Through carelessness, I seriously overdeveloped a roll of 35mm Technical Pan film which has some images I would like to rescue. Before I embark on a lengthy set of tests, I would love some comments about the relative merits of regaining midtones (human faces especially) via superproportional reduction on the negative vs. printing on VC paper at a very low contrast setting.

It seems as though most of the reduction techniques were developed in the days of less flexible contrast control at the printing stage. I can readily reach ISO 200 (or grade 00) with Polymax FB and even ISO 230 (or grade -2) with Ilford MGIV on my enlarger with just filter adjustments. But perhaps reducing the negative will help recover mid-densities better than simple contrast control during printing.

I haven't seen any comparisons of ultra low contrast printing compared with reducing the negatives. For example, Stroebel et al. 1986 Photographic Materials and Processes simply describes how to proportionally reduce a negative, but gives no discussion of the merits relative to low contrast printing. (I don't have a copy of Adams' Print/Negative at hand, but that predates modern papers anyway.)

Any experience/knowledge/references to share? Thanks in advance...

-- Eric Pederson (epederso@darkwing.uoregon.edu), August 07, 2001

Answers

Eric,

Reducing 35mm films is a riscky business! Streaks from holes on film side are commom trouble and they may come due to reducing operation or even from developing stage. Not to mention some possible uneveness on this superproportional reaction. One alternative is bleaching the film, like on sepia toning, and redeveloping on a softer bath. Tech-pan, when too contrasty, usually prints badly on multigrade papers, maybe for some curves unadequacy. With hard to find #0 or #1 graded paper, results can show a little better tone gradation. Good luck.

Cesar B.

-- Cesar Barreto (cesarb@infolink.com.br), August 07, 2001.