calvinbell

Anyone remember how negative prints were created using BW film an enlarger and a darkroom?

bleirer

It had something to do with solarization, exposing the paper to white light in the middle of the process. I believe you partially developed then flashed the light, then finished the remaining steps.

big-guy Loc: Peterborough Ontario Canada

The Sebatier Effect

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

I did the solarization thing a few times.

GoofyNewfie Loc: Kansas City

Sabattier Effect:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sabattier_effect
https://www.pinterest.com/jmellen1222/sabatier-effect-photos/

I remember playing around with it in the early days, with mixed results.

JohnSwanda Loc: San Francisco

I'm not sure the OP meant solarization/sabattier effect when he asked about negative prints. A true negative print could be made by duping a negative onto negative film, resulting in a positive image which would print as a negative. It could also be done by using a print as a paper negative and contact printing it.

robertjerl Loc: Corona, California

#1. I cheated, I used the reverse print paper made for doing color prints from slides.

#2. Another method I tried was use the negative but 4x5/8x10 sheet film instead of printer paper, then do a print from the sheet film which being a negative of a negative (positive) produced a negative print.

#3. And a technique I and some of my students worked on the one year I taught basic photography (renamed "History and Practice of Photography" so I could teach it on my history/geography credential) was to process B&W negative film to produce a positive image. I don't remember the name but Kodak etc had chemical sets with directions for how to do that. When mounted as slides and projected those B&W slides had a tonal range that made color slides look flat. When used as a negative it of course produced a negative print just like the sheet film in method #2. You could also use B&W 35 mm movie film but the smallest rolls I could get were 100' and that would have blown the class budget. Though I bought some for myself as I had the reusable cartridges and bulk film loading gear. For one thing I found I could load 42 frames in a cartridge and didn't have to load a new roll so often. I had one camera with a "power winder" - poor man's version of a "motor drive" used by pro sports photographers - only about 3 frames a second. Now a 35 mm with motor drive and modified to use 50' or 100' foot rolls of 35 mm movie film gave you a real arm, hand and shoulder strength work out if you used one for more than a few minutes. I got to hold one once and just could not see hauling that monster around, even if I could have afforded one.

And another fun thing I tried was using color slides as negatives and printing on color print paper - a color negative print. The appeal lasted for one 50 sheet box of 8x10 paper.

Blair Shaw Jr Loc: Dunnellon,Florida

This was an interesting discussion that I vaguely remember from years earlier with other hobbyists and totally forgot about. I feel as though I missed-out on something exciting and useful. Wish I had looked into it further while I still had a dark room to experiment.
Thanks for the info from all who shared-in the talk.
Jimbo

JohnSwanda Loc: San Francisco

For those who want to experiment with negative prints, it is one of those things that is much easier to do with digital than with film.

calvinbell

So you shot the negative with the enlarger onto the print paper, and then a flash of white light? That makes the whites black and vice versa?

calvinbell

Was this done on the enlarger or while the print was developing, or in the stop bath?

rebride

To make a negative print first make a regular (positive) print and use that to make a contact print emulsion side to emulsion side.
For pseudo-solarization the film or paper is flashed during development.

JohnSwanda Loc: San Francisco

Solarization is not the same as a true negative print. It only reverses some of the tones in the image

rmalarz Loc: Tempe, Arizona

Essentially, one used positive film. This would produce a negative print.
--Bob

bleirer

I know it was 43 years ago during Photography 101 at Cleveland State. Does that help? Maybe the prof still lives, I could ask?

Or one could probable Google for solarization darkroom method or similar. Or do it in photoshop: Adjustment layer named Invert, then Hue Saturation adjustment layer, click the colorize box, drag the saturation to zero if you want black and white. Or use posterize adjustment layer.

https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/using/applying-special-color-effects-images.html?mv=product&mv2=ps&x-product=Photoshop%2F21.2.2&x-product-location=in-app-search%2Fproduction&context_guid=cd19db61-7c3d-4a7a-8370-b16427f244eb#