??? Selenium-toned Van Dyke Brownprints ???

I'm just getting into alt processes & find this information very useful. There seems so many caveats with selenium toning for archival permanence (see Rudman's Toning book, chapter on archival toning) as well as unwanted color changes at stronger dilutions, is using Agfa Sistan a better route for alt processes? Or should gold or sulfide toning routines be pursued?

Based on what I'm seeing here with Polytoner, I would be very cautious about attempting sulfide toning with an alternative silver process.

I would instead suggest weighing the relative archival benefits against other things such as image color.

For that reason I prefer gold-toning VDBs and POP. Gold toning improves image stability and I prefer the resultant color so if the print only lasts for 600 years instead of 700, I'm OK with that. I'd much rather have a beautiful print with a lovely color on the wall instead of one that was only slightly more archival but stuck in a closet somewhere because I didn't like the color.

Joe

Here's a link to a much bigger file of the comparison picture:

http://my.net-link.net/~jsmigiel/images/technical/toners/vdb_test_11.28.05.jpg

Joe

Joe, wow. really well done. thats awesome to see them all together like that.
you should write up an article about it.