Reversal paper negs, hypo in 1st or 2nd dev?

I trying to make positive images from the paper negatives I get when using BW paper in my folder cameras.
I'm using permanganate bleach.

Those of you who has done this, did you put hypo in the 1st or 2nd developer or not at all?
And if you did, what percentage did you use?

absolutely NO hypo at all in the developer--use a paper developer too--not a strong film developer--paper developers will not produce fog where a film developer will.

if there is any residual yellow or even some dark silver you can bleach it away after second development using ferricyanide bleach by inspection--just use a very very dilute bleach 1g/litre say of ferricyanide...then a final fix.

The high contast of paper makes this produce nice, striking portraits--just remember you're going to be needing to shoot at ei=-0.5 to 1.0 or so depending on your light source.

I am interested to read some more on the process you use for paper reversal (if the paper you use is a fibre-based one), I tried once to do it using Kodak Ektalure and I failed, although the tone reversal was OK I had high Dmin and lots of yellow spots on the prints, due to inadequate removal of the bleach from the paper !! (you can read some info I posted a long ago here: (there was a url link here which no longer exists))

I have acquired some of the new direct positive paper by Ilford but haven't done any tests yet, so all this might prove unnecessary as I might get the desired results easily with the new paper, but knowing how to do it successfully without the need of a special type of paper is always interesting !

for the newly available ilford panchromatic paper--I've only used the RC paper to this point, but have successfully reversed other fiber papers with no residual bleach stain. I think that people attribute bleach stain to actual silver which can be bleached away later--you should try to bleach away your supposed "bleach spots"--they may be silver.

expose at EI=12 (for strobes--I have not tested in daylight/tungsten)

pq universal 1+9 standard for first developer for 2-3 minutes say warm room temperature 77 degrees 25 centegrade

rinse, bleach--dichromate bleach 2 minutes...then wash the bleach away with water rinses, use a clearing bath, re-expose for 2 mintues and re-develop with the same developer you used. then wash and fix

when this stuff is fresh, the whites are white--but even then there's still a bit of brown/pink which may remain--this stuff is silver fog which was developer in the second developer...after a while in holders (not that long--a few weeks), they starte to develop fog--so your second development will be brown looking and eventually you'll get some black silver starting to come in the whites as it ages more...what you do is just put it in a ferricyanide bleach (1g/quart or litre)--only long enough for the whites to clear back to pure white...then re-fix and you're done.

this stuff is GREAT.

johnielvis said:

absolutely NO hypo at all in the developer--use a paper developer too--not a strong film developer--paper developers will not produce fog where a film developer will.

if there is any residual yellow or even some dark silver you can bleach it away after second development using ferricyanide bleach by inspection--just use a very very dilute bleach 1g/litre say of ferricyanide...then a final fix.

The high contast of paper makes this produce nice, striking portraits--just remember you're going to be needing to shoot at ei=-0.5 to 1.0 or so depending on your light source.

Click to expand...

What you say may work very well, but you are incorrect about the relative strengths of film and paper developers.Paper developer is significantly more active than are film developers. If you don't believe this, try developing a sheet of paper in your favorite film developer.

my conclusions are from my own experience and experiments. In other words, I HAVE tried it. Apparently you have not tried it and are thus passing on bad information based upon speculation.

I'm not talking about a wimpy film develoepr here--I'm talking about the STRONG kind required to reversal process film.

Try it yourself--take a strong film developer like d-19 and try to develop paper with it--you'll get fog developing LONG before a paper developer starts to darken. It's the nature of the beast--there are more restrainers in paper developer.

You can check this out yourself under a safelight---have a race between the developers with unexposed paper--you'll see the fog coming up with the film developer where the paper developer remains clear.

+1 johnielvis to above and earlier post.

I have successfully used Dektol, PQ universal and Tetenal dokumol as both the first and second developer. I use a stop bath ( water and a spash of vinegar), before a dichromate bleach. I use my used B&W film reversal chemistry for my black and white reversal prints. My paper has by chance always been Ilford MGIV RC deluxe. I print my B&W trannies.

I only use a re-exposure time of 2 seconds with paper. Turning the room lights on and off.
With film its very different, I do it for 2 minutes close to a lamp.

Another difference is you don't seem to need clearing with paper (permanganate bleach).
With film theres a brown layer that is not possible to wash off, but with sodium metabisulfite it clears instantly.
The paper has no brown tone at all after bleaching.


I bleach until the paper is white, watching it with the safety light on.
I expose it in the camera at 6 iso.
This is with mcp 310 rc paper.

hi autographic

have you tried to make these positives using hippolyte bayard's reversal process yet ?
it doesn't seem as chemical intensive as the process you are working on ..
(dev, dichromate, dev, bleach &c )

you soak paper in amonium chloride
then coat with 20% silver nitrate
when dry you expose it until dark & rinse
then coat it in 4% potassium iodide
and expose in camera ...
fix on olde school hyposulfate of soda
then wash ...

I haven't tried hippolyte bayard's process, but I checked and the chemicals you mention are all available on ebay, sounds interesting.
I see his positive method is mentioned as pre-polaroid, made me think of before, I had the idea to convert a box camera so you could pour the developer directly into the camera, with aprons instead of the backing paper, like the early tanks. Luckily, too little time.