wcroninger

<p>John, <br>

Thanks for the thoughts, will try them out and see. I took a trial at using white vinegar last night with no luck. But your suggestions are definitely worth a go. Yes I do expect this to be a recurring problem LOL. But one thing I've found over the years is that the cleaner you keep the darkroom the more the students seem to be willing to assist in its maintenance!<br>

Bill</p>

<p>Thanks for all the replies, I am also leaning towards contaminated fixer. The jug has been around for a long time and is caked with dried fixer and ? on the outside. Who knows what is living inside! <br>

During the Fall & Spring semesters we have around 36 students continuously using the two labs so the comments regarding filtering fixer are very useful. I will look into that. John the cross contamination idea is a possibility had not previously considered. We use a 20L floating lid tank for negative developer and I had just cleaned that pretty throughly between students so think we are ok there. But that also makes me wonder about how well the students are cleaning up after themselves so check all the developing tanks. <br>

I think we need to "invest" in a competent work-study during the year and setup a regular and timely cleaning schedule. The "black-spots" are new but we have ongoing problems with heavy sulphur smell and water spotting of negatives. A bit more emphasis on cleaning could not hurt.<br>

One last question, any thoughts on how to clean a plexiglas or lexan archival washer? I drain and wipe it down regularly but we have a real issue with "mineral" deposits on the outside where water dries.</p>

<p>We are having a run of irregular black dots on all HP5 negatives developed by students in my intro to photography class. Student prints look like someone stood back and threw dust at the negative, which is what I first suspected until it began to show up on all their negatives. There is no pattern to the spots, they can appear within the image, between frames and within the sprocket hole areas. I discarded all developer and wetting agent last night then used distilled water to mix new. Same problem occurred. The fixer tested as good but I did notice quite a few "floaters" in the batch, so I am leaning towards this being the problem . Couple other possibilities that I want to ask the group about based on what I've read in various threads.<br>

1) Problem seems to have started after I loaded a new 100' roll of HP5 in the bulk loader, defective roll?<br>

2) The Fixer jug is old, residue?<br>

3) We use well water which occasionally has a very strong sulphur smell, bad enough that we have had to discard wetting agent.<br>

4) After developer, students wash for 30 seconds with running water. <br>

Looking at the negatives under a high power loupe the spots are black, irregularly shaped and appear to be "in" the film as opposed to on it.<br>

Any thoughts? Please feel free to point me at a thread that I might have missed.<br>

Thanks!</p>

<p>I teach a course called "Introduction to B&W Photography) here in Maine. The course is primarily taken by students who need to get past the required 3 credits in fine arts of the core curriculum. We do have a few photography lovers on occasion! I have a number of themed projects: still life, landscape, "telling a story" and portraiture. <br>

I would like to upgrade our lighting but not sure which direction, hot vs flash, to go. At this point we had 1 Lowel DP and a Lowel-Pro both with barndoors. I usually bring in my Alien Bees flash (grid, umbrella, softbox) and two Metz 45s. The portrait theme is a two print project and the lighting above is used in the formal shoot, in which I am always onsite to help with placement and safety. <br>

The question then would be arguments for going with another DP or similar light with modifiers or to add a 2nd flash. My main issue is for the students to be able to "see" and control light better. We do make use of sheets of foam core as reflectors or modifiers, however even with that the Metz flashes are of limited use. Complicating the choice a bit is the fact that I would really like any light we purchase to be useful for the folks teaching the studio courses which occasionally need to light an object or model. The department chair has said that dual use would be "nice" but not absolutely required. I've looked through many of the threads here on photo.net and having used the Lowels for years understand the heat, safety and relatively low light arguments. Just looking for anything I've missed.<br>

I'd appreciate any thoughts folks would care to offer. Thank you.</p>

Nick, this might help. On your hard drive, find the Applications folder, inside that scroll

down till you find Utilities and inside that look for the application Disk Utility... run this

program.

When it loads it will take a minute to gather all the info about your machine eventually

displaying icons of your drives. Click on the boot drive icon, some new info/options will

appear in the right most box. Towards the bottom of that window will be two buttons,

click on the one that says verify disk permissions. It will run for awhile and if it finds

something amiss you can use the repair disk permissions to fix it. See if that helps

Ted, just ventured onto your site. I really wouldn't call your images "washed out," I'd call

them good and interesting! :-) Thanks for the info, I wondered about that also...whether

some images produced on PCs might look washed out on this one but as I said, yours did

not. If I get a chance I will look at them on a PC to see if there is any difference. Tough

call, we are dealing with not only different machines but different browsers as well as

invidual preferences. Today has definitely been an education.

Grepmat, Sean, .KAA, Sabrina, John and Pete: Many thanks for all you folks have

contributed on this. I'm not going to tell you I understand everying but I certainly

understand more than I did and have many more resources to look at then before your

assistance.

Bill

Gentleman, thanks for your input. I tried the "soft proof" option in Photoshop and the

results were very interesting. It certainly darkens the image considerably.

When I post images online (nothing at photo.net at this time) I frequently hear from PC

users that the images are much too dark. I've used both Photoshop CS and 7 on 15" iMac

and 20" iMac LCD monitors. When viewed on other Macs with LCD or CRT monitors the

images look exactly as I see them here. Also, when viewed on PC LCDs the images are

once again just as I see them on the Mac. I've been told I need to purchase calibration

software/hardware. Possibly so but prior to that I would very much like to understand

what is going on and whether it is something I am doing in Photoshop.

You can see my website here: http://www.shadowsofmaine.com

I did not see this problem addressed elsewhere on photo.net but if it is please excuse my

missing it..just point me in the right direction and I'll go do some learning.

Thanks

Bill Croninger<div></div>

Never being able to stay out of a Mac vs PC argument!! I do want to echo the advise

of a number of the responders so far, if you are comfortable with your PC and if it

does the job for you photographically there is no reason to switch platforms. The

previous writer's suggestion that you allow the applications software you plan to use

to determine your choice of platforms is excellent advice.

If you were starting over again or new to the field I would definitely argue for the Mac.

Much as I personally believe the Mac represents a superior hardware-operating

system combination I think you will do just fine where you are! Good luck.

Bill Croninger

Maine

Ok, maybe I'm just being dense but I cannot find a link to renew

subscriptions on any of the pages. Mine is set to expire on the 3rd

and I would like to extend the membership.

Thanks!

http://users.adelphia.net/~wcroninger/shadows

Enjoy, critiques always welcome

Bill Croninger