Spotting has become a problem!

Hi everyone!

I have just made the move from Resin coated to fibre paper (apart from the odd sheet of Kentmere art classic) and could do with some good advice on spotting. My choice of paper before was Ilford MG4 warmtone R.C in the pearl finish. I have now changed to Ilford MG4 warmtone F.B in the semi matt and the normal matt finish( I am prefering the matt)

This is where the problem begins. Before, when spotting the R.C paper, the spotone blended beautifully in to the print. Now, with the F.B paper I'm finding it leaves a little gloss dot on the surface of the matt paper.

I have read somewhere, I'm sure it was Ilford's site, that for matt paper I should use watercolour paint.

My question is, are any of you using water colour paint to spot your photographs? And if so, what make, shade etc?

Has anyone got any other method that they use? any advise would be much apreciated

Kind regards

Stoo Batchelor

I've been using Spottone forever (yeah - I know it's no longer being made) and the only time I had a problem with the spotted area being more glossy that the surround was when I applied too much dye - so that in addition to the gloss concern, the spot was also too dark.

I suggest trying a few more times with the materials you are familiar with before you experiment with something new.

Fiber paper absorbs Spotone a bit faster than RC does--you can't reliably dab it off you get to dark a solution on the print like you can with RC. You're probably starting with the Spotone being too dark. Use a 000 brush and work slowly with a weak solution. My method is to lick the brush often. That's not a good procedure for a community darkroom, however.

I use semi-matte Ilford, Oriental and Forte papers and I've never had the Spotone go glossy.

Stoo,

Not to insult your darkroom housekeeping, but you might want to look at why you need to spot your prints, or how to reduce the number of spots. There have been several threads on dust in the darkroom, both on film and in the printing process that may help.

Good luck,

John Powers

I agree with John. I am a clean darkroom - clean processing advocate. I don't do spotting. That is the primary reason why I maintain a separate dust and chemical particulate free Dry Darkroom for printing (and negative drying).

Tom Hoskinson said:

... I maintain a separate dust and chemical particulate free Dry Darkroom...

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Wow... you're quite a lucky kid, Tom!

You might want to try the "dry brush" method of spotting, instead of the drop method. Touch the brush to a scrap piece of paper, until it doesn't hold any excess liquid and is close to the tone you need. Then just stipple the spot. Hope this helps.

Jon

No insult at all Guys.

I did have a problem recently with my water supply as I live in a very hard water area and limescale became a big problem, leaving residue on my negs. I have Ironed this out now by using Reverse Osmosis water right the way through development to final rinse. I,m still left with the problem negs to print though and have tried neg cleaner on the end of a cotton bud (Q tip) but was unsuccessfull.

Thanks for all your quick replys

Regards

Stoo Batchelor

stoo,

are you using dye, or the spotting pens?
We have found that the pens work fine with RC paper, but the dyes do better with fiber. Perhaps this is just an environmental difference.

I'll just go through my neg cleaning, spotting routine.

I lay the neg on glass swept with an anti static wisk and clean the shiny side of neg with the wisk. Then under a magnifying glass I pick off any extra specs etc with a flat ended paint brush. The neg then goes in the carrier which I close after cleaning the one piece of glass that holds the neg flat(a la Barry Thornton). I then clean the underside of the neg, again meticulously, handheld blower, wisk if needed, etc, etc. Paper in easle, quick hand held blow over.

Post printing, drying, selenium toneing, I sometimes have to spot. This is done with the spotone inks and 3,0 and 4,0 brushes. I mix about 4 drops of the '3' and keep adding water to change the shade to a very light grey. Then I microwave it to remove the moisture. Now with a dry pallet of colour I slightly moist the brush, usually in the mouth and start with the darker areas first, always testing on a spare print.

I'ts just that to me, when the spot drys it looks shiny on the matt surface and its driving me mad!

Sorry to bore you all with that and thanks Ann and all.

Stoo

Those procedural details are helpful in many ways so -not to worry.

Lee Shively said:

.....My method is to lick the brush often.....

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I don't recommend using salvia if you wish to work in an archival manner as salvia is a digestive enyzme and also contains many bacteria, I use distilled water.

Luck had nothing to do with it, Brian! I designed it that way.

Many years ago Kodak sold a print spotting set with three different colors, black White and sepia. Everybody used saliva back then, so with a moist brush (4 or 5 ought) pick up a bit of color and mix it on your thumb nail then apply it to the spot. No rocket science here, when the spotted print was cross lighted every single spotted spot came back to life as a dull dot on the prints matte emulsion. Spot tone put an end to this problem unless you were eating a donut while you worked. When color became the big thing, B&W and sepia didn't cut it any more, so we went to water colors (the dry brush effect) which worked like a wonder until you cross lite the print, guess what? The biggest problem with some water colors is that they are fugitive
and will fade back out. One had to test the brand name Winsor Newton or what ever to be certain that it was a perminent dye. We then went to analine dyes which had their own set of problems. The best way to spot a negative is by using a dust free environment. A white spot in the print is caused by dust, dirt or anything on top of the negative. A black spot will be on the emulsion side of the negstive. Eliminate the spots before you print.

Not an opinion, pure fact! Charlie....................

Spotone used to furnish small sponges about 1 sq in that were to wet the fiber paper before applying the dye. The wetting helps paper absorb the dye.

Use dilute dye and build up the dye drying between layers until you get a match. A hair dryer will help speed the process.

Clean water and air in the film processing area will eliminate most all spotting chores.
I use a Calumet water filter and two small Hunter hepa air filters. Chemicals are used one time including film fix. Silver precipitates from used fix and sticks to the next roll.. Washing will not remove it, but mild abrasion with a very soft cloth will providing the film is not dry. After that, get out your Spotone.

These problems really are far easier to prevent than cure.

Last piece of advice is to store chemicals in glass bottles as they wash better and you can see when they are clean. My D76 is put in small 8 oz glass bottles for one shot processing immediately after cooling.

Hi again!

I have just had a good read through all the advice you have all given me, and much apreciated it is. I am not in the position to change my darkroom just yet, which happens to be a room that I use daily for other purposes (and boy am I jealous of some of the ones you fellow APUGers are using) but I can change a few things in my development process.

It was the use of fresh fix for each film and the carry over of silver that Ronald mentioned. I always thought it was a fixer strength thing, and replaced the fix after about 4 films. Its quite logical really. Also the drying of my film will have to change, as its not in a 100% dust free environment.

Thank you John, Tom and Charlie, prevention is better than the cure and if any need for spotting occurs in the future,(which I'm sure it will) I will stick with the advice of Monophoto and keep with what I am familiar with. Practice makes perfect, as they say.

Thanks again for all your advice.

Regards

Stoo Batchelor

If Spotone spotting dye is no longer available, is there another brand that has filled this niche?

Gene

Yes Gene

There are 2 that I know of. Fotospeed do a retouching kit called DY10 and also a company called Marshalls.

Regards

Stoo

Stoo Batchelor said:

There are 2 that I know of. Fotospeed do a retouching kit called DY10 and also a company called Marshalls.

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Thanks. Been away from the darkroom for a few years and the landscape has changed a bit ...

Gene

Stoo et al
I've found that water hardness has a major effect when spotting. I used to live in Harlow (not far from Stoo) and the water left everything with a fine film of lime. To counteract this I filtered all water but spots came out glossy on matt paper. Softened water made it worse. For that reason I stopped using matt paper. I have since moved to Norfolk where the water is a loft softer and I don't even filter now. I use Spottone dyes for warm/toned prints and Tetanal Spot Pens on neutral papers.

Two points in response to the latter posts.
Silverprint list a Spotone replacement called Diaphoto.
It’s often advocated to do the final film rinse in distilled water to ensure a film free of such things as limescale.

Dave Miller said:

.....It’s often advocated to do the final film rinse in distilled water to ensure a film free of such things as limescale.

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We have a lot of lime in our water here (Bath, Ohio USA) also. The house has a water softener. I added a 3 micron water filter for the darkroom. Every now and then some grit still shows up, probably left in the pipes. I also use a gallon of distilled water for the final wash with a drop or two of Kodak Photo-Flo 200 solution in the water. No visible grit has passed this final step. I have the solution in a stainless tank and dip the 4x5 or 8x10 sheets of film in this, one sheet at a time, 3-5 seconds a sheet. When I processed roll film I would dip the reel.

Stoo,
You mentioned not being able to implement some of these ideas because you don’t have a darkroom. Here is an item you can collapse or roll away that will help clean the film drying process. http://www.bedbathandbeyond.com/product.asp?order_num=-1&SKU=11678653&RN=303 It is a canvas storage box on casters that can roll away or collapse. The canvas keeps the dust out, but allows the water to evaporate off sheet or roll film hanging from the coat hanger bar. I don’t know if this store is international, but I imagine some other company is selling a similar product there.

John Powers

Dave Miller said:

Two points in response to the latter posts.
Silverprint list a Spotone replacement called Diaphoto.
It’s often advocated to do the final film rinse in distilled water to ensure a film free of such things as limescale.

Click to expand...

Thanks Guys

I feel I've conquered the dirty neg problem. I'm using reverse osmosis water, I'm told it's as pure as purified water, the only difference is the cost, 75p per 5 ltr compaired to £3.60. I use this right through my process. Developer, my stop and my fix. Then my hypo clear and the ilford wash routine. Then the film is dropped in to the final rinse bath with the wetting agent. This is the part where it falls apart as my drying area is my daughters bedroom who is only here at weekends. I know its not ideal and take on board Johns idea of the clapsable closset but still find it far from ideal. I am toying with the idea of making something similar to one Iv'e seen in the thread on peoples dark rooms, it's made out of a heating duct and apparently works fine(where i'm going to put that, heaven knows).

It does seem strange that Rob has suffered the same problem as me, refering to the spotter going shiny on a matt surface, he describes my exact problem, and we were both getting the same tap water, so our prints received the same wash. I'm determined to stay with my choice of paper, the ilford 4 fb matt, so I feel I have 2 more things to try. The Alka-Seltzer tab in water and spot the spot with that before spotting, if that makes sence, or change my spotter, maybe give the one Dave mentioned a try. At the end of the day, if I could dry the film in a dust free enviroment, I could cut out the spotting stage completely. Now wouldn't that be bliss.(how I dream of having a darkroom like yours Dave)

Can I ask you all one last thing. It's a question that may upset some people, I do not intend to do this but I'll ask it anyway. When I have finally cracked this spotting problem, will my change from R.C to F.B have been worth it. I'm all for being as true to the art as I possably can, but will my prints show an improvement, deeper blacks. whiter whites etc or is there a (wait for it) certain snobbery that goes with F.B paper. I would like to have phrased that better but please remember that it was asked with no offence intended.

Thanks again to all of you. I WILL crack this one.

Regards

Stoo