Feroze, My Cibachrome retouching dyes came from a professional photographic supplier. I'd seen the Marshalls products in city camera stores but not small suburban stores. I haven't been looking out for them for years so I can't comment on their current availability.
Some of the oldest B&W papers were naturally warmer toned than present papers because they were silver chloride papers not silver bromide. The two existed together for a while and while I can't confirm that chloride papers are extinct any that might still exist are rare. Some old prints weren't always brown but have "sulphided" due to a combination of age, chemical instability and chemical contamination. Tom has already explained this well so I won't repeat his explanation. What you now find are warm toned papers and warm toned developers, as well as a wide range of colour toners that are used post development. If you're adventurous you might explore some of these toners to get different base colours in preparation for hand colouring with dyes. Apart from the Kodak sepia toner and Agfa brown toner the only other type I've used was "Canchem" brand which is Australian and I doubt is exported. It's even possible to multiple tone a print. You can work on small areas of print with fine brushes and swabs being careful not to let toners run out of the intended areas. You can also use artists' masking fluid to allow toning only on selected areas, I've experimented with this but did get problems at the boundaries of differently toned areas, so it may be necessary to leave a margin of untoned emulsion around each differently treated area, and later blend the tones by hand colouring. One other technique that I've seen used successfully is to copy a B&W print onto colour film, but rather than make a single exposure, each area for different colouring is spot-lit and the appropriate coloured gel put over the camera lens. "Painting with light", using a penlight torch, can solve the problem of odd shaped details of the print. As well, Jobo makes a glass stage for special effects copying, which allows you to put masks or gels between the lens and the original photo at a position where the edges will be unfocussed and more easily blended. It is such a simple device that you could easily make your own if you liked. It was on their website last time I looked (just search for "Jobo"). If you're colouring prints from a consumer lab work gently because the emulsions of plastic papers are delicate when they're damp. And when you're finished don't forget to scan your work, because some of the chemical cocktails you'll get when you mix photos with dyes or pigments that weren't necessarily made for that purpose could reduce the life expectancy of a print in unpredictable ways. Regards, Anthony Farr ----- Original Message ----- From: "Feroze Kistan" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> (snip) > Isn't the sepia tint a natural thing that happens to old > photo's anyway? or has this been designed out of modern papers? > (snip) > Are the inks you using the only > available ones and are they sold in an shop or as a photgraphic item? > (snip)
