How does one become a master printer?

Mike King wrote:
My short answer to this is always: buy a bigger garbage can.

Practice, try new things, read. There are a lot of alternate processes out
there and techniques that are in danger of becoming obsolete since the
sources for the materials are disappearing, so try them now.

Good to retain finished copies of all your "experiments" and keep a good
Daybook or Journal so you can recall what you did (also good). I tend to
write my notes on the back of my prints. Parker ball points write well on


Me to.

Nick

--
---------------------------------------
"Digital the new ice fishing"
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In article ,
"Mike King" wrote:

but the last
exhibit I viewed I was surprised at the sloppy way he spotted prints (may
have been the "help' but I was tickled to know there is one-and only
one!--area in which I consider myself at par with the master).

I know what you mean, i saw the exhibit just after he died and was
surprised to note the spotting issues.


I think it's good to hang your work on the wall but hang some of the
"failures" as well as keepers, you may figure out what it was you didn't
like about a "bad" print or you may change your mind and decide you want to
explore that technique later on!

I nice big, cork bulletin board in the darkroom works well-for failures.


That and 20-30 years will make almost anyone a "master".

"Geesh" maybe in another 20 some of us will be considered master
newsgroup posters ;0)
--
The things we hate most in life often turn out to be a mirror image
of ourselves. Better not to hate.

Findmedirectly - "infoatgregblankphoto.com"

Well, here's another thought. Hire the services of a master printer and
stand by his side for a week watching how he works, then have him watch
you work and help you along. Expensive, but it's doable if you enroll
in a class with six or seven other people for the experience. I have a
sample of one: the basic darkroom class with Bruce Barnbaum. He is
also offering a master printing class for those who have completed the
basic class, or who submit a few 8x10s to show him that you are ready.
I'm not saying he's better than anyone else, only that he is a great
printer and teacher and can save you a few years of garbage can trial
and error work. I have no affiliation with him so here's his website:
www.barnbaum.com
Art

cgrady wrote:

wrote:


Here's a question that I haven't seen asked on the internet: how does
one become a master printer? I'm not looking for a quick recipe, but I
want to know what it takes. Is it a matter of getting a good
background in photography at a school, landing a job in a lab, honing
your craft for years, and building a reputation? I'd really appreciate
it if the printers out there could share how they did it. How did you
become a master printer?



From 1980 to 1991 I worked up to 40 hours per week in a custom B&W
darkroom. I was ordering 3 1/2 by 5 then 4 by 5 paper a case at a
time. This was so I could keep the same emulsion number. During that
time I used about 250,000 sheets of regular prints. I have no idea how
much large paper I used. I started doing darkroom work in 1967. I
worked for a man that had taken classes from Ansel Adams. I printed
and developed negatives from 110 to 8x10. I enlarged everything from
110 to 4x5.
I AM NOT A MASTER PRINTER.

Good luck trying to become a master printer. The only thing I can
recommend is roll your sleeves up, get busy, and lose any thought of
having a social life.

Be wary of the notion tht a great deal of expertise is required to get
good prints. A good negative prints itself. You are just the 'midwife'
to the birth. As imentioned before, I do far less burning and dodging
these days than I used to. I tolerate far less manipulation, and even
expert manipulation is all-too-visible. I have come to prefer the
unaltered print for the most part.

Consider this iamge:

http://masters-of-photography.com/im...ado_covers.jpg

To my eyes, the burning-in of the sky is all too evident (look at the
rim of the hills, where the slight denisty from the burning in of the
sky overlaps the rim)). The figure at the right has been held back.

Same thing he

http://masters-of-photography.com/im...o_ethiopia.jpg

The face has been dodged.

I believe these are prints made by a 'master printer', but I would NOT
print them this way at all.

Art Reitsch wrote:
Well, here's another thought. Hire the services of a master printer and
stand by his side for a week watching how he works, then have him watch
you work and help you along. Expensive, but it's doable if you enroll
in a class with six or seven other people for the experience. I have a
sample of one: the basic darkroom class with Bruce Barnbaum. He is
also offering a master printing class for those who have completed the
basic class, or who submit a few 8x10s to show him that you are ready.
I'm not saying he's better than anyone else, only that he is a great
printer and teacher and can save you a few years of garbage can trial
and error work. I have no affiliation with him so here's his website:
www.barnbaum.com
Art

cgrady wrote:

wrote:


Here's a question that I haven't seen asked on the internet: how does
one become a master printer? I'm not looking for a quick recipe, but I
want to know what it takes. Is it a matter of getting a good
background in photography at a school, landing a job in a lab, honing
your craft for years, and building a reputation? I'd really appreciate
it if the printers out there could share how they did it. How did you
become a master printer?



From 1980 to 1991 I worked up to 40 hours per week in a custom B&W
darkroom. I was ordering 3 1/2 by 5 then 4 by 5 paper a case at a
time. This was so I could keep the same emulsion number. During that
time I used about 250,000 sheets of regular prints. I have no idea how
much large paper I used. I started doing darkroom work in 1967. I
worked for a man that had taken classes from Ansel Adams. I printed
and developed negatives from 110 to 8x10. I enlarged everything from
110 to 4x5.
I AM NOT A MASTER PRINTER.

Good luck trying to become a master printer. The only thing I can
recommend is roll your sleeves up, get busy, and lose any thought of
having a social life.





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Well, here's another thought.  Hire the services of a master printer and
stand by his side for a week watching how he works, then have him watch you
work and help you along.  Expensive, but it's doable if you enroll in a class
with six or seven other people for the experience.  I have a sample of one:
 the basic darkroom class with Bruce Barnbaum.  He is also offering a master
printing class for those who have completed the basic class, or who submit
a few 8x10s to show him that you are ready.  I'm not saying he's better than
anyone else, only that he is a great printer and teacher and can save you
a few years of garbage can trial and error work.  I have no affiliation with
him so here's his website:   a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="http://www.barnbaum.com"www.barnbaum.com/abr
Artbr
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cgrady wrote:br
blockquote type="cite"
legroups.com"
pre wrap=""a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" /a wrote:
/pre
blockquote type="cite"
pre wrap=""Here's a question that I haven't seen asked on the internet: how does
one become a master printer? I'm not looking for a quick recipe, but I
want to know what it takes. Is it a matter of getting a good
background in photography at a school, landing a job in a lab, honing
your craft for years, and building a reputation? I'd really appreciate
it if the printers out there could share how they did it. How did you
become a master printer?
/pre
/blockquote
pre wrap=""!----
>From 1980 to 1991 I worked up to 40 hours per week in a custom B&W
darkroom. I was ordering 3 1/2 by 5 then 4 by 5 paper a case at a
time. This was so I could keep the same emulsion number. During that
time I used about 250,000 sheets of regular prints. I have no idea how
much large paper I used. I started doing darkroom work in 1967. I
worked for a man that had taken classes from Ansel Adams. I printed
and developed negatives from 110 to 8x10. I enlarged everything from
110 to 4x5.
I AM NOT A MASTER PRINTER.

Good luck trying to become a master printer. The only thing I can
recommend is roll your sleeves up, get busy, and lose any thought of
having a social life.

/pre
/blockquote
br
/body
/html

--------------090205040005010208020206--

Art Reitsch wrote:
Well, here's another thought. Hire the services of a master printer and
stand by his side for a week watching how he works, then have him watch
you work and help you along. Expensive, but it's doable if you enroll
in a class with six or seven other people for the experience. I have a
sample of one: the basic darkroom class with Bruce Barnbaum. He is
also offering a master printing class for those who have completed the
basic class, or who submit a few 8x10s to show him that you are ready.
I'm not saying he's better than anyone else, only that he is a great
printer and teacher and can save you a few years of garbage can trial
and error work. I have no affiliation with him so here's his website:
www.barnbaum.com
Art

c

Other examples. The sky burn-in is obvious:

http://masters-of-photography.com/S/...pute_full.html

http://masters-of-photography.com/S/...utec_full.html

UC wrote:
Be wary of the notion tht a great deal of expertise is required to get
good prints. A good negative prints itself. You are just the 'midwife'
to the birth. As imentioned before, I do far less burning and dodging
these days than I used to. I tolerate far less manipulation, and even
expert manipulation is all-too-visible. I have come to prefer the
unaltered print for the most part.

Consider this iamge:

http://masters-of-photography.com/im...ado_covers.jpg

To my eyes, the burning-in of the sky is all too evident (look at the
rim of the hills, where the slight denisty from the burning in of the
sky overlaps the rim)). The figure at the right has been held back.

Same thing he

http://masters-of-photography.com/im...o_ethiopia.jpg

The face has been dodged.

I believe these are prints made by a 'master printer', but I would NOT
print them this way at all.

I agree that the burning and dodging are pretty obvious in those
images, and yes it is a bit distracting especially the burning of the
sky. But then with out the burning the clouds would have been mostly
blown out and the photo would lose a lot of its dramatic feel. Overall
given the image on the negative I think this is about as good as your
are going to do.

Scott

Scott W wrote:


I agree that the burning and dodging are pretty obvious in those
images, and yes it is a bit distracting especially the burning of the
sky. But then with out the burning the clouds would have been mostly
blown out and the photo would lose a lot of its dramatic feel. Overall
given the image on the negative I think this is about as good as your
are going to do.

Scott


I'm not sure. I'd like to see a straight print of these. I'm becoming
less satisfied with these crude techniques. For decades, this sort of
thing has represented 'mastery' of printing. Sure, I learned to put my
hand on the print in the developer to warm it up in a spot that needs a
little help, but today I really doubt that such measures are going to
save a marginal image.

In article .com,
"Scott W" wrote:

UC wrote:
Be wary of the notion tht a great deal of expertise is required to get
good prints. A good negative prints itself. You are just the 'midwife'
to the birth. As imentioned before, I do far less burning and dodging
these days than I used to. I tolerate far less manipulation, and even
expert manipulation is all-too-visible. I have come to prefer the
unaltered print for the most part.

Consider this iamge:

http://masters-of-photography.com/im...ado_covers.jpg


I agree that the burning and dodging are pretty obvious in those
images, and yes it is a bit distracting especially the burning of the
sky. But then with out the burning the clouds would have been mostly
blown out and the photo would lose a lot of its dramatic feel. Overall
given the image on the negative I think this is about as good as your
are going to do.

Scott

In a perfect world one could use a little flash and a grad neutral
density filter. No burning required.
--
The things we hate most in life often turn out to be a mirror image
of ourselves. Better not to hate.

Findmedirectly - "infoatgregblankphoto.com"

You might think about some of the Maine photography courses.

I was taught by one of Australia's best printers - Gordon Undy (based
in Sydney) - who, in turn, had done courses with Paul Caponigro and (I
think) George Tice. Gordon taught Murray Fredericks - who is a superb
printer and recognised as one of Australia's best landscape
photographers. See

http://www.pointlight.com.au

http://www.murrayfredericks.com.au/

(I should hasten to add that I am not even close to being in either
Gordon or Murray's league!)

You can waste a lot of time and paper (and not get very far) if you are
not taught properly - a bit like your golf swing, you need to get the
fundamentals right.

Cheers
Gareth

PS Check out Murray's landscape shots from the Himalaya's, Tasmania and
Patagonia, especially