I’m deep diving into the Kallitype printing process. I’ve fallen for it in a big way. I have a workflow for this project that is almost perfect. The technical is worked out (at least for this version of the process) and I’m very confident of the archivable quality of the prints.
I have the wet, and dry, collodion negative process dialed in to make very nice prints with no redevelopment or additional steps. My negative density is between 1.8 - 2.0 and my development time runs from 45 seconds to 1 minute with the wet negatives and 10 - 15 minutes for the dry negatives. All of my chemistry is dialed in, too.
Along with all of that, I’ve decided that I’m only using my Petzval lenses for this work. I’ve discussed before why I’ve made that choice, but it’s based on the painterly quality and the natural look and feel, or signatures these lenses give to the subject matter. On top of that, they are from the time period I’m referencing in the project (1850s - 1880s).