Two bath print developing - how many grades?

I have been doing a lot of lith printing lately and am going to try some other papers for this such as Kentona. I think this paper is only available in grade 2.

It struck me that this might also be an opportunity to try a 2 bath developing setup (such as Beers) for standard printing. Up to now I have only used VC papers.

I have not seen any definitive information about how many grades one can get out of this process. Most of my negatives seem to print between grades 2 and 4. So on to questions:

I presume that you would not be able to get grade 4 out of a grade 2 paper or am I wrong in this?

And what alternative developers do people use in a 2 bath setup?

And is there any advantage to using graded papers at all these days?

Thanks.

Have you come across this article Mark ?
(there was a url link here which no longer exists)

I'm not sure if two bath development has any advantages over the various split grade printing tecniques which should give you all the control necessary. It may offer a different look to your print but I haven't sat down and examined all my tests when I was trying all these methods.

I've had success trying to squeeze a few grades of contrast out of grade 2 paper by using 1+6 dilutions of developers such as Tetenal Dokumol and pulling the print when the blacks emerge, but this isn't a suitable technique for most negatives.

Try Tetenal Centrabrom and Dokumol for two bath development. But in my experience, most of these techniques are used to lower the contrast fof prints from high contrast negatives.

The article above starts with grade 4 paper, so the contrast is there to begin with and the weak solutions of soft developer helps to introduce lower grades for highlight detail.

Thanks, Gary.

Yes I read that article and the info in Les' book on the subject, but it doesn't say how far the technique can be pushed. Looking at those scans I would say that is about 1 paper grade of contrast? So if you could get a pack of grade 2 and grade 3 papers you would have enough leeway for printing grades 1 to 4 which is probably plenty. Kentona is only made as grade 2 so it would still be limited, I suppose.

I am also reading about 2 bath lith+soft developer techniques (eg lith/meritol, lith/amidol). These might be able to push things further, but there is not a lot of information about these techniques. I have seen the texts in Tim Rudman's World of Lith Printing and Wolfgang Moersch's website.

We are probably heading down the same route, I posted a question and got some excellent answers in this post:
(there was a url link here which no longer exists)

As far as two bath development with standard printing goes, I would try some very strong dilutions of high contrast developers and see where that takes you, but it's a lot easier if you start with a contrasty neg.

I only use graded paper when I've no alternative. Are you planning to settle on one paper; Kentona for both lith and standard printing?

Modern papers are often designed to give very consistent results over a wide range of developing conditions, so developer controls don't often work as well as they may have in the past, but with some papers, like Efke Emaks, you've still got a lot of flexibility, and I wouldn't be surprised if Kentona was one of those papers. I wouldn't expect more than one grade in either direction with a two bath system, but if you need more contrast you can intensify the neg, and contrast masks are another option at another level of complexity.

Why use graded papers today? You might like the results, and you might not be able to get the same results with VC papers. One doesn't have to commit to either one absolutely. I usually prefer graded paper, but occasionally find something that works better with VC, either because it might need a split-contrast technique or I might need something outside the contrast range of the graded paper I'm using.

Thanks for your replies.

Gary Holliday said:

We are probably heading down the same route, I posted a question and got some excellent answers in this post:
(there was a url link here which no longer exists)

As far as two bath development with standard printing goes, I would try some very strong dilutions of high contrast developers and see where that takes you, but it's a lot easier if you start with a contrasty neg.

I only use graded paper when I've no alternative. Are you planning to settle on one paper; Kentona for both lith and standard printing?

Click to expand...

I am not planning on settling on one paper for both, but I thought as I was getting the Kentona anyway for lith I might as well try it for regular printing as well just to see how it looks.

My main intention is to get different colour responses and effects with lith to my other papers and Kentona looks like a must-try (even the non-cadmium version).

I have only just found out about lith 2 bath processes and they look very interesting.

mrtoml said:

It struck me that this might also be an opportunity to try
a 2 bath developing setup (such as Beers) for standard
printing. Up to now I have only used VC papers.

I have not seen any definitive information about how many
grades one can get out of this process. Most of my negatives
seem to print between grades 2 and 4. So on to questions:

I presume that you would not be able to get grade 4 out of
a grade 2 paper or am I wrong in this?

And what alternative developers do people use in a 2 bath
setup? And is there any advantage to using graded papers
at all these days?

Click to expand...

Tests I made of four papers indicate a 1 to 1 1/2 grade shift
twixt Beer's 1 and Beer's 7. Emaks Grade 2, went from
a center 0 to 2.

I don't two bath with Beer's. I pre-grade the negative then
choose the paper, there be any choice, and the Beer's. The
same can be done with Adam's A - B Ansco 130.

All things being equal, which of course they are not, I'll
stick to Graded for the higher level of darkroom lighting
it allows. BTW, a real PLUS for those who do lith printing
as it makes easy the tracking of development and seeing
the snatch point. Dan

Thanks, Dan.

This is an interesting example of the possibilities with Lith 2 bath:

(there was a url link here which no longer exists)