Recent Entries
Pyrocat HD for Two 4×5 Sheets
**I had taken a couple of shots of the Chattahoochee River after a big tropical storm had dumped a bunch of rain trying to capture the raging waters. However the water was so high that the rocks that normally protrude above the river were completely submerged. And it was near past my normal exposure time […]
Thermometers and Darkroom Precision
**I dropped my ancient trusty Kodak mercury thermometer a few months back and finally replaced it with one from Patterson. I then used it to check my dial thermometers to see if they had stayed “calibrated” (I had reason to suspect they had not). I found that one was two degrees higher than the mercury […]
Bergger Pancro 400 and Pyrocat HD
**Having seen some interesting images a few months back shot on Bergger Panchro 400 I decided to order some and give it a try. Since I usually work with Ilford FP4+ at EI of 100 it was going to be a bit of a challenge to find a suitable scene for a 400 speed film. […]
Toning Selenium before Sepia
**Here is the final print version of Amicalola Creek. My initial version was a scan of the negative and processed in Photoshop to my normal brown tone. However after printing this image I thought I liked it better more neutral grey. But I did decide to warm it up a bit so did a little […]
Ilford Multigrade 500H
**My Dichro 45s enlarger head died a few months back so I was using a cold light head in its place. I had to use under the lens graded filters since there was no control for the color of light when using multigrade papers. I then found on ebay, for a somewhat reasonable price, a […]
Amicalola Creek
**Amicalola – The Cherokee word for Raging water. The falls at Amicalola state park are the unofficial start of the Appalachian Trail with a 10 mile hike to Springer Mountain. It was the last day of the first quarter of 2018 and I had not shot anything in a while. The weather finally warmed enough […]
Multiformat Image Viewer
**I was thinking the other day about how I like the 5×7 ratio but do not really want to upgrade my kit to support 5×7. I rarely enlarge more than 11×14 anyway so I know I can crop and enlarge 4×5 to resemble 5×7. In the field it may come in handy to have a […]
Pyrocat HD as Second Pass Developer
**I did a little experiment today. I bleached a test print and redeveloped it with Pyrocat HD just to see what would happen. It redeveloped to a nice neutral grey in about 7-8 minutes. Used roughly 10:10:1000 mix. I thought it might stain the paper but it did not seem to or was very subtle. […]
PF 130 Paper Developer Review
**Yesterday I decided to try Photographers Formulary 130 Paper developer which is same or very similar to Ansco 130 developer. The developer is supposed to provide rich blacks with high contrast if used straight, or can be diluted 1:2 for a softer working solution. PF recommends 1:1 for best overall results. There are 6 ingredients […]
Nelson’s Gold Toner – First Impressions
**This week I received the one liter Nelson’s Gold Toner kit from Photographers Formulary. I opened it on Friday and read the mixing instructions. They were a bit daunting so I waited until Saturday afternoon when I knew I could mix the kit uninterrupted. The first part of the solution is mixed at 125 degrees […]