Monday 20 May 2019

Lith and Slavich Unibrom paper

This was one of those films that had got stuck inside a camera for a few months, so I'd completely forgotten about 3 or 4 shots that I'd taken on a trip to Belfast I made by train a while ago.  I'd borrowed Missy's OM-1 and 50mm lens and just fired off a few shots as the train exited Belfast.  A couple of them looked promising so yesterday morning I had a short darkroom session to see how they printed.  I knew I had a box of Slavich paper lurking somewhere in the darkroom - it had been a while since I'd printed with it.  In lith developer it takes on a very graphic look - doesn't suit every negative but I had a feeling this one would work.

Passing through Belfast station on the train, 2019.  Fotospeed lith on 9.5"x12" Slavich Unibrom paper
I liked it. Some dark bits and some light bits and it tells a story.  I might even put this into a Club competition - if only to hear the judge's comments.

4 comments:

  1. It's well-composed, for sure. Interesting effect from the developer and paper. Graphic, indeed. In fact, I thought this was the negative at first glance. I like it. I wonder what a landscape would look like done this way.

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    1. Cheers Marcus. I shall 'do' a landscape on lith sometime soon - just for you :)

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  2. Unlike yourself I just got my first batch of Slavich paper in the mail a few weeks ago. It's not going to be my last, it seems. I have been searching a bit around for this paper for a while as I thought it was only the old stock of the paper worth having for lith printing. Searching around the usual place to get ripped off I found the prices to be too high to pay for something you really don't know about, so I finally caved in and bought a couple of hundred sheets (smallish ones) of new papers. Well, it seems I might have to add a few sizes as well as I simply love it. It's not for all negatives, as you say, but for that right one...
    This one looks really great, my friend! Mine seems to take on a lot more random patterns in the shadows than you got here, but it might have something to do with heat and/or concentration of the fluids and what have we. It's not exactly easy to predict the final results using this technique :))

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    1. As you say, Roy, I think part of the attraction of this particular paper is it's unpredictability. It's totally unlike any other paper I use which is just what is needed at times. I can see how you could end up going a bit mad with it, actually...the look is quite unique and about as far away from the current trend in photography as you can get (and that's no bad thing in my eyes).

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