Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2005/03/10
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]Published perhaps after he died, the book is on a CD and available at: www.monochromephotography.com Here is the depressing (for wet fans) introduction: "You can't make a fine print from a coarse negative". That has been the critical point I have made for many many years working in conventional silver-based `wet' darkroom monochrome photographic work. Too many photographers believe that the fine print is manufactured by uniquely gifted printers in the darkroom using almost black arts. This belief, comforting to the those photographers unwilling to take the time and trouble to understand and apply the craft of their pursuit, is encouraged by the very printers claiming the mystique of the secrets of the darkroom. It supports their ego and their earnings. The truth is that if a negative is properly exposed and processed, it is difficult not to make a high quality print. What so often passes as `fine printing' is, in truth, often nothing but exercising considerable time and effort in rescuing an adequate print from a bad negative. The whole process would have been far quicker, far simpler, and far more productive of high quality had there been a good negative in the first place. Prevention is better than cure! Sometimes, a real cure isn't possible. I found out this hard truth over decades of my own work, and printing professionally for others. The truth was so hard won, that it became a rigid unshakeable principle of my work, my teaching, and my writing. It was the very foundation of my beliefs. Well, the foundation just cracked. The first hairline crack started appearing with digital contact negatives (see my web site www.barrythornton.com, or my articles in Ag magazine for details) after I had read about Dan Burkolder's work in this field in the USA. Briefly, I discovered that I could scan a monochrome negative on a low-priced flatbed scanner with a transparency scanning accessory hood, adjust the image as required for final appearance in Photoshop, output it in negative form on transparent or translucent film at the final print size on a home desk-top inkjet printer, then contact print that inkjet negative on conventionally processed photographic printing paper. The resulting print was significantly better than even the best photographic fine print made directly from the original negative. The real shaker was that I was able to make fine prints by this technique from inferior, even downright coarse, original photographic negatives. I spent some time developing this technique even further and refining it before a chance meeting with Adrian Joyner of Clevedon alerted me to the process that shattered my rigid `fine negative' foundation - Piezography. I saw his prints at the Arena gathering of photographers. He showed me prints made by this archival process on home inkjet printers that were clearly superior to conventional photographic fine prints, that rendered the fuss of preparing and printing a digital contact negative then using that to make a photographic print completely redundant. On 11/03/2005, at 11:54 AM, Eric wrote: > Alastair: > >> Well, after round one of the LUG print exchange and reading Barry >> Thornton's CD book; transitions, I can tell you the ink jet >> market/users are here to stay. > > I looked at Amazon, but didn't see mention of a book named Transitions > by > Thornton. Can you provide any more details? Thanks! > > -- > Eric > http://canid.com/ > > _______________________________________________ > Leica Users Group. > See http://leica-users.org/mailman/listinfo/lug for more information > > Alastair