[pure-silver] Re: After sinks, your favourite tongs?

  • From: Lloyd Erlick <lloyd@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • To: pure-silver@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
  • Date: Thu, 28 Jul 2005 11:11:00 -0400

At 09:07 AM 7/26/2005 , Jerry wrote:

>To remove the smell of fixer from your hands just pour some 3% hydrogen
>peroxide in your hand and rub them together for a few seconds, then
>rinse with water.
>
>Jerry
>



July 28, 2005, from Lloyd Erlick,

Can I be the only one using single-tray print processing? I don't use
tongs, gloves, squeegees, or anything at all that touches the wet face of
any of my prints.

My skin exposure to chemicals is close to nil. I don't claim nil because
I'm not perfect and sometimes I slosh the tray a bit too much, so a drop
flies out. But if one tried, I'm sure it would be possible to not only have
absolutely no chemical exposure, but not to even wet (plain or tap water,
that is ...) one's hands or fingers. This last might be hard to achieve;
after thoroughly rinsing my print at the end of its process, I lift it from
the tray by fingers at a corner and carry to the washer, so critics might
say my technique is not quite perfect. Still, my hands never get wet and
strictly speaking I don't need to wash them much, although I do anyway, old
horse that I seem to be.

Single-tray work has many advantages.

A few years ago I went on a rampage to eliminate smells I did not like from
my darkroom. Between the "innovations" of single-tray print making, and the
removal of any type of acid from my darkroom, I now work in complete
olfactory and respiratory comfort, and produce work much more easily and
quickly than I did when I had to slug around all those trays.

For an ordinary, black and white darkroom used for the 'regular' processes
of film and paper, there is no need whatever of bad smells (there are good
smells, though. I actually like the mild odor of sodium thiosulfate in
solution by itself.) There is also no need of any type of chemical exposure
of any sort; the darkroom can be completely safe, and very easily made
safe. Doing so also will not detract from the pleasure of working in the
darkroom, or add difficulty to what we want to do. When comfort rises, so
does productivity.

I've pontificated at even greater length on this subject on my wesite.

regards,
--le
________________________________
Lloyd Erlick Portraits, Toronto.
voice: 416-686-0326
email: portrait@xxxxxxxxxxxx
net: www.heylloyd.com
________________________________
-- 


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