A Brief Guide to Making and Evaluating Proofs and Prints (2009)


It takes a long time to accumulate the experience needed to easily evaluate one’s photographs.  This begins with having the confidence that you will be able to do it someday.  The rest is trial and error, work and play. 


Evaluating and Caring for Negatives

Place your dry negatives glossy side up on a dust-free clean lightbox.  Hold your strip of negatives up to the light and look to see if there are any waterspots or if there is a soapy residue from the wetting agent (photo-flo).  If so, get the negatives wet again and put them through a fresh wetting agent, and hang them to dry again.  When your film is dry and clean, carefully cut the negatives and slide them into negative preservers.  Use a lupe to examine the negatives closely.  We need to look for clues indicating proper exposure and development. If the negative has no shadow detail it was underexposed.  If it has no highlight detail it was overexposed.  If there is detail in both the dense and thin areas, the negative should be printable.  If the numbers along the sprockets are very thin and transparent, most probably the film was underdeveloped.  If the numbers are extremely dark, and there is no detail in the dense areas of the negatives, chances are the film was overdeveloped. The lupe will not magnify the image enough for you to determine if it was well focused and sharp with no blurriness.  You will have to put it in the enlarger to see.  In the meantime, store your negatives in a box-like notebook that closes on all four sides to keep dust out.  The next step is to make a proof sheet, which will be much easier to evaluate if made properly.


Making a Proof Sheet

A proof sheet is also known as a contact sheet.  Begin by elevating your enlarger so that it is projecting a large rectangle of evenly illuminated light.  Stop down the lens around two clicks (f. stops).  Place the proof printer in the center of the rectangle of light and turn the focus light off.  Open the glass, place a strip or sheet of enlarging paper emulsion side up (the shiny or sticky side), and center your sheet of negatives over the paper.  Close the glass.  Cover all but a small section of the paper and set the timer to 3 or 4 seconds.  Expose that section.  Repeat this procedure section by section until the whole test strip or paper has been exposed.  Process the test strip in the developer for 90 to 120 seconds for RC paper, or 2.5 to 3 minutes for fiber-base paper with constant agitation.  Rock the boat or make waves.  Next, carefully move the paper to the stop bath tray without getting stop bath on the tongs.  Return the tongs to the edge of the developer tray and pick up the tongs for the stop bath.  Agitate for 15 to 30 seconds and then move the paper to the fixer tray.  If you are not planning to keep the test it is sufficient to only fix it for one minute before taking it into the light to evaluate it.  Please use a tray (available under the sink) to do this.  If you are planning to keep anything you fix, it is necessary to leave the paper in the fixer for at least three minutes before exposing it to white light.  After evaluating it, return the print to the fixer for another three minutes before moving it to the holding bath tray (water).  Place it in the holding bath upside-down so the heavy metals of the fixer will more easily fall off and wash away.  Throw away whatever you don’t want to keep.  No need to waste water.

Examine the test strip to find the shortest exposure that turned the sprockets black.  Until the sprockets and the space between the pictures (known as the film base plus fog) turns black, there will be no black within the frame either.  Make the whole proof sheet with the shortest exposure possible to turn the film base plus fog into black on the proof sheet.  The only exception to this is when your entire roll was either over or underexposed.  Please note that it is not necessary to use a variable contrast filter when making a proof sheet.  However, if you do, it should be a #2 filter.


Evaluating a Proof Sheet

If you follow the procedure above, it will be easy to determine which exposures are overexposed, underexposed, underdeveloped or overdeveloped.  The frames that are too light were overexposed.  The frames that are too dark were underexposed.  The frames that have no deep black or bright white were underdeveloped.  The frames that have only black and white but very few grays were overdeveloped.  The frames that look the right value, meaning not too dark or light, with a good black and white and a full range of grays are likely to be very rich, and are also going to be easy to print.


Making a Print

Now pick your favorite frames from the proof sheet.  Take the negative holder out of the enlarger and open it.  Place your chosen negative glossy side up, with the top of the frame towards you, and center it in the open space of the holder.  If your negative carrier has pegs, make sure the sprockets slide under them, otherwise your negative will not be flat and will not print with even sharpness.  Dust off the negative with either a blower brush or compressed air.  If you use the latter, be sure to hold the can upright and position the nozzle to blow over the surface with a quick blast of air.  Put the negative holder back in the enlarger.  Use the elevation mechanism of the enlarger to move it up and down.  Compose the image on your enlarging easel.  Do not use a proof printing frame.  Make sure you dedicate one sheet of paper to focus on.  This can be used repeatedly.  Use the back of the paper, as this will be brighter than the front.  If you don’t do this, the grain in your print will probably appear mushy.  The thickness of the piece of paper must be considered as part of the equation that equals sharp enlargements.  Your lens should be wide-open when you focus.  Otherwise, the dimness will make it hard to be precise.  Use a grain focuser.  Without this tool you will not be able to focus your enlarger accurately.  Turn the focusing knob until the grains of your film are sharply visible and in maximum focus.  They will look like sand or miniature tablets.  Now, place a #2 variable contrast filter under the lens in the filter tray, and make sure it is centered in the rectangle of light being projected.  Click your lens aperture 1, 2 or 3 clicks down, depending on the density of your negative.  Turn off the focus light.  Remove the focusing sheet and replace it with a test strip.  Follow the procedure for exposure and processing described above for making a proof sheet.


Evaluating a Print

When you evaluate your first test print you need to make four decisions. 
You should make the decisions in the following sequence:
1. Decide if you like the picture and if it is sharp.
2. Decide the correct value.
3. Decide the correct contrast.
4. Decide whether or not to dodge and burn.

1. For your first decision ask yourself if the picture meets the criteria for the assignment.  Within that, choose the picture that interests and excites you the most; the frame you are most curious about.

2. Value means the lightness and darkness of your print.  On a television or computer monitor we would call it brightness and dimness.  Make a test strip with several different exposures strategically placed on your enlarging easel to give you the maximum amount of information.  Pick the section that seems not too light and not too dark, mindful that not all areas of your print are going to be the same value (such as the sky and foreground).  In other words, make an educated guess based on the test strip.  For example:  I might make 7 exposures at 4 seconds each.  The different sections of my strip will represent 4 – 8 – 12 – 16 – 20 – 24 – 28 second exposure times.  Ideally, my best time will be somewhere in the middle.

3. Contrast is the dynamic range of black and white.  Just black and white with no gray is high contrast.  A sampling of grays with no solid black or white is low contrast.  A good black with shadow detail, a solid white with highlight detail, and a full range of grays in-between is what you should be trying for.  Make your test strip with a # 2 filter.  That will give you normal contrast with a well-exposed and well-developed negative shot in ideal conditions.  If you don’t use a variable contrast filter for your first test, but rather make a test strip with no filter, and your first print isn’t perfect, which it isn’t likely to be, you will have to start over.  So, if the print is too gray, without a good black or white, increase to a filter higher than #2.  If it is not gray enough, decrease to a filter lower than #2.  Just how far to go is a matter of experience, or trial and error.  If you increase to a number 4 or higher filter you need to double the exposure by either doubling the time, or opening the lens one aperture, thereby making the light twice as bright.

4. The fourth decision you need to undertake is whether or not to make some areas of the photograph lighter and some areas darker.  Dodging makes part of the picture lighter by blocking light before it reaches the enlarging paper.  You need to make a dodging wand with cardboard taped to a thin wire that easily vibrates.  Hold this between the enlarging lens and the enlarging paper during the initial first exposure to reduce the light that hits the paper in the areas you want to be lighter.  The higher you hold the wand (closer to the enlarging lens) the more light it will block, and vice-versa.  Burning makes part of the picture darker by adding light. In order to do this you will need to make a burning board.  Purchase an 11” x 14” piece of illustration board, black on one side and white on the other.  Make a hole approximately ¾ of an inch in diameter in the middle.  Hold the board with the white side up and the dark side down between the enlarging lens and the enlarging paper.  Make a second exposure, and the light that passes through the hole will render those areas of the print darker.  You can also use the edge of the board to darken skies, etc.  Keep the wand and board vibrating at all times.  It should not be apparent to the viewer that any dodging or burning was done.  Make it invisble.


Common Problems

There are four main problems, and four more subsidiary combinations, each with their own possible solutions.  These are:
1. underexposure
2. overexposure
3. underdevelopment
4. overdevelopment
5. underexposure and underdevelopment
6. underexposure and overdevelopment
7. overexposure and underdevelopment
8. overexposure and overdevelopment

1. If your negative is underexposed it will appear very thin.  Your choices in printing such a negative will be limited to three possibilities.  In order to get a good black you will have to make a print that appears too dark.  Alternatively, you could reduce the light hitting the paper and get a better overall value, but you would have to sacrifice a good black.  Thirdly, and most often preferably, you could print the picture lighter than the first method and darker than the second, and increase the contrast somewhat by increasing the variable contrast filter to a higher number, thereby getting closer to a good black, yet still not entirely arriving.  As you can see, underexposure is not easily fixed in the darkroom and requires significant compromise to approach an imperfect result.

2. Overexposure means the highlights are blocked up in your negative and the shadows and mid-tones have more information than necessary.  Overexposure will dramatically increase the grain that forms your images as well.  You will need to print these negatives with the enlarging lens wide open.  Your exposure times will be very long.  The highlights will need considerable burning.  Try switching to a #0 or 00 contrast filter for the burning, as this will accelerate the time.  Most probably your highlights will become slightly gray but lack detail, although contemporary films hold a lot of detail in blocked highlights and the results are likely to be better than overexposed digital files.

3. Underdeveloped negatives look thin, like underexposed ones, but they hold more detail in the shadows.  Therefore, they can often be satisfactorily printed by simply using a higher number variable contrast filter, and stopping the enlarging lens down to a dimmer setting.

4. Overdeveloped negatives appear very contrasty.  They must be handled in a manner similar to overexposed negatives, but especially require a lower than #2 filter, combined with considerable dodging and burning.

5. Combined underexposure and underdevelopment is usually a hopeless case.  A good print is impossible to make.

6. Underexposure and overdevelopment may work well when photographing on a cloudy overcast day, but will be disastrous for scenes shot in the bright Southern California sunshine.  If shot in normal light ( four stop span from shadow to highlight detail) the negatives will have insufficient shadow detail from underexposure, and be lacking in highlight detail from overdevelopment.  Such negatives will require considerable dodging and burning and rarely generate a satisfactory result.

7. Overexposure and underdevelopment is ideal for a bright and contrasty scene.  It is the worst for an overcast diffused lighting scenario.  For normal light the negatives will appear dense in the shadows and thin in the highlights.  This will result in somewhat grainy prints.  The best way to approach such negatives is to use long enlarger exposures with a higher than #2 variable contrast filter.

8.  Overexposure combined with overdevelopment, like underexposure with underdevelopment, is usually hopeless.  Reshoot.

Please note that the above advice is merely a starting point for experimenting in the darkroom.  There are more advanced techniques and uses of chemicals that can also be used to enhance and correct weak negatives.  Nevertheless, it should at this point be clear that understanding how exposure and development work together is extremely important, and make the printing process far easier and less expensive.


Concluding Thoughts

It can easily take a full hour or more to make a good print, so don’t get frustrated if the going is slow.  Relax, and enjoy the amber light and watery world of the darkroom.  Think of your first print as a proof print, your second as a work print, and thereafter refine towards a fine print.

The instructor will be happy to demonstrate once you have made your own dodging wand and burning board.  Be proactive and ask the instructor for help until you feel confident to make these four decisions on your own.  Additional details for printing are included in your textbook and will be detailed at length in classroom demos at the beginning of class.