Where does one begin?

Lets say I find the right 4x5 camera... and I shoot some amazing stuff... Where do I go from there? I have a source for developing the negatives, though it involves mailing in, I may be able to get it done locally. What is the best beginners approach to contact sheets? I have seen it done a couple ways, but it usually involves a full dark room. Do you need a full operation to make contact prints? I wont even begin with larger prints... I really want to get into 4x5 but it is increasingly more detailed, especially compared to 120.

I'm sorry if this is entirely too basic for this forum, but I love hearing your input.

Check out Fomalux paper for contact prints.
It is a slower speed than paper for enlarger prints.
Put the negative on the paper, put glass over the top, turn on the light, turn off the light.

Well, thinking back many moons ago, my darkroom for basic development was my bathroom. A simple roller base and drum was all I used for developing. Contact printing was also done with my roller and drum. A simple light source, contact printer (the glass out of a cheap frame will do quite nicely), and clear plastic 4x5 sheet film page. It is too bad, the basics, but for a few, its all they want, but you decide where you want to go from there. Just play and have some fun. Learning will be spontaneous Cheers!

Jeff Bradford said:

Check out Fomalux paper for contact prints.
It is a slower speed than paper for enlarger prints.
Put the negative on the paper, put glass over the top, turn on the light, turn off the light.

Click to expand...

Is there developer involved or does the print somehow exist purely on the paper? I imagined a wet process, no?

Canuck said:

Well, thinking back many moons ago, my darkroom for basic development was my bathroom. A simple roller base and drum was all I used for developing. Contact printing was also done with my roller and drum. A simple light source, contact printer (the glass out of a cheap frame will do quite nicely), and clear plastic 4x5 sheet film page. It is too bad, the basics, but for a few, its all they want, but you decide where you want to go from there. Just play and have some fun. Learning will be spontaneous Cheers!

Click to expand...

This sounds totally doable, and my goal from there would be to create contact prints good enough to be scanned hi-res, instead of scanning negatives. Please forgive me for having a digital motive here...

If sending them to a lab proof is normally an offered service. Scanning too.

My first question would be: how do you handle 120 film? If it is all done by lab, they should be able to provide the same services for 4x5.

But let's move on a little. You don't mention loading and unloading holders, but you have two options: either a bathroom or closet which you can make light tight when you need to, or a changing tent. The closet/bathroom is easier, because you have much more room. You will need to remove exposed film from the holder and put it into an empty film box, and take unexposed negatives from a box and slide them into the holder.

If you have a light tight room, you can also do your own developing, using any of the in-tank methods which only require darkness for loading the sheets. The BTZS tube system is one choice (you can make your own PVC tubes), there are used Kombiplan tanks (but rare), there is an insert which fits into a Patterson tank, and I am sure that there are even more choices. (I have a full darkroom with sink and 4x5 enlarger, I tray develop, but I recognize this is something of a luxury.)

Contact printing gets tricky since you need darkness and trays with developer, stop bath (or water) and fixer, and a safelight. The equipment is minimal - you can pretend to be Edward Weston, and make contact prints with a sheet of glass and a bare lightbulb, but you still need the darkness and the chemical trays.

I would suggest NOT trying to have prints made by scanning a contact print. You really want to scan the negative, and print from the file. Any lab that handles 4x5 will be able to do it. If you want to play by yourself a little, you can take your negative, place it on some kind of a light source, and photograph it with a smartphone or a digital camera, and then load that onto your computer to play with. Obviously not as good as a scan, but a way to see what you can do with the negative.

I load my film holders in a Harrison tent. For b&w 8x10 developing I use a Jobo expert drum on a Besseler motorized roller. For 4x5 color I use a pro lab. I scan my negatives on an Epson V750 flatbed scanner. I'd like to contact print 8x10 b&w but I don't have the room. One day my college age daughter will move out (I'm not trying to hurry her ) and I can use her bedroom.

There is more than one way to skin a cat. Do what works for you.

I think with the educational resources available today, education is a click and a youtube video away. I just
got back into 4x5 recently, and I hand process mine in a simple Jobo tank, hand inversion. Ask yourself
why 4x5 though? Is it entirely necessary for what you want to achieve? You can get great images with a
medium format or 35 system. I find nothing more enjoyable than taking the time, making the composition
with the dark cloth over my head, but a great deal of striking images are done on 120. And 35mm.
Think content.

A bathroom has worked fine for a darkroom for me, and I agree w/ the post above, why 4X5? I have contact prints from that format, and they're not so much to look at. It's a small print. 8x10 is a totally different story, but a totally different camera too! Think BIG and HEAVY and SLOW. If that works for someone, then they get those beautiful 8x10 contact prints, but for most of us, even 35mm will make some very nice, largish prints, and you can slip the cameras into a coat pocket if it's a small camera.

A 35mm camera w/ a fine grained film, if exposed and developed properly, can produce a lot of detail. 120 gives you a little more, but mostly you get smoother tonality. 4x5 is not that big a jump from 120, but 120 is a big jump from 35mm in terms of the negative's surface area ratio. I usually prefer my 120 negs to 4x5. You can get different shots w/ those cameras, and work a lot quicker.

There is always the option of alternative processes such as carbon or gum printing - A darkened room is often all that is required as most of the materials are only sensitive to UV light, and even then, the sensitivity is low.

Use a contract print frame [http://www.freestylephoto.biz/166316-Printfile-CP-1-Contact-Proofer-8.5x11] and tray develop.

LMNOP said:

This sounds totally doable, and my goal from there would be to create contact prints good enough to be scanned hi-res, instead of scanning negatives. Please forgive me for having a digital motive here...

Click to expand...

+1

After parting with all of the tanks, enlargers, processors, drums, rollers, trays, and stuff that wasn't absolutely necessary to making a print, I found myself relieved at how much gear I didn't really need. I tore down the "darkroom" and converted it back into a "dark space". Today it's nothing more than a corner in the garage with a plastic table, some trays, a safe light, a timer, and a light for making contact prints. A nice heavy thick piece of glass works good for contact printing. And I actually prefer that over the results from the contact printing frames. So, when it comes time to process . . . it's all about what I can do with what's available. And since there are no more bells & whistles . . . . it's all about honing skills and developing what little talent I may have.

PS: Little things such as poly-contrast filters, print tongs, hanger clips, a thermometer, etc; can also be useful.

Fomalux paper(1st reply) sounds easy enough.

A print drum, 8X10 will usually take two sheets of 5X7 too. The only part in the dark is loading it. A roller base takes some of the monotony out of rolling the drum back & forth
for the process. The dev, stop & fix takes around five minutes so it's no big deal.

Chemistry's available in liquid concentrate and easy to mix so not a long time there either.

Washing prints you can do in a dishpan.

hi LMNOP

aside from getting scans of your negatives made at the lab that processes your film
you can also take a sheet of photo paper, regular old stuff, and put it with a negative on top of it
in the sun under a piece of glass ... you can get fancy with a contact print holder but it isnt' necessary ..
after a while, ( depends on the sunlight and blue light ) you will have a photograph printed on the paper
that you can scan like a regular print ... you don't need any chemicals, and you only get once chance to scan it
because it will turn greyish with every pass of the scanner
you can do this with paper in your camera instead of film too, it takes a while to get an image but you get one ...
also, you can make cyanotypes, super fun, super simple takes 2 chemicals and when you wash it
nothing is washed away but iron complexes so it is really kind to the environment if you worry about your footprint ...
you can find premade cyanotype paper called " sun print paper" sold at crafts stores, or you can make it yourself,
bostick and sullivan sell kits and the photographers forumlary too, it just takes paper and a paint brush ( foam is ok or a hake japanese brush )
if you don't like blue prints you can soak the print in a teeny bit of baking soda or washing soda to bleach it ( take the blue out ) and dye in tea
emil schildt ( gandolfi here on apug ) is a master of this process ( and a whole slew of others ) if you need inspiration

least effort low tech is paper in the sun you get chemical free positive prints ... the cyanptype takes a bit more effort but they can last forever ...

2 samples attached are both scanned sun prints made with photo paper and a negative

have fun! ( and good luck )

If you can make a room dark, you can contact print. Ages ago I used the storage area behind the stairs in my parents' basement as a temporary darkroom, and contact printed from paper negatives. Put the two papers with the emulsions facing each other (negative on top), put a piece of glass over the top, turn on a 40 watt bulb for about 10 seconds, then dev, stop, fix in the dark. Wash the print in the kitchen sink.

If you want to try 4x5 you need a changing bag to load film holders in addition to camera kit & tripod.

If you want to develope the negatives you need a tank insert and a large tank to fit - the tank should be cheap the insert dearer. You can load the tank in the changing bag.

If you want to proof on silver halide, rather than flat bed scanner, you need a flame polished glass plate larger than 4x5 thin plywood same size three clips to sandwich. You can load your print frame in changing bag, or at night with heavy drapes.

I assume you home process already.

I have tried many times to scan contact sheets and it simply doesnt give you the quality that a scan from the negative does. It defeats the purpose of using large format in the first place.

tfalk said:

I have tried many times to scan contact sheets and it simply doesnt give you the quality that a scan from the negative does. It defeats the purpose of using large format in the first place.

Click to expand...

like with anything in life, it depends on the skill of the person doing it ...
film or print scan ... doesn't make a difference ... print scans are better
because you actually have a silver print ! ( or whatever media it is )

Can someone explain this price breakdown? I am looking at LTI to get my early shots developed and contact printed, so that I can scan the prints. They list a 10x12 contact print for $12 - how is a contact print larger than the negative?

http://www.lti-lightside.com/?page_id=39

Does anyone have examples of scanned prints? I want to start printing myself and stop filling up my hard drive with scans. I want a physical aspect if I am going to get into this LF business.

Pete Lewin in post #7 gives practical advice. Others may say what you need only because it is what they use. After many years I still tray develop film and prints. Trays intended for darkroom use are nice, but many other trays also work well. For developing film in trays, you do need a dark room, dark tent, or homemade dark box. You should have at least four trays; I use six. A kitchen timer suffices to time the developing. A few people have used a metronome or a quartz clock that ticks once a second, but that demands lots of attention. Only the time in the developer is fairly critical. For contact printing you should add a safelight, a small ordinary light bulb, and a sheet of glass. A clock is handy. With experience it is possible to dispense with a few of these items. However, if you acquire those items to gain the experience, you might as well enjoy the convenience of using them forever.

LMNOP said:

Can someone explain this price breakdown? They list a 10x12 contact print for $12 - how is a contact print larger than the negative?

Does anyone have examples of scanned prints?

Click to expand...

The 10x12 print is a "proof sheet" with as many negatives as possible squeezed on to the sheet - This will be a whole roll for 35mm & 120, or four 5x4 negatives. This means that there will be no exposure compensation, cropping, or selective dodging/burning applied to the images, so the sheet should only be used to select a negative for enlarging.

If you want to see examples of scanned prints, hop over to the gallery and peruse at your leisure - Plenty of examples of LF prints to look at.

Jim Jones said:

Pete Lewin in post #7 gives practical advice. Others may say what you need only because it is what they use. After many years I still tray develop film and prints. Trays intended for darkroom use are nice, but many other trays also work well. For developing film in trays, you do need a dark room, dark tent, or homemade dark box. You should have at least four trays; I use six. A kitchen timer suffices to time the developing. A few people have used a metronome or a quartz clock that ticks once a second, but that demands lots of attention. Only the time in the developer is fairly critical. For contact printing you should add a safelight, a small ordinary light bulb, and a sheet of glass. A clock is handy. With experience it is possible to dispense with a few of these items. However, if you acquire those items to gain the experience, you might as well enjoy the convenience of using them forever.

Click to expand...

Some of us started out using kitty litter trays