Harmann Direct Positive + Ancient Kodak Lens

[David]

I've had a LOT of trouble figuring out Harmann's direct positive paper. It has a very narrow exposure range and overexposing it turns it to negative paper, something I want to master but haven't yet. I also haven't pinpointed the ISO yet, but suspect it to be somewhere around 2 or 3.

Work gave us all a few hours off on Christmas Eve, so I managed six shots with Harmann paper, four of which turned out (kind of). For two of these I used a Kodak 112mm f7.7 (I think, or maybe an f6.3) that came off an old 1A or similar camera. I picked it up for about $12 without the camera, so I'm not 100% certain where it came from.

Here are those shots:


I'm really pleased by the detail. I picked this as the first shot to see how it would perform at f32. Full coverage on 4X5 (with VERY limited movement), good sharpness, and reasonable contrast.


Put in a little bit of rear tilt (which is possible when the subject requires a bit of bellows extension) and the results look pretty good. I believe this was f16.


Here with my Caltar 165mm f6.8 for comparison. Same shot (different rotation because in the above image I like that rotation better). I also made this a mirror image so that it looks like the real thing instead of being reversed.


This was seriously overexposed. At f64 (again with the 112mm lens) this was a 24-ish-second exposure. I found earlier this year that at around 5 stops over exposed the tones begin to go negative. At about 15 stops, a very faint negative image appears.

Direct Positive paper is still really hard to work with for me. But at least I feel like I'm closer to cracking the code.

[mmelvis]

Run a google search
site:http://www.largeformatphotography.info Alessandro Bocchi

This person, Alessandro Bocchi, gives a good bit of detail on his shots using the Harmon Direct Positive Paper

[iangreenhalgh1]

Not bad, I like the first and third.

I've just started working with paper, in my case old Agfa Brovira, and it's tricky, I rate it at ISO 3.

The Kodak lens will be a 4 elements in 4 groups Dialyte, I have a 170mm version from a 3A folder. They are very sharp but lower contrast due to 8 air-glass surfaces.

[David]

Bocchi's work is top-notch. He seems to have this medium nailed-down better than anyone else out there. This is still my first box of the stuff, so it's a big learning curve. But these images are actual images, and that's a whole lot better than what I had been getting.

I'm going to try ISO 3 next time and take the camera and lenses out for an actual hike. I have a couple film backs with Ektar loaded for red scale that I'd like to play with, too.