The Printmaker's Friend is a non-toxic replacement for gum and dichromate. It will hopefully go on sale on Amazon in the US and www.printmakersfriend.com in Spain and the rest of the world in 2024.
Calvin, thanks for all your hard work. I used to make alt prints in the 80s and 90s but stopped when I developed autoimmune issues and environmental sensitivities. I also engaged in traditional fine art print making and appreciated over the years people's work to develop eco-friendly options to commercialize. It isn't easy, it often isn't commercially successful but sometimes lightning strikes and a product takes off. I'm hoping yours is around for a long while because I have plans...
Thanks. Yes, hopefully sales pick up. Right now I'm 13k euros in the red. It would be nice if there was more interest in non-toxic alternatives, especially since it's a lot easier to use.
@@carbonprint Ouch, you're at that painful stage. Well IMO printmaker's friend should become the next akua kolor since there seems to be a string parallel between the two products, marketing and stories. I shall not only give it a try for gum prints I'll experiment with it to see if it can be etched since I really want to print gum oil process and dont want to use dichromate.
He is using a diazo compound (DAS/diazostilbene) as the sensitizer and a polymer like PVA or PVP as a colloid. You can do a similar thing very cheaply with Speedball diazo sensitizer (normally used for screen printing) and gelatin as the colloid.
That sounds very promising! I remember gumprint from the 80s when a friend of mine did some b&w experiments with it. No Digital negatives but Internegatives enlarged from Slides. Results were very coarse, dull and harsh and i found them not very pleasing to view. But your prints are looking very amazing vibrant, detailed smooth and sharp! Here on my small screen they look almost like your carbon prints. How do you make spotcolor separations? A special software rip? Are the negatives you use continous tone or stochastic screen from imagesetter? I am looking forward to see more of that process and hopefully a comparison to carbon printing…
Thanks. I use x-rite's i1Profiler software to build extended gamut profiles then in Photoshop I simply select that multichannel profile and it converts the image from RGB to the colors of my choosing. I use imagesetter negatives. Makes life A LOT easier. All this is outlined in my book on calibration- thewetprint.com/digital-workshops/
@@carbonprint Thank you, i hope i will have access to a bigger darkroom this year and will try to get into that kind of printing next to my normal silver gelatine printing. Will buy your book of calibrating and printing then…
@@brucehorn7600 No, It’s almost non-toxic. I just wasn’t able to get non-toxic certification because there is very little data on it. But similar diazido compounds are very low toxicity or non-toxic. I would much rather use DAS than dichromate. However, that’s not the main reason why I use it. DAS is stable so calibration is a million times easier.
@@carbonprint Thanks Calvin. It is good to see your real world assessment of that. Looking at the data sheet for it makes it appear more hazardous. Good to know. There are many things that attract me to carbon printing for the type of photographs I make but the toxicity of dichromate is a deal killer for me. Nice to know there is an option that can be used with just normal PPE.
Looks a little *too* good. Appears to lack the handmade look/charm of gum prints. But I'll be following the progress of your product and I wish you well! Back in the 1980s (and before, I guess), there was a product on the market called KwikPrint, which seemed to amount to gum prints in a bottle. I once had a bottle of black, but I believe that KwikPrint also came in process colors. Anyway, it was very convenient and less daunting than mixing chemistry for gum ptints, all of which is to say that you may have a winner on your hands with a product that allows for manipulation and control of prints, straight from the bottle, without the hurdle of grappling with toxic chemicals. I would think that Printmaker's Friend might be very popular with people who want to get a feel for alternative photographic processes, and for more experienced photogs who want fine control over their prints.
Jacquard makes a product called SolarFast which would be close in properties to KwikPrint. The problem is permanence. Dye-based processes are going to fade fast. You can use PMF to make prints that look identical to what you would consider a normal look for a gum print.
@@carbonprint Thanks for your response to my comment! I suppose that, among other variables, choice of paper/support would make a difference as far as the look of the final print. Your prints in the viddy look super detailed and saturated. Will PMF come in pre-mixed colors?
I'll post information on the PrintMaker's Friend website in a week or so. printmakersfriend.com/workshops-2/ You can also send me an email through the website to be placed on the contact list.
Fantastic work .. and most interesting to learn more. But Your webpage is not very interesting :-) Tried to se for workshops. Looking forward to see more
The website crashed. Take a look now. There's little information on workshops because they are all booked for this year, and I won't be offering them again for a while. The website is a work in progress.
