{"id":114024,"date":"2017-11-30T17:26:07","date_gmt":"2017-11-30T17:26:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/amateurphotographer.co.uk\/?p=114024"},"modified":"2018-02-02T13:51:26","modified_gmt":"2018-02-02T13:51:26","slug":"darkroom-toning-tips","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/other.kelsey.host\/amateurphotographer\/latest\/darkroom-toning-tips\/","title":{"rendered":"Darkroom toning tips: How to get terrific tones"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
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Read Tim Rudman’s darkroom toning tips. ‘Old Forest’. Gold and selenium toned amidol – lith two-bath print. The mix of rich browns and cold blues partner well to bring out textures and add depth. Credit: Tim Rudman<\/p>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\n

Toning has much to offer the film photographer who wants outstanding prints. Longer-lasting prints and deeper, more luminous tones are worthy goals, but the optional introduction of false colour alters perceptions of reality \u2013 enabling a more personal interpretation by the viewer. It also boosts mood and atmosphere on the finished results. Using colour contrast can also enhance tonal separation and aerial perspective.<\/p>\n

We consider selenium, gold and sepia toners, while in a future article we will take a look at the more colourful copper and iron blue toners.<\/p>\n

Darkroom toning tips: Selenium toning<\/h2>\n

Readily available and easy to use, selenium toner is a single solution for dilution with water. As it smells of ammonia good ventilation is advised. Label the diluted solutions for reuse until they are exhausted. Often the only toner used by the black and white masters of the past, selenium typically was diluted 1:20 as a 2-minute final processing stage to increase print Dmax (the maximum depth of black yielded by a paper). This added luminosity and depth to a print and also imparted some archival protection without significant colour shifts on their coldtone papers. Today it is also used for its colour shifting properties, mostly with warmtone papers and lith prints.<\/p>\n

There is no \u2018correct\u2019 dilution for selenium. The figures \u20181:20 or weaker for Dmax and 1:10 or stronger for colour\u2019 are sometimes quoted, but it depends on the make of solution and the paper. Be aware that strong solutions can be pungent.<\/p>\n

Darkroom toning tips: Colour<\/h2>\n

Selenium toner converts image silver to orange silver selenide, which resists chemical attack by atmospheric pollutants and almost any chemical used in processing \u2013 a fact we take advantage of with duo toning. However, its colour is heavily but variably masked by surrounding black silver grains, so warmtone papers may initially \u2018cool off\u2019 and then reveal a shift to reddish browns. Coldtone papers respond slower and can shift to aubergine or purply blacks. Lith prints respond with great enthusiasm.<\/p>\n

Darkroom toning tips: Split toning<\/h2>\n

Selenium toner acts \u2018bottom up\u2019 from darkest tones, to mid and eventually lightest tones. This is fantastically useful as it allows us to snatch the print from the toner at a given point on the tonal scale by moving the print swiftly into running water. This leaves the untoned silver uncoloured and available, if required, for another toner \u2013 duo toning. Selenium will irretrievably stain dishes and worktops, so be sure to mop spillages up immediately. It can also stain prints if poorly fixed or in acid environments. If using acid fixer, wash well or dip in hypoclear before selenium toning.<\/p>\n\t\t

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\u2018The old West Pier, Brighton\u2019. Selenium, sepia and gold tri-toned multigrade print. The effect of gold after sepia is to produce a range of orange to red hues, depending on the amount of sepia additive used. Credit: Tim Rudman<\/p>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\n

Darkroom toning tips: Gold toning<\/h2>\n

Direct gold toner is simplicity itself. Colourless, odourless, archival and non-staining, use it straight from the bottle and rebottle for re-use. Slide the print in, watch for colour change and remove when satisfied. Gold is beautiful but expensive.<\/p>\n

Darkroom toning tips: Colour<\/h2>\n

Coldtone prints will turn a colder blue- black. Warmtone prints give a stronger blue shift and warmtone lith prints much more so. These may even show an initial red flush that can be arrested before it quickly moves through purple, mauve and lilac hues, finishing a delicate sky blue with white highlights.<\/p>\n

Darkroom toning tips: Split toning<\/h2>\n

Gold toner works \u2018top down\u2019, so watch the light tones and pull early when you like what you see. A word of warning \u2013 with fibre papers the blue intensifies on drydown, so pull early and assess when it\u2019s dry. It\u2019s easy to put it back in if necessary. Split-toning warmtone and lith prints produces a blue on warm-brown split. Pretty, but also useful for colour contrast, directing the eye and creating impressions of depth as the blue is visually recessive, and always in the lighter tones.<\/p>\n

Darkroom toning tips: Duo toning<\/h2>\n

After split-selenium, gold tones the untoned (lighter) silver giving blue on brown. Selenium after split-gold gives the same colours; however gold toner works largely by coating the silver grains with colloidal gold, rather than converting them into something else. Selenium penetrates this envelope eventually turning that silver brown and irreversibly displacing the blue colour. This cannot happen if gold toning follows selenium. Gold toners are usually acidic, so selenium after gold will instantly stain a poorly washed print. Duo toning after sepia however, turns the sepia colour to an attractive range of red or orange tones \u2013 this of course depends on the paper and the sepia colour used.<\/p>\n\t\t

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\u2018Emergency exit\u2019. Multigrade warmtone paper, selenium-sepia duotone with short bleach bath. Despite being a warmtone paper, a colder colour is achieved by extending the selenium time to affect some silver grains in the mid-tones and by using more alkali additive in the sepia bath. Credit: Tim Rudman<\/p>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\n

Darkroom toning tips: Sepia toning<\/h2>\n

Sepia toners vary from the older \u2018rotten- egg\u2019 smelling type to more versatile odourless variable \u2018thiourea\u2019 sepia kits such as Fotospeed ST20. These consist of three concentrates \u2013 bleach, toner and an additive that changes the colour produced by the toner. They are archival and easy to use. Unlike \u2018direct\u2019 selenium and gold toners this \u2018indirect\u2019 toner requires an initial bleach stage. This changes the silver into pale yellow silver ferrocyanide, which the toner then converts to stable brown silver sulphide.<\/p>\n

To control colour the toner requires the addition of an alkali \u2013 \u2018solution C\u2019. This colour is variable from yellow-brown, sepia, mid-brown to dark brown. Few paper\/developer combinations give that complete range, but it may be achieved by changing the developer and\/or paper.<\/p>\n

Darkroom toning tips: Full vs split toning<\/h2>\n

The bleach works \u2018top down\u2019 from highlights towards shadows, and can be interrupted for split-toning at the light or midtones, or be allowed to proceed through to the blacks for a nostalgic- looking all-brown print with brown \u2018blacks\u2019. Slow coldtone papers need stronger bleach for this, with a longer wash before toning.<\/p>\n

Split-toning is achieved with shorter bleach times. The effect may be obvious when toning to midtones, or just the subtlest hint of warmth in the highlights, in which case it helps to dilute the bleach further for better control. These need only short washes before toning. Whilst you can snatch from the bleach early, you should never snatch early from the toner before the less-stable ferrocyanide is all converted. The \u2018split\u2019 is controlled in the bleach, never the toner, which only tones the bleached silver, leaving the remaining silver still available for another toner if desired.<\/p>\n

There is always some highlight density loss with sepia toning. This is greater with a low-alkali yellow-sepia mix than with a high-alkali dark-brown combination. Anticipate this when printing.<\/p>\n

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Dos and don\u2019ts<\/h2>\n