I have just started doing wet transfers and must say that I love this process, however, I have run into my first brick wall. My main problem is that any picture that has white in it is coming out very muddy looking (grocery bag colourish... if that is a colour). For instance, a white flower with pink highlights will come out brown with only a hint of pink in it. If anyone has any suggestions I would love to hear them. Here are some of the basic parts of my process:

- presoak blank paper in distilled water that is at simmering temp - sqeegee paper to lessen moistness and then air dry 20 minutes - develop picture for 10-15 secs. - roll picture onto paper - set aside for 20 minutes - pour simmering water over negative side then over back of picture - then peel apart - frown at the brown !!!!

Thank you in advance for your help.

-- Richard Knight (rjknight@ibl.bm), December 02, 1999

Answers

You technique looks OK, but I don't think that you can get a really clean white color in Polaroid transfer. It is one of the problems of Polaroid image transfer that can be used in fact as advantage. E.g., a white or gray sky looks quite terrible on a color slide, but it is appearing much more interesting in Polaroid transfer:



I am trying to show here two more pictures from my transfers with a lot of white:





Is your white any worse? Have you seen (e.g. in on-line exhibition) the white color you would like to achieve in your transfers?


-- Marek Uliasz (uliasz@frii.com), December 02, 1999.

About the muddy whites -- You might try dabbing a swab (q-tip or cosmetic swab) that has been dipped in diluted vinegar (1:1) on the white areas, gently. I have also lightly rubbed white areas with my finger. This removes the brownish guck (sp?) that is the top layer (or more) of the emulsion. I process prints in a way that does not include pouring simmering water over the back of the film-- Could it be that the hot temperature adds to the problem? In my experience, as noted by Marek, there are no truly clean whites in polaroid image transfer.

Margery

-- Margery B. Franklin (mbfranklin@earthlink.net), December 12, 1999.