The concept of push/pull with paper printing.

[Y.Lee]

I was wondering if there would be a corresponding concept with exposure time/developing time of the printing process, similar to push/pull in film processing. Apart from exposure time and development affecting brightness in general, do they impact contrast or grain size on print?(This is not an accurate expression, but is there any difference in the behavior of image cells on the paper?)

[AJG]

You could try this, but I would expect poor results.  I have seen many of my students over the years try to pull prints out of the developer when it had become clear that they had overexposed them in the enlarger but I have never seen an acceptable let alone a good print result from this.  Extremely long developing times could lead to fogging and loss of contrast due to the safelight beginning to expose the highlights of the print.  As for grain, unless you plan on looking at your prints under magnification I can't imagine that you would see it.  Print developers are fairly high energy to begin with unlike developers formulated for small format film where grain is an issue.

[glen_h]

Print developing, unlike film, is designed to go to completion.

Usual is Dektol 1:2 for 1 or 1.5 minutes, depending on the paper.

If you see a print developing too fast, it doesn't hurt to take it out early, but as noted the results will be poor.

But letting it develop until completely black is even worse.

 

That does leave the question if different dilutions, and corresponding time.

Less than one minute is hard to time accurately.