From: bjs@RUTS.ccc.amdahl.com (Barry Sherman)
Newsgroups: rec.photo
Subject: Joys of big ones (Was Re: Barnbaum and Sexton like the same rock?)
Date: 13 Oct 92 19:34:11 GMT
Reply-To: bjs@RUTS.ccc.amdahl.com (Barry Sherman)
Followup-To: rec.photo
Distribution: usa
Organization: Amdahl Corporation, Sunnyvale CA

Jim Cathery writes:

>(No! I will
>_not_ succumb to the wiggles [mphhh, grunt, arrrgh].)
>
>My local pusher, err, dealer has been waving used 4x5's in my face.
>I wave back (so far).

Careful!  Those big wigglers really *are* addictive.  And, just like any
other addiction, you want more and more and more.  Or maybe I should say,
bigger and bigger and bigger.  I keep finding new things to like about
the big negs (or maybe I should say originals).

I've recently discovered the joys of friskets.  At least I think that's the
name of what I've made.  If one has 1)  a big original and 2) registration
equipment to keep everything lined up and 3)  an original with tiny areas
that you want to dodge/burn then one can:

Register a blank piece of film (fixed but not developed) with the original
and paint over the areas to be dodged or burned with Kodak Opaque Black.
Then contact print that, in register, onto some Kodalith.  Now take the
Kodalith and contact print that, still in register, onto another sheet of
Kodalith.  Now you have two masks, one all black except for the areas
to be burned and another which is all clear except for the same areas.

BTW - the Opaque Black never seems to really dry hard so I contact print
it onto Kodalith even if the original painted one is all that I need.

Even easier, if the small areas are highlights then one can contact
print the original onto the Kodalith (although a panchromatic litho
film is really better), thereby producing a "highlight bump mask".

These can be combined with the original (negative or transparency) in
a registration negative carrier to permit dodging or burning small areas.
My first use has been in a photo in which a rock covered in bright green
seaweed dominates the foreground.  The rock has an orange starfish right in 
the center.  I wanted to burn the rock and, while at it, increase the green
without making the starfish turn muddy or making the gray, wet foggy sand
in the background go green.  I also wanted to burn the starfish and to increase 
the red to make it more vivid.  

So I made a "burning" frisket for the rock (all black except for the rock) and 
"burning" (all black except for the starfish) and "dodging" (all clear except 
for the starfish) friskets for the starfish and was able to do two burn 
exposures after the base exposure.  

In the first burn exposure the rock frisket isolated it and the "dodging"
starfish frisket kept the starfish from being exposed while I burned the rock 
with green light.  (The total "sandwich" was the original transparency, a 
contrast reduction mask, the "dodging" rock frisket and the "dodging" starfish
frisket)  Then I replaced these two friskets with the "burning" starfish 
frisket (all black except for the starfish) and burned the starfish with
red light.  

You can do really interesting things with big originals!  (And I'm coming
to think of my investment in registration equipment as some of the best
spent money in my darkroom.)

Barry

--


|----------------------------------------------------------------------------|
| Barry Sherman, Amdahl Corp.  | PROGRAM: n. A magic spell cast over a com-  |
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| said of me as well.                                                        |
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Newsgroups: rec.photo