What the testing is telling me...

The point of photographic testing is of course to learn the attributes and characteristics of a process or procedure. That part is paying off handsomely. What I had learned, and applied thirty years ago is now having to go through a revision, to accommodate new variables that weren't around back then. One of those newly arrived variables is the digital negative. Not even a concept back then. The second is the newly built Solar Printer, also not even in my dreams at the time. The proven wisdom's that worked so well must now be altered, like it or not.

What I was writing about last post had to do with the 'fallout' of densities in the middle tones of the print I had just completed. In a sense, that was my fault, having dropped out some of those densities intentionally for the purpose of 'separating tonal values'. It did that better than I could have hoped, leaving an image that was for me visually more of a lithograph than a continuous toned photographic print. I am mending my ways.

There are two ways of achieving that feat. You thought otherwise? I will be exploring both to compare the prints to see which defines the print values as I prefer them. That means employing Burkholder's method of bulging the CI curve in the center and toning the negative with a green color; spectral density. Because the Solar Printer is putting out so much UV intensity as it is, instead of varying the height of the printer we prefer employing spectral density to retard print time. I have a negative ready for printing via Burkholder's method. Also is a negative that I did almost the same thing, by increasing middle tone densities and highlight densities (zone 7-8) as well, separately. Both will have the same green tone, keeping that variable constant.

I have always preferred an image with full textural detail, over the entire tonal range, (those having texture; zone 3 thru zone 7). The current, fairly constant print time of 13 minutes is within the time frame we had been seeking. For now, I plan on printing salt paper prints, as the differences in Kallitype prints made yesterday ended up working in opposite directions; one print darkened considerably and the other lightened up considerably, losing the zone 7 to a blank zone 8. Weird. We'll be finding out why later.