Matte paper

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I am currently reading two books each I find very interesting. Eddie Ephraums Gradient Light and Bruce Barnbaum's Art of Photography. Both use potasium ferrcyanide and both, of course, and other techniques are similar...Ephraums tones more though. Ephraums advocates Matte paper and he is from the British Isles....and Barnbaum advocates glossy as did Adams and Weston and many American photogs....Ephraums sells his work and he says that Matte paper has a more tactile feel and is a reason for his success selling. Why is it that Matte is seemingly used less here in the states by selling photographers. I prefer the clean, sharp appearance of glossy myself but am wondering if for landscapes, at least, I might sell more to Americans....will I? just wondering.....

-- Kirk T. Kennelly (kirk@ioa.com), January 11, 2000

Answers

interesting question. i tend to use matte paper for portraits and nudes. i do a partial sepia tone (about 30 secs in the bleach, then into the toner), so that only my highlights and mid-tones are affected, which gives a really nice skin-tone kind of look. for landscapes, abstracts, and what i'll call 'architectural,' for lack of a better term, i stick with glossy and bleach for about 45 secs before toning, to get more toned look. i just let it air dry for a not-too-super-duper glossy look; i don't want it to look like RC glossy.

sometimes matte paper is nice because it's more forgiving of mistakes; it doesn't require as much retouching and doesn't show fingerprints like glossy paper.

as for the feel affecting sales, i can't say. i will comment that, like everything else, it all comes down to what works best in your photography. adams and weston were interested in detail, detail, detail and sharpness, that whole f.64 philosophy. glossy paper is sharper and shows more detail, so naturally they preferred it.

i guess i'm not being much help here, just babbling. i guess my only suggestion would be to try switching to matte for a while and see if your sales pick up.

--brad daly

-- brad daly (bwdaly@scott.net), January 12, 2000.


The blacks on matte paper are not perceived as being as dark as those on glossy paper. I recently accidently purchased some semi-matt Ilford Multigrade. I tried to return it with no success, so I used it and I absolutely loved the results--particularly for my nudes, but also for some of my landscapes. Once it's under glass, you can't tell the difference from glossy anyway.

-- (edbuffaloe@unblinkingeye.com), January 12, 2000.

There is a discussion about the way individuals see things related to their environment. In the British Isles and elsewhere in Europe, the sunlight, especially in winter/spring, is very soft and chalky. Hence the preference for soft papers. Here in the West the light is bright and contrasty and our preference is for gloss papers. Of course it is a generalization and not meant to be construed as concrete reasoning. Most paper has a "best" use. You would mostly use flat or pearl for nudes because the subject matter is soft. But would you also use the same paper for nude studies of males? Or would you be more inclined to use a gloss paper? A foggy landscape would best be rendered with which paper? I would choose a satin for it's softness. A forest or mountain scene? For me it would be a gloss paper surface for the increased detail it would hold and the Dmax inherent in gloss papers. And I'll disagree with the poster that says you can't tell the difference between flat and glossy under glass. I can. Try it and see for yourself. Flat will never have the high Dmax of glossy papers. Get some and test it yourself. You will see the difference. James

-- Mr.Lumberjack (james_mickelson@hotmail.com), January 13, 2000.

I think it's something that depends as much on the subject as on personal preferences. I share the experience reported by Ed Buffaloe with the accidentally purchased paper with the wrong surface. Until some time ago, I exclusively used glossy paper because of the greater apparent density range. Then, after I had to use the paper with the semi-matte surface and liked it very much, I made a couple of prints on matte as well as glossy paper, seeking to find my preferred surface. The result was very helpful (though not in the sense intended): I prefer both. Though it's not a rockfast rule, I like to have cold-tone prints on glossy paper. Sepia-toned images, especially when an antique look is intended, tend to look better on semi-matte or matte paper. So the decision remains with you, but I don't think you have to decide this once for all your prints.

-- Thomas Wollstein (thomas_wollstein@web.de), January 13, 2000.

I agree Thomas. There is a reason different papers are made and used. People have differing tastes and that is one of the things that make this endeavor so rewarding. It is the different ways of portraying the world around us. How boring it would be if we all saw and interpretted the world on RC alone. And images always seem to have a look that changes with the material used. I for one don't think much of RC papers. Just my opinion. But it doesn't suit my vision. Ed on the otherhand may have images that scream to be printed on RC. That is what makes this so interesting. I print most of my images on three or four different papers a couple of different ways just to see what they would look like. It surprizes you sometimes. james

-- Mr.Lumberjack (james_mickelson@hotmail.com), January 14, 2000.


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