Ha Ha !! I learnt that when I was a member of the South Essex Camera Club in about 1953 age 16. ! When That Club Folded I joined Barking Photographic Society in 1959. I had a 15 x 12" print taken in Cornwall with my Contax III , Pan-F in Beutler and I put some Liquid Sunshine on a Wave breaking over a Rock in the Middle Distance and WON AN AWARD !
Just watched this for the umpteenth time. I have a packet of Farmers reducer here but I guess it will be far more cost effective to buy sodium thiosulfate and potassium ferricyanide and make my own? Despite first being introduced to darkroom printing in the 70s I’ve never tried this. No internet in those days so we learnt from local “experts” some of whom were very reluctant to share their knowledge. You Sir, are the antithesis of my 1970s experience 👍
We always used it locally, applied with a sable brush and swabbed with cotton wool. It was a recognised (cheap) method of colour correction where masking films were very costly ie. a single 8 x10 (inches) sheet of Kodak Tri-Mask cost £10 in 1973,.... nearly half a weeks wage for a trainee.
You wouldn't believe how often I've gone too far! Like you say - it makes such fun to paint with "sunlight" that it's really hard to stop in the right moment ;)
@@flutgraben13 Thanks Rüdiger :) With John's information below considered, I will need to do a test series in painting different solutions for given times.
Good evening. Is this stuff juseable to completely get rid of the silver on a negative? If so, this could be jused in black and white reversal prosseses to get rid of the silver created in the first development. Normally I juse H2O2, but it is a bit weak and isn't very reliable...
Thanks for this. I’ve always found it amazing how much added “punch” this technique, (once you learn not to wait to actually see the change before rinsing!) can add to a photograph.
Slightly more to it i regard to re fixing (or not) and when to apply, before or after toning. There is a bit of workflow here that needs to be established or one could not fix enough or spend a long time washing refixed prints.
Hello John. When applying the bleach on your beach scene, I noticed a few things, could you use cotton swab to do full prints rather than submerging the whole prints in the tray?. Also when applying the reducer to the print I noticed you were going over into the white border, would this not leave streaks in the border ? Regards
No streaks on the white, it doesn't bleach as it's already white. You could use a cotton swab BUT you have to get the bleach off quickly, before you start seeing any effect because it works fast and can quickly get out of hand. Practice on old test prints.
It does but not instantly. So you have to start washing the bleach out just before it's ready. Then give the print a full thorough wash again to complete the process.
@@PictorialPlanet Hi thank you for the video! A printer I follow suggests to do a second fix after bleaching, what do you think about it? He has a bit of a different process, because he only mixes FPIII with water (no hypo) and bleaches the print right out of the fix, before washing, so that the bleaching process is slower because the fixer slows it down a bit and there's more control. I guess there are different ways to reach the same result, however I'm curious if without the second fix it works also for archival prints?Thanks!
Thank you so much for sharing your precious knowledge! A question, if you are so kind: what kind of Hypo recipe you use? A Sodium thiosulfate - Sodium sulfite recipe will work? Thank you in advanced!
Hi and thanks for your comment. I use TF2 for classic films such as FP4+, HP5+, and PAN F+. This is also a good hypo for papers. I have a video here that shows how to make it.
Hi, John. A couple of questions. I fix film in Ilford Rapid Fixer 1:4; paper in PF's TF-5. Will either work,and if so, can you suggest an amount/dilution? I don't keep hypo around, and odn;t wish to add anther chemical to my shelf if I don't have to. Second, This method avoids fixing the print between applications of purely ferricyanide solution (or almost, with a bit of fixer), but I'm surprised that the hypo included in your solution is adequate to fix the bleached grains properly in such a short time. Any comment on that? Finally, I have read that potassium bromide is useful to prevent yellow staining when bleaching warm-tone papers. Have you any experience with this? Thank you for your great work!
Hi Philip! I have never used fixer concentrates for this so cannot make any recommendations. The amount of fix used in the ferricyanide solution is enough to fix the bleached silver but by all means drop the print into some fix if you are worried about it. It can do no harm. I have another video on sepia toning where I add bromide. I've never used it in warm toned papers though. Thank you for your kind words!
Philip, I was just looking at my copy of Way Beyond Monochrome and they recommend a Farmer's Reducer made using Soln. A 10g potassium ferricyanide with water to make 1ltr - Soln. B Rapid fixer (working solution) 1 Ltr. It says to use the solutions in sequence or mix 1+1 just prior to use. Hope that's helpful.
@eliashaglund1029 You'll notice that the bleach has 125ml of sodium thiosulphate (hypo) in the formula. This is fixer. Because it has fixer in it it fixes as it bleached to there's no need to fix again. If the bleach didn't have this fixer added then sure, you'd need to refix. This one's ok though.
Hi John. I have just tried that cotton swab on one of my prints, silhouetted windmill at early twilight. End result was awful! completely streaked all over the dark areas and light blotches. Nothing like your beach scene print, Can you figure out what went wrong !! . Ps your not to blame. Not too fussed ,I can re- print. I accept it is a steep learning curve.
Great video, John. One question - what formula do you use to mix up your bottle of Hypo 10% and the other bottle of Potassium ferricyanide 10%? It looks like your drawing the chemicals from bottles that contain more than 125ml of the Hypo and 12ml of the PF.
Hi Frank. I made the 10% solutions by using the maths of 10g of the chemical in 80ml water and making the total up to 100ml. This ratio can be changed depending on how much you need. For instance 20g in 200ml (I think that's what I did for this video), or 50g in 500ml. These are all 10% solutions. I hope that's a better explanation. The solutions keep for a few months in a bottle with a squirt of butane lighter gas over them.
@@PictorialPlanet A great set of very informative videos John.Thank you so much for all your excellent work. A question of clarification: For the 10% solutions in your answer to Frank you mention the example of 10g of chemicals to 80ml water. I am not sure whether there is a correlation between weight and volume but I thought these are fairly close and so I expected 90ml water instead of 80ml. I would be grateful for a clarification on this. Peri
Good morning Pericles. Yes, my answer said to use 10g of chemical in 80ml water and make up to 100ml. That last bit (make up to 100ml) is important to make a 10% solution. I start with 80ml so it doesn't exceed the 100ml by mistake. Btw, a gram is very very close to 1ml water and can be used as an equivalent in the darkroom.
@@PictorialPlanet Thanks very much John. I understand that you wish to avoid having a spill on the solution, hence the 80ml to start with. I look forward to using many of your excellently explained techniques.
Hi B! This is bleaching, making things lighter or adding brightness to your photograph. Selenium toning is quite different. It is adding a slight tone change or colour change to your photograph and/or making a print more archival.
Ha Ha !! I learnt that when I was a member of the South Essex Camera Club in about 1953 age 16. ! When That Club Folded I joined Barking Photographic Society in 1959. I had a 15 x 12" print taken in Cornwall with my Contax III , Pan-F in Beutler and I put some Liquid Sunshine on a Wave breaking over a Rock in the Middle Distance and WON AN AWARD !
Ha, that's great. You won an award because you take great photographs, Peter! Thanks again for watching these videos my friend.
I've used bamboo brushes to bleach highlights but I like the idea of using the cotton swab.
Thanks for the feed back john, I will take on your advice. Regards
Cheers Jonathan
I am always looking forward to your videos. Thanks for sharing your knowledge!
Thank you, Jawad, for watching my videos! You make it a pleasure.
Just watched this for the umpteenth time. I have a packet of Farmers reducer here but I guess it will be far more cost effective to buy sodium thiosulfate and potassium ferricyanide and make my own? Despite first being introduced to darkroom printing in the 70s I’ve never tried this. No internet in those days so we learnt from local “experts” some of whom were very reluctant to share their knowledge. You Sir, are the antithesis of my 1970s experience 👍
Ha! Thanks, Dave!!
We always used it locally, applied with a sable brush and swabbed with cotton wool. It was a recognised (cheap) method of colour correction where masking films were very costly ie. a single 8 x10 (inches) sheet of Kodak Tri-Mask cost £10 in 1973,.... nearly half a weeks wage for a trainee.
Wonderful technique, thank you very much for sharing this very versatile creative tool! - Cheers from Greece!
Thank you, Christos!
I was afraid the water in that sink would start to overflow 😄
I have read Rudamn's book years ago but I had never seen this done. Need to try this!
Lol... me too! I thought I was going to get drenched. Yes, Rudman's book is awesome as is his work.
You wouldn't believe how often I've gone too far! Like you say - it makes such fun to paint with "sunlight" that it's really hard to stop in the right moment ;)
Higher dilutions of ferri lowers local contrast so be careful here. It might be slower but won't give you the pop in the highlights.
@@PictorialPlanet Mhh... Good to know that! Sounds like I will have some fun by doing a test series :D
@@flutgraben13 Thanks Rüdiger :) With John's information below considered, I will need to do a test series in painting different solutions for given times.
Good evening. Is this stuff juseable to completely get rid of the silver on a negative? If so, this could be jused in black and white reversal prosseses to get rid of the silver created in the first development. Normally I juse H2O2, but it is a bit weak and isn't very reliable...
Sorry, I don't do reversal with film so don't know.
Awesome. Thanks so much for doing these
Thanks Christopher! It's such fun 🤩
Thanks for this. I’ve always found it amazing how much added “punch” this technique, (once you learn not to wait to actually see the change before rinsing!) can add to a photograph.
Yes, and definitely a good reminder, don't wait to see it come right before rinsing or it'll be too late! Thank for commenting, Bob.
Great video
Thanks Bruce
You can also use a small paint brush for watercolors and use it for line and other highlighting like in the eyes
Yes, good point. I don't mention that.
Another gem in your archive , I've not watched this before , any guess what book arrived yesterday that spurred me to research farmers solution!!?
Tim Rudman's book on toning?
@@PictorialPlanet Eddie ephraums
Superb!
@@PictorialPlanet £5.95 delivered!
Wow
Slightly more to it i regard to re fixing (or not) and when to apply, before or after toning. There is a bit of workflow here that needs to be established or one could not fix enough or spend a long time washing refixed prints.
Good point. Added to the video notes. Thanks, Simon!
Hello John. When applying the bleach on your beach scene, I noticed a few things, could you use cotton swab to do full prints rather than submerging the whole prints in the tray?. Also when applying the reducer to the print I noticed you were going over into the white border, would this not leave streaks in the border ? Regards
No streaks on the white, it doesn't bleach as it's already white. You could use a cotton swab BUT you have to get the bleach off quickly, before you start seeing any effect because it works fast and can quickly get out of hand. Practice on old test prints.
Does the water completely stop the bleaching action?
Cool technique ❤️
It does but not instantly. So you have to start washing the bleach out just before it's ready. Then give the print a full thorough wash again to complete the process.
@@PictorialPlanet Hi thank you for the video! A printer I follow suggests to do a second fix after bleaching, what do you think about it? He has a bit of a different process, because he only mixes FPIII with water (no hypo) and bleaches the print right out of the fix, before washing, so that the bleaching process is slower because the fixer slows it down a bit and there's more control. I guess there are different ways to reach the same result, however I'm curious if without the second fix it works also for archival prints?Thanks!
8:21 Tim Rudman, Iceland
That’s the one! Thanks. He’s one heck of a photographer.
Thank you so much for sharing your precious knowledge! A question, if you are so kind: what kind of Hypo recipe you use? A Sodium thiosulfate - Sodium sulfite recipe will work? Thank you in advanced!
Hi and thanks for your comment. I use TF2 for classic films such as FP4+, HP5+, and PAN F+. This is also a good hypo for papers. I have a video here that shows how to make it.
@@PictorialPlanet So I assume that TF2 is used as a Hypo with this Reducer on the above video… hank you so much for your quick answer!
Hi, John. A couple of questions. I fix film in Ilford Rapid Fixer 1:4; paper in PF's TF-5. Will either work,and if so, can you suggest an amount/dilution? I don't keep hypo around, and odn;t wish to add anther chemical to my shelf if I don't have to. Second, This method avoids fixing the print between applications of purely ferricyanide solution (or almost, with a bit of fixer), but I'm surprised that the hypo included in your solution is adequate to fix the bleached grains properly in such a short time. Any comment on that? Finally, I have read that potassium bromide is useful to prevent yellow staining when bleaching warm-tone papers. Have you any experience with this? Thank you for your great work!
Hi Philip! I have never used fixer concentrates for this so cannot make any recommendations. The amount of fix used in the ferricyanide solution is enough to fix the bleached silver but by all means drop the print into some fix if you are worried about it. It can do no harm. I have another video on sepia toning where I add bromide. I've never used it in warm toned papers though. Thank you for your kind words!
Philip, I was just looking at my copy of Way Beyond Monochrome and they recommend a Farmer's Reducer made using Soln. A 10g potassium ferricyanide with water to make 1ltr - Soln. B Rapid fixer (working solution) 1 Ltr. It says to use the solutions in sequence or mix 1+1 just prior to use.
Hope that's helpful.
@@PictorialPlanet John, how good of you to follow up! Thank you kindly.
Do you need to re fix the image or you can just wash it off and let the print dry?
@eliashaglund1029 You'll notice that the bleach has 125ml of sodium thiosulphate (hypo) in the formula. This is fixer. Because it has fixer in it it fixes as it bleached to there's no need to fix again. If the bleach didn't have this fixer added then sure, you'd need to refix. This one's ok though.
@@PictorialPlanet thanks for quick answer , going to test this in the darkroom on Sunday 👌 great video
@eliashaglund1029 Enjoy, it's a nice way to add contrast.
@eliashaglund1029 Give it a complete wash when finished, 60 mins for FB paper 30 mins RC.
Hi John. I have just tried that cotton swab on one of my prints, silhouetted windmill at early twilight. End result was awful! completely streaked all over the dark areas and light blotches. Nothing like your beach scene print, Can you figure out what went wrong !! . Ps your not to blame. Not too fussed ,I can re- print. I accept it is a steep learning curve.
Oh no! I wonder if 1. The bleach wasn't diluted enough or 2. it wasn't washed off quickly enough?
@@PictorialPlanet hi John . probably both.
Great video, John. One question - what formula do you use to mix up your bottle of Hypo 10% and the other bottle of Potassium ferricyanide 10%? It looks like your drawing the chemicals from bottles that contain more than 125ml of the Hypo and 12ml of the PF.
Hi Frank. I made the 10% solutions by using the maths of 10g of the chemical in 80ml water and making the total up to 100ml. This ratio can be changed depending on how much you need. For instance 20g in 200ml (I think that's what I did for this video), or 50g in 500ml. These are all 10% solutions. I hope that's a better explanation. The solutions keep for a few months in a bottle with a squirt of butane lighter gas over them.
@@PictorialPlanet Thank you, John.
@@PictorialPlanet A great set of very informative videos John.Thank you so much for all your excellent work. A question of clarification: For the 10% solutions in your answer to Frank you mention the example of 10g of chemicals to 80ml water. I am not sure whether there is a correlation between weight and volume but I thought these are fairly close and so I expected 90ml water instead of 80ml. I would be grateful for a clarification on this. Peri
Good morning Pericles. Yes, my answer said to use 10g of chemical in 80ml water and make up to 100ml. That last bit (make up to 100ml) is important to make a 10% solution. I start with 80ml so it doesn't exceed the 100ml by mistake. Btw, a gram is very very close to 1ml water and can be used as an equivalent in the darkroom.
@@PictorialPlanet Thanks very much John. I understand that you wish to avoid having a spill on the solution, hence the 80ml to start with. I look forward to using many of your excellently explained techniques.
Hi there again! What's the difference between this and selenium toning? Many thanks.
Hi B! This is bleaching, making things lighter or adding brightness to your photograph. Selenium toning is quite different. It is adding a slight tone change or colour change to your photograph and/or making a print more archival.
@@PictorialPlanet Thanks for the answer! I've heard that selenium toning also helps for achieving better Dmin? is that true?
It does add contrast by a slight lowering of the shadows.
How long does the un-used solution last?
A few months.
Would it work on RC paper as well? Question from a starter...
Hi Enevan. Yes, it works perfectly well with both RC or FB prints. Thanks for asking.
Can you put the Tim Rudman reference in your comments section please?
Done