Re: Cyanotype toning and lead acetate.-reply to Judy

Judy,
   Yes! It was a conmbination of tannic acid and sodium carbonate (fairly
non-toxic) that produced those wonderful purple-brown tones on cyanotype.
Now that you mention it, I believe it was
published in "Post Factory." I have the whole process recorded in my
"cookbook" and I can post it to the list with your permission.

Bob Schramm

Check out my web page at:

  http://www.SchrammStudio.com

>From: Judy Seigel <jseigel@panix.com>
>Reply-To: alt-photo-process-l@usask.ca
>To: alt-photo-process-l@usask.ca
>CC: alt-photo-process-l@sask.usask.ca
>Subject: Re: Cyanotype toning and lead acetate.
>Date: Fri, 21 Apr 2006 01:27:53 -0400 (EDT)
>
>
>What's throwing me off is I think I did publish the one Bob describes, tho
>maybe didn't identify it clearly. In P-F #5, I describe the alternating
>baths that my spacey undergraduates did getting gorgeous dark purplish
>shadows and tannish highlights.
>
>I call them spacey simply to point out there was no great science required,
>just careful timing, & system. (I loved -- not all -- but many of the
>spaciest dearly.)
>
>The relative timing in the bleach and the redevelop control the relative
>depth of the tones. If you bleach longer the shadows will go tanner. We
>never used a citric acid rinse, ever, and got perfectly clear whites -- IF
>THE BATHS WERE FRESH. Many of our combos (from memory again) gave much
>better color WITHOUT a rinse between -- so we'd mix up a huge beaker of the
>tannic acid & another of the sodium carbonate bleach, and pour just enough
>to cover the wet print... then dump after use.
>
>Another point for anyone who's got P-F #7 -- I was so peeved to find Robert
>Hirsch & John Valentino had copied and pasted that rot from Keepers of
>Light about the problem with cyanotype toners turning the highlights yellow
>"in about a week" that I wasted too many of my remaining hours on earth
>trying to figure out where they got that from. And I did. There's no way I
>am going to type that up and put on line -- I'm not keeping secrets, it's
>just a very large project I can't undertake if I want to retain whatever
>shards (not in my spellcheck) of sanity remain.
>
>However, just glancing now at the article, I see I've got in italics that
>rinsing between baths is useless "In fact, it's counterproductive." In my
>tests, rinsing between baths made the print flatter & the paper base not
>one bit whiter... If anyone has a P-F #7 and an optical scanner, however,
>they're welcome to put that article from P-F #7 (page 36) on a website,
>just please attribute and also include my diatribe about fakes in manuals,
>in loooong footnote at the end of the article, page 38.
>
>Bob, does this sound like the combo you use?
>
>PS. I also commented, "I forgave the great, trail-blazing KoL for its faux
>pas though I wondered where in the world it came from. However,"It's no
>mystery where the Photographic Possibilities formula came from, though it
>makes matters worse with some touches of its own."
>
>Judy
Received on Fri Apr 21 00:08:30 2006