Toning Kallitypes

[Johnindc]

I have been toning kallitypes as follows:

A solution of 20 drops of sodium chloropallidite plus 5 gms citric acid in 1 liter distilled H2O. After about 7 minutes of toning there is a distinct tonal change, but there is also a bleaching of highlights and overall increase in contrast. Is the solution to this problem to overexpose the print or reduce/eliminate the citric acid in the toner.

 

[doughowk]

What developer formulae are you using?

 

[davido]

I have been using B&S palladium sol. #3 which is apparently fairy close to a 20% sodium chloropalladite solution for toning. I use 5ml of this solution per 1000ml of toner, plus 5g of citric acid.
My question is: do you use the toner as a one shot? If you are not using as a one shot perhaps the palladium is being used up from the toner and the citric acid is beginning to bleach out the print?
Also, I notice a difference in the colour immediately and only tone for 4-5 minutes for permanence.

-david

 

[sanking]

This is the formula I use. Tone in a flat bottom tray, use as little of the solution as possible, and keep it moving over the print. Lift the print from time to tim and allow to drain to reduce the possibility of stains on the back.

The image should change color as much as it will in five minutes, but the palladium metal continues to replace silver for the next ten minutes or so. If you tone longer than fifteen minutes some bleaching is likely.

Sandy King

I have been using B&S palladium sol. #3 which is apparently fairy close to a 20% sodium chloropalladite solution for toning. I use 5ml of this solution per 1000ml of toner, plus 5g of citric acid.
My question is: do you use the toner as a one shot? If you are not using as a one shot perhaps the palladium is being used up from the toner and the citric acid is beginning to bleach out the print?
Also, I notice a difference in the colour immediately and only tone for 4-5 minutes for permanence.

-david

 

[davido]

Sandy, I didn't realize it took so long for the palladium to completely replace the silver. I would assume that a majority of the metal has been replaced after 5 minutes, would 15 minutes be needed for an archival print?
How long do you tone for?
Also, I have noticed these small stains on the back of my prints, I will try lifting the print.

thanks
david

 

[sanking]

David,

One of the conservators at the Getty Museum in LA tested four kallitype prints that I processed identically except for length of toning time. I posted the results at the time on the alt photo process list but have since misplaced the data. However, my recollection is that replacement was about 60% at five minutes, 70% at ten minutes, 80% at 15 minutes and 90% at 20 minutes.

Those figures are probably off a bit, but what you see is that with this toner it would take a fairly long time to replace all the silver. However, even if only 80-90% of the silver is replaced with palladium the print should be quite archival by any standard.

Sandy

Sandy, I didn't realize it took so long for the palladium to completely replace the silver. I would assume that a majority of the metal has been replaced after 5 minutes, would 15 minutes be needed for an archival print?
How long do you tone for?
Also, I have noticed these small stains on the back of my prints, I will try lifting the print.

thanks
david

 

[davido]

Sandy,

Do you recall if the Conservator said what these different percentages meant in regards to archival nature of the prints?

Do you tone for 15 to 20 minutes for your kallitypes? Yikes!

thanks
david

 

[sanking]

He did not offer an opinion about this.

However, if we work on a replacement figure of 80% of the silver, that leaves 80% palladium and 20% silver. Even if the fading of the silver is 50%, highly unlikely if the print is processes correct, that still leaves an image with 90% of its original Dmax.

If the replacement figure was 90%, that would leave an image made up of 90% palladium and 10% silver. If the fading of the silver is 50%, that leaves 95% of Dmax.



Sandy

Sandy,

Do you recall if the Conservator said what these different percentages meant in regards to archival nature of the prints?

Do you tone for 15 to 20 minutes for your kallitypes? Yikes!

thanks
david

 

[davido]

Thanks Sandy.
That makes it very clear. Now that I'm in a position to hopefully start selling some of my Platinum toned Vandykes, I'm concerned about the archival quality of them. It sounds like toning length isn't an issue I need to be too concerned about. Though I will start toning them longer than 5 minutes.

cheers
david

He did not offer an opinion about this.

However, if we work on a replacement figure of 80% of the silver, that leaves 80% palladium and 20% silver. Even if the fading of the silver is 50%, highly unlikely if the print is processes correct, that still leaves an image with 90% of its original Dmax.

If the replacement figure was 90%, that would leave an image made up of 90% palladium and 10% silver. If the fading of the silver is 50%, that leaves 95% of Dmax.



Sandy

 

[Lukas Werth]

Regarding the original question:
fading is a phenomenon I encountered with kallitypes when I left them for too long in the (slightly acidic) sodium citrite developer, and/or cleared them for too long in citric acid.
I never had an issue with fading in the toner, and I imagine you might try to use a much stronger toning solution: for 20 drops of sod. pal. I consider a solution of 100 cc of 1% citric acid more than enough. In such a solution -50 cc is onough for an 8x10 - made to slosh over the image area, you see the toning action immediately, and the image is rapidly toned to visual completion - leave it for some time longer, though.
In the weak solution you mixed, the citric acid might iduce some bleaching even when the toning goes on - this is just a suggestion.

 

[Johnindc]

Thanks for the replys. I've found that by reducing the citric acid from 5gms to 2gms per liter I no longer bleached the print.