The Four Hour Print

This picture made at Darian, Georgia was my first four hour print. It is from the mid 1970's. News photographers of the day prided themselves on their ability to rush in on deadline and process a roll of black and white film, crank out a really good quality print and deliver it to the copy desk in a very short time.

There were some excellent print makers around with lots of little darkroom secrets and time savers.
I learned from some of the best. Ralph Jones was head of the Photo Department when I came to the paper.
He was an old school artist in the darkroom. Taught me patience, the art of burning and dodging. For you young folks, that is selective exposure of your paper while making a print.

Freddie Bentley taught me to use hot water to darken a specific part of the print. We would use sodium sulfite, a bleaching agent, and a q-tip to lighten shadow areas that we could not hold up in the print.

The making of a print was an art in itself. Lots of skills involved. There is something about making a print and watching the image appear on the paper as you rock the developer tray. Alas, a thrill that has gone away. But also gone is the frustration of spending 20 minutes on a print to have it dumped because you overprinted a section, or held back too much on another. Photoshop is much more forgiving, but some of the magic is gone.

Black and White

It is amazing the difference black and white can make. Often I will see a photograph as black and white when I am looking through the viewfinder. Other times I will try an image in black and white to see how it looks. Some subjects just lend themselves to black and white. One of my favorite images was shot in color years ago. Last year I decided to convert it, and like it even better as black and white.

I shot almost exclusively black and white for so many years, guess it is just burned into my brain.

The images included here were all done digitally last year and in color. It is easy to make digital images into monochrome. You can go to Mode and just make them Grayscale, and you got black and white. I usually leave my images as RGB's and desaturate them. Desaturate is under Image and Adjust in Photoshop. If you want to print them later they do better saved as RGB.

Using Desaturate is the easiest way to make a black and white mage, with part still color.

If you are still shooting film, try some of the C-41 process black and white film. C-41 is the chemistry for doing color print film. You can shoot black and white and still have it processed anywhere. Sometimes the printing kinda lacks, so find a good printer. Even better, have your images put on CD, play with them in an image editing software, save them as RGB's and then have them printed.

Play with it. Give black and white a try. It is a really cool way to see the world.