Silver bromide rehalogenized paper without safe light...???

Hi all
I do darkroom since 30 years. Except selenium, I didn't tone very much but i'm interested to tone with polysulphides and thiourea for some pictures. I read a major part of Tim Rudman "The Toning Book". I know you don't need to process paper with a safe light when you "rehalogenized" the paper in a mixture of ferricyanide/bromide bleach....I realised that I don't understand what is the difference in silver bromide in the paper when you buy it and handle it under a safe light and the new silver bromide you add to the paper when you bleach the paper under daylight. There is something not clear for me to understand why I didn't need to ALSO use safe light when I bleach the paper?

My English is approximative, sorry
I hope I'm clear

Regards
Norm

That's because you have already processed the paper and have a print at hand. The unwanted quantity of silver bromide is already removed by the fixer. Whatever will be created by the rehalogenating bleach will be used again, to form the toned image. It doesn't matter if it will be fogged by light, all of it will be converted to silver sulfide.

Anon Ymous said:

That's because you have already processed the paper and have a print at hand. The unwanted quantity of silver bromide is already removed by the fixer. Whatever will be created by the rehalogenating bleach will be used again, to form the toned image. It doesn't matter if it will be fogged by light, all of it will be converted to silver sulfide.

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So, it's why if I just bleach (ferri/bromide) and don't tone it,...and wait, the paper will fog (print out). Am I right?

norm123 said:

So, it's why if I just bleach (ferri/bromide) and don't tone it,...and wait, the paper will fog (print out). Am I right?

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Yes, given enough exposure it will print out.

Anon Ymous said:

Yes, given enough exposure it will print out.

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Thanks a lot! It's clear now.

norm123 said:

So, it's why if I just bleach (ferri/bromide) and don't tone it,...and wait, the paper will fog (print out). Am I right?

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Not if you wash and fix it after bleaching (and then wash to archival levels). Bromoil matrices are bleached and fixed; they don't yellow or print out over time.

Some people will use this as a safe way to reduce prints (reversible farmer's reducer essentially). Bleach in ferri/bromide to the reduction you desire, then wash/fix/wash. If you go too far with the bleach, just redevelop and try again. Or you can partially bleach, and redev in very dilute paper developer which will return highlights at a softer grade - the dilution gives you more control of when to stop redeveloping. Hit the stop bath, wash/fix/wash, and you'll lock in the newer highlight style.

M Carter said:

Not if you wash and fix it after bleaching (and then wash to archival levels). Bromoil matrices are bleached and fixed; they don't yellow or print out over time.

Some people will use this as a safe way to reduce prints (reversible farmer's reducer essentially). Bleach in ferri/bromide to the reduction you desire, then wash/fix/wash. If you go too far with the bleach, just redevelop and try again. Or you can partially bleach, and redev in very dilute paper developer which will return highlights at a softer grade - the dilution gives you more control of when to stop redeveloping. Hit the stop bath, wash/fix/wash, and you'll lock in the newer highlight style.

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Yes I know if I fix it after the bleach, it won't print out. Thank you. If I understand right, I use a ferri/bromide bleach when I want to tone/redevelop follow by wash/fix/HCA/final wash and I use Farmer's reducer if I want to reduce density follow by wash/fix/HCA/wash. Am I right?

norm123 said:

Yes I know if I fix it after the bleach, it won't print out. Thank you. If I understand right, I use a ferri/bromide bleach when I want to tone/redevelop follow by wash/fix/HCA/final wash and I use Farmer's reducer if I want to reduce density follow by wash/fix/HCA/wash. Am I right?

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Yes - though it's said if you redevelop to completion, you don't need to fix, but seems safe to fix and re-wash anyway.

If you're really paranoid about overdoing it with farmer's, you can bleach with ferri/bromide til you hit what you want, and then wash very well and fix - that way you can redev (before fixing) if you took it too far.

Another common bleach is copper sulfate, which can produce warmer tones on redevelopment. It can go a little weird on some papers and do sort of a posterized look though.