Trying Lith for the first time

I’m about to do some Lith printing for the first time.

A roll of film from the Golden Gate Bridge left me feeling like they deserved a high contrast graphic treatment instead of a straight Silver Gelatin print approach.

I couldn’t get the contrast I wanted with stock print developer and Kodabromide F4 11x14 Single Weight paper.

So I thought of picking up some lith chems.

I’d “forgotten” lith was a thing. I was just going to hit some paper with a generic graphic arts infectious developer.

But when I asked Glass Key if they had some lith chems, out from the back came a box of Moersch SE 5 Lith Master Kit with parts A, B, C and D

So now I am going to try to improve some of these shots from the bridge.

I’ll need some tips because it’s new to me.

But I’m experienced in graphic arts materials so I’ll be including Stouffer scales in my tests. My high school print shop teacher Mr. Ford would look down over his half glasses and mutter “pinhead” anytime someone would ask for help if they ever left off the scale. How else are you going to know where you are and where you have to go.

The still make lith supplies? Most everything had gone over to rapid access 30 years ago. I hated it. You must be rich. Even if they still make it, I'd hate to think of the supply costs. BTW, lith chemistry and rapid access are totally different. Stick with the chemicals made for the process. If you go with rapid access, have your fine brush and jar of opaque handy, because you're going to be using it, a LOT. Good luck with your endeavor.

It’s not that expensive. Not using lith film in process cameras, just using similar chemistry on normal enlarging photo paper.


Here’s the company website:

Bill,
Moersch products are the best for lith printing.
Start with a dilution of 40ml A + 40ml B + 1 liter.
Additive D is very important because it delays the arrival of the blacks. So you can really massively expose the print.
You have to expose for the highlights and you get the blacks in the tray.
Kodabromide is not the best to go for Lith.
If you have some Agfa Brovira or Portriga, some Oriental or Forte, you will be fine.

Sorry. thought you mean you wanted to go full print shop lith. Not sure what you're trying to achieve, judging from the single photo posted. Going litho would mostly blow out the water and the boat. I assumed you meant using Stouffers wedge, screens, and all that, like you were doing pre-press, plates, and ink.

Yeah that’s my experience but I’m going to be trying this paper printing technique

F4U said:

Not sure what you're trying to achieve

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Read this: https://www.alternativephotography.com/the-lithprint-process/
All this has nothing to do with lith materials as you are familiar with them, with the exception of the formulation of the developer, which is used in lith printing in a way it would never be used back in the day in process applications.

Bill Burk said:

I’ll need some tips because it’s new to me.

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Try, try, try. Try everything you can throw at it, as this is really a process that requires extensive experimentation to get where you want to be. And even then it'll remain inherently uncontrollable; lith printing is very much like skidding down a mountain slope in a go-kart with one foot full on the throttle and the other on the brakes. It can be glorious if you get it just right.

My advice would be:

Start with a paper that is known to lith well. Modern production Fomatone MG AFAIK still liths reliably straight out of the box. Old-stock papers like Forte Polywarmtone and Kentmere Kentona (if you can find them) are stellar - but most of it will have been snatched up from the market by now. You can get any paper to lith, in principle, but the bandwidth is just much narrower for some papers. E.g. modern chlorobromide papers like Fomabrom will lith, but it's hard to get any smoothness from them and the results are generally not very colorful.

Start with a very simple developer formulation, so use only Moersch A and B at first. Save the C and D for later once you get the basic principle to work.

This is going to be controversial, but I've personally mostly used the developer one shot (a small volume in a flat-bottomed tray), and without adding any 'old brown' to the fresh developer. The reason is consistency. Especially when you're starting out, I think it helps to have a process that's as consistent as possible, so that you can actually see what the effect is of any variables you change. If you reuse the same developer and/or add 'old brown', you can never be quite sure whether things stall to a halt because you inched back on the exposure a little too much, or your developer is just dead (for instance). I've also always preferred to print at room temperature instead of using a warm developer since it's difficult to get the temperature to be stable during a longer development time.

This is again quite personal, but I've always formulated by developer to be fairly fast and get to the 'snatch point' within something like 4 minutes. I know some people use developing times that are up to ten times as long. Learning is very slow that way and you have to have some really good music going on to survive staring at a slooooowly changing print for the best part of an hour. A more concentrated developer will do exactly the same thing as a less concentrated one and the only difference will be speed.

Unless you use a paper that's specifically known to produce very wild colors 'out of the box' (e.g. Polywarmtone, Kentona), be prepared to see a lot of shades of tan and not a whole lot else, especially if you start with just A and B. Many of the lith examples you see are toned, and/or exploit some kind of chemical manipulation such as Moersch offers with his 'Polychrome' product range.

Keep in mind the basic laws of lith:
1: more exposure = more color. If your prints end up looking pretty close to a regularly developed print, you're not giving enough exposure (unless you're looking for a very subtle effect).
2: more exposure = less contrast. Less exposure = more contrast. Development determines the black point.
Tim Rudman of course tells it all a whole lot better than I do.

Moersch' writings, although sometimes hard to find and not always available in English, are excellent.

Thanks @koraks exactly what I needed to see! Also exactly what I thought I was getting into.

Quite a few members on a U.K. based site called FADU use the Moersch product and prints from it always look good to me

pentaxuser

Koraks' post gives a great starting guidance. I started with Lith during the pandemic when found a heap of old paper in the community darkroom and someone mentioned the process. Actually cheap, as just a Moersch (easy) lith kit is necessary.
I often describe it more as alchemy than chemistry. Found my exposure times quite quickly by estimation from normal exposures plus trial and error. Then in this case, a lot of the look is related to the particular paper.
Also using the "one shot" method with hot and dilute A+B and prints look quite good. Snatch point at 15min (1st) to 45 min (3rd/4th print) and then exhausts. I actually need to get back to it again, been more than a year since I last did Lith. Reserved some old Orwo and Emaks for it. Polywarmtone is beautiful in lith.

Great to hear @Bill Burk! Have fun!
I agree with @Prest_400 above:

Prest_400 said:

I often describe it more as alchemy than chemistry.

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Sure, it's all hard science in the end, but it's temperamental and at the same time carries great creative potential, making it feel a whole lot less strict than regular development.

Following the good advices from Koraks I will add some personal view points that are different from him.

The beauty of lith resides in the wild range it can gives so all approaches are valid. There is a real freedom in that process. After almost 20 years of Lith I’m still surprised by what can come up. It’s an endless journey.

The one shot process works, strong lith developer to not stay too long in the tray works. But you can get much more.

By diluting more the developer and having some D solution, you have more time in the tray, meaning you have more control, color is building up and the blacks are not coming too fast.
No need to do test strips because the developer will be different for the print.

Starting with a fresh developer, the first print is good, it comes really fast. But the second, a little bit slower has already more grit and is better.
And it goes up in for two or three prints, texture, color, grain, better and better (and longer in the tray) until either developer collapse or you replenish it.

The exception to this is the foma 131 that requires a very fast developement (less than 6minutes) before snowball cover the paper.
Strong dev with D to control the blacks.

That additive D is really the Lith secret weapon for control.

Consistency is where the issue is. Definitely.
But making that with vintage papers is almost impossible. So instead I chose to embrace the diversity of any paper I could find. And toning is a way to bring back continuity in the work.

Beware… When you open the door to Lith it’s very difficult to go back ! Very addicting !

I would love to see some examples. how does old Ilford multigrade IV fiber do with this process? I have an old unopened box of 20x24 that I have no idea what condition it is in.

@Guillaume Zuili loving your work on your website!

ChrisArslain said:

I would love to see some examples. how does old Ilford multigrade IV fiber do with this process? I have an old unopened box of 20x24 that I have no idea what condition it is in.

@Guillaume Zuili loving your work on your website!

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Thanks Chris.
Unfortunately Ilford MG doesn’t work at all in Lith..

Aw thanks. Well I’ll put my big lith print dreams back on the burner. I’m into a years worth of projects as it is.

It works in second pass lith.
You process your print normally.
Then you do a copper bleach and you redevelop in a very diluted (1/1/100 or 200) Lith.

Oh, @koraks, you've summarized just what I was about to write! That is exactly what my lith printing looks like. Little volumes enough to cover the sheet, Moersh dev with only A and B, mostly one-shot developer (though with some papers you might run 2-3 sheets in the same solution with good results).

And another important stage - water bath before development - it is often a key with a stubborn paper and helps to avoid unevennes.
If you get snowballs, pre washing in a weak solution of hydrogen peroxide might help (found this somewhere here on photrio).

These are just few paper names, that in my experience lith well and are not very hard to find: Kodak Polymax Fine Art (beautiful results, though sort of a hard to start), Kodak Polycontrast III RC, Fomatone, Foma Retrobrom, Slavich Bromportrait.
Of those old Forte sorts my favourite is Fortezo.

My first experience was fun. Learned the value of a flat bottomed tray. My first print had ridges.

I used 20ml A + 20ml B + 500ml water.

Used analyzer to guess a normal exposure would be 32 seconds f/5.6 so I gave 2 minutes.

About 8 minutes to snatch point.

Found an 11x14 picture frame so used the glass in the tray for the second print.

About ten minutes to snatch point.

That came out pretty nice but thought I saw ridges from the stop bath.

Third print took 19 minutes. I thought I saw a bubble so rubbed it down. I think I accelerated the development in that spot. Or maybe the safelight isn’t so safe.

Fourth print, thirty minutes and pure white. I held up cardboard to protect the tray from the brightest safelight. Next time I’ll rig a clip, my arms got tired.

I remember the old days, that feels about how I remember lith developer goes bad fast.

This is the second print that I think is the best:

When I do lith, I turn off the safelights after I get the print started in the developer, and then turn them on every couple of minutes or so to inspect. When I know the snatch point is getting close I leave them on.

I switched my safelight filters. The safelight with the green one had a pull and amber was always on (when plugged in).

Now I will do the same

You're inspiring me to get off of my butt Bill. I did some "organizing" this past weekend. I need to burn an hour or two the next couple of nights to finish up and my darkroom should be useable again.

I have the Arista Lith A&B to work with.

Lith is bullet proof regarding fogging. This is why so many vintage papers can be used. They would go black with a regular developer. Safelight is not an issue. You can even switch on the light or use a lighter to check the print in the developer. It doesn’t fog.

Love lith printing! It can be very challenging at first, but can result in some unexpected surprises. So many different variables in materials and technique make it exciting for me.
I've had negatives that I never really printed to my satisfaction in traditional B/W, but were transformed when I tried them as lith prints.
I need to have a reasonably bright safelight while developing because the shadow snatch point is critical and my "night" vision is not so good anymore.
I've used a lot of different papers - Foma 131 has been good for a current paper, but my favorite has been old Forte Fortezo. Old Oriental VC-FB warmtone has also been good. I recently bought a box of Slavich Unibrom from Guillaume which I am really eager to try out once we finish our move up to Vancouver Island and I get the darkroom set back up.
Moersch SE5 lith developer is pretty much my standard now.

Both these prints were made on Forte Fortezo using Moersch SE5 developer. Similar subjects but very different lighting situations and challenges during printing. Neither one really worked for me as a standard print, but lith really seemed to sing to me.

jimjm said:

Love lith printing! It can be very challenging at first, but can result in some unexpected surprises. So many different variables in materials and technique make it exciting for me.
I've had negatives that I never really printed to my satisfaction in traditional B/W, but were transformed when I tried them as lith prints.
I need to have a reasonably bright safelight while developing because the shadow snatch point is critical and my "night" vision is not so good anymore.
I've used a lot of different papers - Foma 131 has been good for a current paper, but my favorite has been old Forte Fortezo. Old Oriental VC-FB warmtone has also been good. I recently bought a box of Slavich Unibrom from Guillaume which I am really eager to try out once we finish our move up to Vancouver Island and I get the darkroom set back up.
Moersch SE5 lith developer is pretty much my standard now.

Both these prints were made on Forte Fortezo using Moersch SE5 developer. Similar subjects but very different lighting situations and challenges during printing. Neither one really worked for me as a standard print, but lith really seemed to sing to me.

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Beautiful prints !

bedrof said:

These are just few paper names, that in my experience lith well and are not very hard to find: Kodak Polymax Fine Art (beautiful results, though sort of a hard to start), Kodak Polycontrast III RC, Fomatone, Foma Retrobrom, Slavich Bromportrait.
Of those old Forte sorts my favourite is Fortezo.

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jimjm said:

Love lith printing! It can be very challenging at first, but can result in some unexpected surprises. So many different variables in materials and technique make it exciting for me.
I've had negatives that I never really printed to my satisfaction in traditional B/W, but were transformed when I tried them as lith prints.

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Do you have any Fortezo and Bromofort tips? I think I had an available couple big boxes of the latter. Didn't experiment much as these appear to be slow (very high contrast, no color), within the limited parameters I have tested. IIRC, used to do a lot of 10A+10B+980ml Moersch Easylith; hot, and for just a few (3-4) prints.
Managed to try a few scavenged sheets of Polywarmtone and oh, that is a beautiful paper in Lith for portraiture.

I really agree on how it transforms the photographs, fantastic prints!

Guillaume Zuili said:

Lith is bullet proof regarding fogging. This is why so many vintage papers can be used. They would go black with a regular developer. Safelight is not an issue. You can even switch on the light or use a lighter to check the print in the developer. It doesn’t fog.

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Literally turned "old dubious paper" into a goldmine of different lith pallettes when I discovered Lith thanks to a photo club member, who mentioned "those can be good in Lith"; and the entry barrier to the process is just a combination of developers and heaps of patience. I need to get back into it, and might have some time during next winter. Even planned to Lith print some color negs, including the whacky spectral rendition of that, but I keep not scheduling any Lith session myself.

Quoting you also to send my appreciation of your work, seen a bunch also in the FB lith print group.