Text Printing on Border of Image

[Renato Tonelli]

I have a student who would like to print text (a sentence or two) on the bottom white border of a series of fiber prints. He does not want to scan his negatives to make digital negatives (too many negs. and in different formats; he also does not feel he is up to the task).

Ideally he would like to print an inkjet acetate (? not sure what it's called ?) with the text and overlay it on the easel (a secondary step) when he is printing.

Has anyone done something similar? If anyone can point us in the right direction, I would be very grateful. I have turned up nothing on my searches or my personal reference books.

Thank you in advance.

 

[ndrs]

I did a few A0 size B&W posters with both text and images in the pre-computer era using only 35 mm microfilm (is it the same as lith film? very high contrast) and fibre paper. First I shot letters and numbers I needed from a typography book, then did a cut and paste (real, with scissors!) to glue together text blocks. Black ink was involved at some stage, IIRC, when I needed white text on black. This was shot once more on high contrast film to create paper negatives and finally exposed wet, emulsion to emulsion, for final print. Image had to be exposed separately into its masked space. Lot of work but results were good.

Nowadays an inkjet negative of text part is likely easier to use, but I suspect a paper printout shot on lith film and then contact copied would probably give a better result. I'd also consider text size and sharpness you want.

 

[degruyl]

The same transparency material that is used for digital negatives (for example Pictorio OHP) can be used to print the captions. Contact print the caption, then print the image or vice-versa.

This might belong on dpug.

 

[bblhed]

Why not just write directly on the border with a dark color grease marker (or crayon) then expose the print and border, then when you process the print the grease marker should wash (with a little effort) off leaving white text.

I would experiment with several markers on a test strip first, but that should work.

The idea of making a "Digital Negative" and using it as a mask would work as well if you want to make black text on white border, but with the way that these sometimes print you might end up with black text on a grey border.