Digital BW, The Print

One of the main advantages of using Pyro TEA is you only have to buy 
it about once every 10 years or so. Just top it off with "fresh" 
developer.

When it gets to the consistancy of glue, make a new batch.

Mine is 6 years old and still going strong. Not ever close to "glue"!

Scott

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "Brian Ellis" 
<bellis60@...> wrote:
>
> "I used pyro on a couple of films a while back and while I was
> impressed with the lack of grain in areas of continuous tone (sky
> etc.) I found the grain quite exagerated in other areas compared to
> some other developers"
> 
> I performed extensive testing comparing pyro to D76 several years 
ago. My 
> basic procedure was to make duplicate negatives of various scenes, 
develop 
> one in pyro (PMK) and one in D76 1-1 using lford HP5+ film, then 
making 
> prints from both. I found no advantage  to the pyro prints in the 
sense that 
> identical prints could be made from either set of negatives. I 
concluded 
> that even if there happens to be some scene somewhere that could be 
> photographed and better processed in pyro, for the vast majority of 
scenes 
> pyro just wasn't worth screwing around with.
> 
> ----- Original Message ----- 
> From: "Chris Ellis" <christian.ellis@...>
> To: <DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com>
> Sent: Wednesday, March 29, 2006 3:15 AM
> Subject: [Digital BW] Re: Scanning Pyro Negs?
> 
> 
> I used pyro on a couple of films a while back and while I was
> impressed with the lack of grain in areas of continuous tone (sky
> etc.) I found the grain quite exagerated in other areas compared to
> some other developers.
> 
> I used FP 4 and Pan F in 35mm and have a Minolta Scan Dual III.  The
> Pan F was fairly grainless but was very high contrast so highlights
> didn't hold a great deal of detail.  I didn't use an alkaline fixer
> which I understand makes a difference to the stain.  Perhaps I 
should
> have another go with an alkaline fix and reduce my dev time...  (I'm
> afraid I've been chasing silver bullets for a while and never settle
> long enough on any technique to really work it out properly.  When
> will I learn?)
> 
> One idea I've recently had was simulating the effects of Pyro in
> Photoshop.
> 
> Roughly speakly:
> 
> 1)  Develop and scan your film as normal - I like to apply a slight
> USM with no threshold to make the grain less mushy, but your scanner
> might be better than this.
> 2)  Use grain removal software (eg Neat Image / Noise Ninja) to
> produce a reduced grain version of the original.
> 3)  Create a photoshop file with two layers:  the full grain and the
> smooth.  Probably put the grainy version on the bottom.
> 4)  Create a layer mask for the top layer using the technique
> described for capture sharpening here:
> http://www.creativepro.com/story/feature/20357-2.html.  Blend the 
two
> images by eg setting the opacity of the top layer to 50%.
> 
> I've inconclusively played around with this but wonder if anyone 
else
> has some similar techniques up their sleeve.
> 
> Some further thoughts:
> 
> 1)  You could do this in reverse using digital capture (another 
silver
> bullet):  your initial capture becomes your grain-free layer and you
> can create a layer with added noise as your grain layer.
> 2)  Speculatively:  you could use a pyro negative to emphasise this
> effect if you could somehow separate the grain and the mask into
> layers.  You would probably need a really good stain to stand any
> chance of getting this to work.
> 
> Chris
> 
> 
> 
> 
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