority of the people preferred a neutrally white base.

Question: Will you make a creamy base color like Agfa MCC had for those who preferred this ?
Answer: We are planing to do so if we feel that sufficent demand exists. We are currently working on a technique to make both colors is one coating run.

Question: Some batches of MCC had stability problems in the past. Will your MCC have this problem too ?
Answer: No. We undertook major changes in stabilizing the paper. Agfa has a very high technology advantage over other manufacturers due to its state of the art knowledge about color emulsions. We managed to transfer silverchloride emulsion stabilisation technique from CN films into the new MCC. The paper is now very stable. Agfa could have done this as well but there was no great interest in the b/w product line while they were making almost 90% of its turnover with CN films.

Question: I have asked yoo to send me MCC samples but I have not received a reply or samples. Will you still send out samples ?
Answer: I am very sorry about this. We received a lot of requests in the past 4 weeks. As this is a project and not a regular sales item all requests need to be handled individually. Currently I am weeks behind in answering requests beeing sent to mccproject(at)adox(dot)de. But we do punch in the addresses for sending out samples.
Everyone who sent an email will be considered for the next 500 sample packs which we are currently making. Once these are out we need to recoat.

Again, thank you all for your support.
We hope to bring this paper to a great success and make it available to you for the next 150 years of analog photography.

Best regards from Berlin,

Mirko

 

[Ian Grant]

Great news Mirko.

Ian

 

[pentaxuser]

Good news about MCP. I had no idea that it would be available so soon. In what surfaces will it be available and what will be the distribution network in the UK?

I started with Ilford at a night school course then had the opportunity to buy some MCP glossy at a very good price. Blacks seemed to be particularly deep and I probably made the best print ever of a group of motorbikes. The blacks and chrome really shone.

I have been very satisfied with Ilford since MCP's discontinuation but I'd try it again for certain subjects.

pentaxuser