For the past ten years I've been printing with warmtone Forte or Ilford variable contrast fiber based papers. I am getting tired of that greenish warm look and would like to return to the cold tone snap that I remember from the 1980's vintage Oriental Seagull and other fiber papers.

Are there any suggestions for papers that combine good shadow detail without pasty highlights? I want that cold tone brightness without sacrificing midtone subtlety. So far I've settled on Ilford Multigrade IV fiber. Does anyone have another suggestion? Frank

http://www.culturalvisions.com/

-- frank Ward (frank@culturalvisions.com), June 29, 2000

Answers

Frank, I too love a good cold tone. I have been using Edwal LPD developer and love it. With dilution, you can go from cold tone (straight), to warm tone (1:4 or 1:8) without contrast buildup. It is long lasting and has great tones and comes in liquid or powder. You can also add some benzotrialzole to the developer to cool things down some more. There was a site that I went to last night, www.bergger.com, that their papers look and sound promising... Hope this helps, Cheers, Scott

-- Scott Walton (scotlynn@shore.net), June 29, 2000.

I forgot about LPD. I used to use it to emphasize warm tone, but I remember it goes the other way too. Maybe I can stick with Multigrade IV and try switching developers. Frank

-- Frank Ward (frank@culturalvisions.com), June 29, 2000.

Greetings,

I recently tried some VC Seagull in RC and was pleased with its cold tone. I believe they make it in a FB version. Additionally, Kodak's AZO give a beautiful cold tone. AZO is a very slow paper meant for contact printing, but enlarged negatives can be printed - it just takes time depending on your light source. Using an Omega Dichro II head on high, I enlarged 4x5 negs on AZO grade 2 at f11 for 5 minutes. The results were beautiful. Good luck!

Regards,

-- Pete Caluori (pcaluori@hotmail.com), June 29, 2000.

I forgot to mention that the Seagull VC RC paper had a greenish cast, but a few minutes in dilute (1:20) selenium took care of that. The AZO produced beautiful cold blacks with nice highlights without toning.

Regards,

-- Pete Caluori (pcaluori@hotmail.com), June 29, 2000.

The new Oriental papers are quite 'cold' and tone nicely in Selenium. The Cachet is another nice cold tone, not quite as 'metallic' as the Oriental (whatever the hell that means....:). Has quite a long toe so its really nice for holding long highlight detail. DJ

-- N Dhananjay (ndhanu@umich.edu), June 29, 2000.

I regularly use Forte FB VC cold tone paper - matte and glossy. Both lovely papers, and gives you very smooth prints with a gorgeous range of mid tones. Shadow and highlight details are very good, but then, I usually dodge and burn a lot to get the "perfect" picture. These papers tone beautifully in selenium. I use Fotospeed SLT20 selenium toner at 1:6 for around 1.5 minutes for beautiful tones..

-- R. Sriram (r_sriram@bigfoot.com), June 29, 2000.

Zone VI Brilliant in VC & FB are very good cold tone papers in Zone VI developer 1:3 and less than Bergger in cost. Pat

-- pat krentz (patwandakrentz@aol.com), June 29, 2000.

Kodak Polymax FB. Too cold to my taste, for portraits, using Paterson Acuprint as developer. I'm not sure if it would be warmer with other developers but I just bought some warmtone Agfa developer to try this.

With the developer I have used, the image has a blue tone. I can assure you you will not get any green tint with this paper! One nice thing about the Kodak FB polymax is the paper quality, it is very flat. If developed long enough, the blacks are deep and very sufficient for real prints, despite rumours of low d-max. I use the version with whitener, not the one with 'cream base'.

-- Peter Olsson (peter.olsson@lulebo.se), June 30, 2000.