Aphrodite III

[Pete Askew]

Just as a comparison, I have now printed the Aphrodite negative. I framed it to reproduce the crop used in Aphrodite II. As you know, the original image was shot onto New55 film using a Speed Graphic and Aero-Ektar lens (see first link below). The negative was fixed in Ilford Rapid Fixer (mixed 1:1 with water and then washed and dried - this was done in my kitchen in England and so a few spots of dust crept in) and printed onto Ilford MGIV FB Matt paper (16" x 12") using a Devere 507 enlarger fitted with a Heiland Split-Grade controller + 150mm Apo-Rodagon enlarging lens (at f1:22). A base exposure of 32s at G4 was used although her face was dodged for 2/3 stops (i.e. 2 exposures were made so I could dodge that area in the first - one of the annoyances of using a split-grade controller) and 1 stop vignette was added. The paper was developed in Ilford MG developer for 2 minutes and then fixed and washed. After drying the print was stained using strong black coffee (freshly filtered of course - but goodness knows how old!) then washed and dried. The print was copied using a Hasselblad 503CW + 50mm Zeiss Distagon CF f1:4.0 onto a PhaseOne P20 back. The raw file was processed to a 16 bit TIFF file using CaptureOne Pro and this was then imported into Lightroom. A border was added in ColorFX.

Links

http://www.realphotographersforum.com/forum/threads/shooting-aphrodite.21296/

http://www.realphotographersforum.com/forum/threads/aphrodite.21289/

http://www.realphotographersforum.com/forum/threads/aphrodite-ii.21294/

 

[Rob MacKillop]

It's perfect, isn't it? I don't know what else to say.

 

[Pete Askew]

Thank you, Rob.

Actually it was quite hard to print as there is such a low range of tones present in the negative. I could almost certainly have printed it with higher contrast but I wanted to reproduce what came from the original positive and the scanned negative. I have framed it but it's a bit of a nothing picture I think. Mind, I'm not feeling well so maybe it is just me!

 

[Rob MacKillop]

There's a good touch of sentimentality about it, for sure, but the toning staves off any schmaltz. I like it.

 

[Pete Askew]

I was thinking about New55 the other day, maybe prompted by the discussion on LF, and so I revisited some of the threads about it. That led me to this image. I was quite negative about it and, seeing it again online, I can sort of see why. However, it is still hanging on the wall of the studio and so I see it most days and, although not one of my favourites, I’m quite fond of it and will leave it there.

 

[Gary R. Smith]

A lot of work getting from here to there!

I miss having a full-time wet darkroom with an enlarger.

 

[Pete Askew]

I don’t use mine anywhere near enough, but I plan to change that. I will close the one in the UK though as it is in the laboratories and the room is used for UV microscopy and it would be difficult to do much in there now. Hopefully someone will want the processors and enlarger, etc.