Customer Reviews

Black & White: Photographic Printing Workshop

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This book is not only a collection of great photographs. It is also a book that explains in detail how the printer evaluates the straight print and then proceeds to make the fine print. At the beginning many general aspects of printing with multigrade paper are discussed. Some advice for HW is also given. After this short introduction comes the main part: The printing process of many photojournalistic/glamour/still life photographs (really good ones!) is explained. First comes the straight print. Then comes a sketch of the burn-in/dodging procedure. The subjective opinion/reason of the printer for each step is also stated. Finally comes the fine print. One main idea that pervades the whole book is the idea of local contrast. This alone can improve the craft of many newcomers to B&W printing. Reading this book has opened my mind as to what good printing is capable of and I believe that my printing has improved since then.

i have a lot of book on B&W photography. everyone who shoots B&W knows that at least half (often MORE) of the work, skill, art and effort is in the darkroom. In this book you have VERY specific instructions, details, data on how other artists printed their work. very well done, very well documented. concise yet useful. highly recommended.

Bartlett's book is a great course in black and white printing for anyone at any level. The way that he sees a straight print, and how to improve it, is a sure sign of his years of experience in the darkroom. Bartlett's heavier printing style may not appeal to every printer or every subject matter, but he caused me to question my printing more indepth, and by applying his ideas ,I did see immediate improvements. The book should not be seen as how to print other people's so called problemaatic negatives, as another reviewer alludes to. You can have full control of the photo process, lighting, film, etc, and get a perfect negative, but there is always room for reinterpretation in the darkroom. Bartlett gives the reader these tools with ample examples of his work which include straight prints and then finished prints. I would highly recommend this book to every black and white printer to help expand their own vision. There is a reason why Bartlett was so highly sough! t out to make prints for so many photographers. You can see it in his work.

How outstanding it is that the authors have shared their extensive knowledge of darkroom printing techniques with the masses, especially since one of them died in 1995. It is rather rare that extremely erudite photographers are willing to share what they know based on years of experience as well as trial and error. This is an exquisite tome on how to use dodging and burning with variable contrast papers to get the utmost in quality in one's enlargements. True, one has to master dodging and burning to the extent the authors have to achieve the same or similar results, but learning and practicing are two of photography's most wonderful aspects and there is a wealth of examples herein to get you on your way to achieving astoundingly better results in your darkroom. Bravo to both authors!!

This book gives you an idea of what can be achieved with a little imagination and effort. Larry was renowned for his printing style and passion, also he was rather forthright in his belief that printing is an extension of the photographic art, not merely an effort to reproduce the tones apparent on a negative, but a way of emphasising the photographer's original impressions and perceptions.

Even if you have been printing for twenty or thirty years, you may want to read this simply to take pleasure in the interpretation of the negatives. A note, this book was published posthumously, this is the last tribute to his life's work.

This book is a great way to see another way of looking at printing black and white photographs. The author is usually printing other people's negatives, but the knowledge gained can be even more useful when the printer is also the photographer. The end result should be in mind when the photograph is taken, thus the printing will be much easier. This isn't a good how-to book in the sense that it is fairly advanced. It is good at presenting another theory about printing, and teaching techniques that are very effective.

Since there are relatively few books on this topic in print, and too many have too few examples and too much theory, Bartlett's book is a welcome addition to one's reading list. But be warned: This book focusses on printing photo-journalistic negatives shot by someone other than the printer. In this sense, if you have a pile of negatives that are less than ideal (either because of how you shot them, becuase of the situation in which they were shot, or because they were shot by someone else, etc.), this book can help you get the most out of them. Bartlett actively encourages taking manipulation in the printing stage to whatever extreme you desire -- which is nice.

But such a procedure works best if, like Bartlett, you are printing someone else's photos shot on the fly. If you have control over all aspects of your work (the camera, the negative, the situation photographed, the development of the film, and the printing) -- or very nearly have such control -- the draconian crutches for printing that he suggests can be overkill and, more importantly, can simply serve to cover up sloppy habits elsewhere in one's technique.

That said, I feel more well-rounded for having been exposed to such a work. And I wish that the plethora of examples he walks through would become a standard part of future treatments of this subject. Too often, in an excellent book on printing such as that by Carson Graves, the examples, while present, are not nearly as extensive as one would like.

(For what it's worth, I disagree with the review here that suggests that Bartlett is not beholden to any particular school of thought with regard to photography/printing. I think he is, though it is merely a kind of reckless iconoclasm against the known properties and potentials of the materials he works with. To a degree, this is the natural outcome of being "only a printer". But the extent to which he champions such a position could seriously misguide a beginning photographer who would do well to understand that t! here is an understandable, useful relationship between how one exposes a negative and how one's paper will be able to represent what one wants. Without an understanding of that WHOLE PROCESS, sub-standard results at various stages of producing a fine print from an interesting photographic situation will likely ensue.)

Bottom line: I'm glad I read it, but aside from cribbing from some of his examples for some of my sub-par negatives, it won't be on my A-list of useful photography books.

It doesn't favour any company, theory or whatever. It gives you the plane advise, how he does it, not more and not less. Nothing for someone who wants to hear that his lens is the best, it's more for the one who is beyond his startups and wants the practical information of how to get fine print pictures.