"Old Jerome Ghost" ~ Pallaium toned Kallitype

 This third image of the Jerome series was one of the old, original buildings still standing. As can be seen, this one didn't last past the early 20th century. It is also not one to get a lot of visitor attention or be photographed much. This hotel was well used in its day, during the late 19th century when Jerome was a booming copper town, and Jenny Jerome walked Main Street. It also sits just a short step below "Husband's Alley" that led from said hotel, The House of Joy, and other evening activity establishments of the time.

Again, this print is a palladium toned Kallitype. The price of palladium is now very close to the same price of platinum. From $3/ml to $10/ml from a year ago. This is not the first time the cost of platinum & palladium has been beyond many printers, and that, begat the "poor man's platinum/palladium"; take your pick. Coating a large sheet of paper with pure platinum, then lose the print from a printing error, meant losing a lot of money. In today's price of platinum, now palladium as well, making even an 8"x10" print costs $10, for the coating, plus paper & chemicals. Make a mistake and it's junk, or something to give away, or keep in a drawer as a memorial to mistakes. A "poor man's platinum/palladium, is a silver print toned in platinum or palladium, or a combination of both. The potassium based platinum, not the sodium based Na2 version, which works beautifully in combination with palladium, but bleaches prints as a toner. If you make a mistake with silver, the cost is less than a dollar, even for 11"x17" prints. Palladium, being a more noble metal than silver, replaces all the silver salts [in metallic silver form] with palladium, thereby becoming a true palladium print, indistinguishable from a print, printed with palladium.

I have been using mostly Revere Platinum rag paper for my silver/palladium prints, as I have found it to be a very nice printing paper, pretty much identical to Arches Platine paper. I also use Hahnemuhle paper from time to time, as I also like that paper a lot. I've been developing these images in sodium citrate, giving the image a warm look. The palladium toner shifts the the 'brownish' warm tones much cooler overall. The toner also opens up middle tones nicely, with downward toning, from highlights to deep shadows, leaving a very nice, deep D-Max black. I also use a density curve that I manually set, for platinum/palladium [Na2-double sodium] printing. it is shorter than the palladium curve I created, for printing with palladium, which tends to need a bit longer curve for a full range print.

The most difficult task in posting images is arriving at the same light qualities of the original print. The digital copy usually never tends to be a visually appreciative and bright as the original. My apologies for that.

Palladium toned Kallitype

"Old Jerome Ghost" ~ 11"x17"

Jerome, Arizona 1985

"The House of Joy" ~ Palladium toned Kallitype

 The House of Joy was around when Jenny Jerome walked Main street. Near this establishment is the "Husband's Alley", where said husbands slipped behind Main Street to where the evening establishments once stoop. House of Joy being the last of that breed, kept up over time. The palladium printing actually shows off the place about as nicely as the original color image, shot with an old Canon QT - 35mm camera, using color film, to capture the colors of the buildings, and surroundings.

The color images are converted to "black & white film" filter, rendering the original color image into a very long scale b&w image, same as if I shot the image using FP4, developing in Beutler 105. This print also was printed to a digital negative using the Na2 <curve>, to keep all the middle tones and textural detail intact An 8 minute print in my custom UV printer. I have a 16"x20" print frame that just fits inside, with the flip up loading door closed. The print is 'brighter' than the digital copy shown here.

Palladium toned Kallitype

"House of Joy" ~ 11"x14"

Jerome, Arizona

"Paul & Jerry's" ~ Palladium toned Kallitype

The time away has been focused on caregiving. A wife that has had surgery, mid August, and still in the hospital. There are days I am able to print, recently. The focus has been printing a series of images of Jerome, Arizona, a town I lived in fifty years ago. Now, quite different, yet, still Jerome. In the late sixties, early seventies, Jerome was a hippie town, with the shops and restaurants owned by granola types, getting away from the city life.

Most of the images are of the historic buildings, most of which date to late 19th century days, when Jerome was a copper mining town. Something like a billion dollars was  mined in that town over its lifetime, when Jenny Jerome was the name of two women; Sir Winston Churchill's mother, and Jenny Jerome the Madame, the richest person on Main street,  Wasn't around to capture that, although, I certainly would have, had I been around back then.

The prints in this series will all be palladium toned Kallitype prints; 11"x14" and 11"x17" respectively, depending on whether the image was captured using my Burke & James 5x7 view camera, or my Canon 20D, with the longer format. I have always framed my shots as I want them to print, edge to edge. No cropping intended. Unfortunately, the longer format images simply can't be edited down without losing the fuller essence of the image as a whole.

I use two density <curves> that I made using Paintshop Pro X9; Photoshop for digital photography. All the same tool, plus some special features. The shorter <curve> was made for printing platinum/palladium Na2 prints, and the longer density range <curve> was made for straight palladium printing, or Kallitypes. The print times between the two are approximately 8 minutes for the shorter <curve> and 14 minutes for the longer density <curve>. They end up very close to being the same. Very close but not the same. The longer <curve> creates a print with deeper blacks [D-Max] and less shadow detail. The shorter <curve> is slightly flatter print image, showing good middle tones, with good blacks, just not quite as deep. I print for the highlights, zone 7, so that remains a constant. This print was made using the shorter Na2 <curve> for better detail in a dark interior.

This image was taken in 1985, and those at the bar are the "old timers" of Jerome, the bartender known by everyone in town.

Palladium toned Kallitype

"Paul & Jerry's" 11"x17"

Jerome, Arizona