Thank you all for those helpful responses. It is diffusion in the shadows that gives the effect intriguing me. Here's Hubert's view of Ralph Gibson at work http://www.hubertgrooteclaes.com/cache/photos/4ccc7dbb9b745.jpg Don Sweet ----- Original Message ----- From: "Richard Knoppow" <dickburk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> To: <pure-silver@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> Sent: Thursday, February 24, 2011 4:50 AM Subject: [pure-silver] Re: Hubert Grooteclaes > > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Eddy Willems" <eddy@xxxxxxxxxxx> > To: <pure-silver@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> > Sent: Wednesday, February 23, 2011 2:24 AM > Subject: [pure-silver] Re: Hubert Grooteclaes > > > > Hubert had an old portret enlarger lens, wide open it was > > soft like you > > see in his pictures, > > at the end of his life he was printing his old negatieves > > again but this > > time very sharp > > and yes he worked with color pencils on his prints > > best regards > > I am on my dial-up right now so looking at the images > is really not possible. However, FWIW, soft focus lenses and > diffusers tend to spread out bright areas of the image. When > used on a camera they diffuse the highlights mostly, > spreading them out. The exact effect depends on the > mechanism of diffusion, i.e. whether from uncorrected > spherical aberration or straight diffusion from some object > in front of the lens. > When used on an enlarger, and enlarging from negatives, > the effect on the print is the reverse: the lens is still > diffusing the bright areas but these are now the shadows so > the effect in the print is to spread out or blur the > shadows. While this kind of diffusion has been used to good > effect it is quite different from the effect on a camera or > when making a reversal enlargement. I find it mostly leads > to rather murky images where the effect on highlights leads > to a glowing quality. > Without seeing the photos I have no idea of what > Grootclaes was doing but it should be fairly obvious. > OTOH, if he was able to make sharp print later than the > diffusion or whatever it was, had to be on the enlarger. > There are a great many materials which can be used for > diffusion, those with simple geometrical patterns, like > cheesecloth or window screen, tend to have a directional > diffraction pattern (typically star- or cross-shaped) where > a soft focus lens does not. > > -- > Richard Knoppow > Los Angeles, CA, USA > dickburk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx > > ============================================================================ ================================= > To unsubscribe from this list, go to www.freelists.org and logon to your account (the same e-mail address and password you set-up when you subscribed,) and unsubscribe from there. ============================================================================================================= To unsubscribe from this list, go to www.freelists.org and logon to your account (the same e-mail address and password you set-up when you subscribed,) and unsubscribe from there.