[Bakody]

Hi,
For both of them I use the same: http://www.cdags.org/wiki/index.php?title=Fixing

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[Bakody]

My first silver plater gave me milky silver plated plates. My second silver plater gave me mirror bright silvered plates. I think because of the mirror like surface, he used brightener and I didn’t have any problem with those plates…
Just to study and understand more about silver plating: What kind of bath are u using to make silver plating at home?

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[Bakody]

Hi,

Yes it’s possible to make portraits without flash as well, but you will need to have a good model, and something to hold here head. Here is 2 example for Becquerel dag, in camera exposure. I used just the sun for lighting. I can’t remember for the exposure time.


Lens: symmar 210mm f5.6

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[Bakody]

I posted it here, because maybe someone used it for some reason. I’m asking this in chemistry forums as well, but they are just keep saying safety data sheet informations, but as we know bromide and iodide data sheets look like similar, but the are in different danger level. First I wanted to order ethylenediamine, but it’s fumes are dangerous like bromide fumes.
I would like to use it for silver plating.

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[Bakody]

Too much iodide!
This happened with me when I heated the plate, or too hot weather, or too much iodide concentration. If you have more time, you can make more even coating and you can check the colors to keep control on it.
First yellow or purple will be ok.

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[Bakody]

Maybe at the beginning you should use 10-15 micron silver thickness and you can reuse them.

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[Bakody]

Yes, at the end if you don’t like the final image, you can reuse your plate. How many times you can reuse it it’s depend on your polishing technique.

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[Bakody]

I could read about 6microns somewhere here in the forum. But that one is the minimum I think. At the beginning I think you should use more, 10microns and you can repolish your plate 3-5 times.
Yes, just a simple red (red, dark red) film is enough for Becquerel. Order more to able to use them in more layers. Sun light will be ok at the beginning.
Ask if you have any other question!
Good luck!

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[Bakody]

Hi,

I think 3-4micron won’t be enough. I read it somewhere you will need at least 6 microns. I’m using 10microns silver thickness.

I have never heard about this Ulano CDF film. I bought my red film in a simple paper store. I have to use it in 6 layers to minimize blue tones to 0 and get black and white. Need to filter out other wavelengths. 1 or 2 from Rubylith film is usually not enough, plus you will need enough power and time, maybe 1000w lamp for 2-3 hours. Blue tones means underdeveloped Becquerel plate!

I’m using 2 3M gas mask. One with 3M 6057 filter for bromide, iodide and the other is for mercury: 3M 6096 HgP3

Others can help you how to hear mercury.Maybe alcohol lamp will be fine. I’m using vacuum development, so I don’t need to heat.

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[Bakody]

My hairdryer is not strong as well and I blow just the back of the plate with it.
Sun development is fine too. Try more development time and maybe more then 3 red films. Sometimes I can see others try maximum with 2 layers of red film and they get blue images, so 3 will be the same…
I will be waiting for the next post…

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[Bakody]

Hi,

It look much better and it will be a good topic.
1) Polishing: I can see some oblique/cross lines. Polish it a little bit softer material. I think they weren’t created at the last polishing. I think you already know it: if the image will be a vertical image, the last polishing direction should be vertical as well.
2) I can see some water marks on it. Wash it much longer! At the beginning you can wash it in running water/ under tap water and you won’t waste much distilled water. But at then end put your plates in distilled water. Keep moving it, change the water on it. For the last washing I use hot distilled water, because I dry the back of the plate with hairdryer (from the white parts to the blacks). You will see how quickly will be dry. If you are not quick enough you can still get some marks during drying. Just need to practise.
3) BLUE is NOT the NATURAL color of Becquerel daguerreotypes! If you read this on this forum or in other homepages, it is not true!!! You can get black and white b-dags!
First of all your plate is underdeveloped. You need to leave it under the red film (foil)/ruby light for much longer. For example I’m using 2x500w halogen lamps. The distance between the 1000w and the plate is about 25cm. You will need to cool your plate during development, because if it will be too hot it will be grey. With this setup I need about 3hours of development under red films/ruby light.
If you are using longer and longer development times and you still get blue tone on your dag it means, your red films (foil)/ruby light not red enough, still some other wavelengths can go thru. This is the most common problem, mistake. I figured out, you just simply need to use more layers of red films (foil). For example I need to use 6 layers of red films to get black and white images, but maybe you are using different red films then I so maybe you will need different number of red films.
Good luck!

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[Bakody]

And I believe in Turkey you can find really cheap silver plater. Hungarian prices cheaper then in the USA. But the silver and gold products  are cheaper in Turkey than in Hungary. So I think you can find a cheap one. (maybe we will order from  you 🙂 )
“what problems face in the future?” Mostly it’s it’s depend on you. You need to bring a mirror like polished copper to the plater. Then explain to him, after you polished the silver surface at home, you need to get a perfect mirror like plate.
But sometimes it’s depend on the plater: poor cleaning of the copper, bad pretreatment… but first find one and try it. If something wrong, post it here!
Good luck!

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[Bakody]

Hi,

If you want to make daguerreotypes in the future (for many times), you need to find a good silver plater in your country. For long term it will be cheaper for you, than buy it from other counties.  I know it will be difficult, but if you find a good one, you will be happy with it and you can save money. At the beginning you should ask for  15 micron silver on copper and you can reuse it many times. You need to explain to him what you want (after you polished the silver, a mirror like surface, how it have to looks like…..). Don’t let him to polish the silver. You need to do it. You will need to polish the copper as well until it looks like a mirror and then take it to the silver plater. You don’t need any nickel under the silver.

If you want to make dag just a few times and you don’t want to bother with local silver platers you can buy it from Mike Robinson. http://www.centurydarkroom.com/portraits.html

It’s difficult to make electroplating at home. You can find many electroplating formulas which contains no cyanide, but it will take lots of time to research to find the right one and then lots of money to experience with it. Need to read a lot and when you think you find the right one, you always will find a better publication about it 🙂  But yes, it’s possible (but not at the very beginning)!

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[Bakody]

Don’t let the silver plater to polish your plate!! You wont know what did he do with it. You need to do that. I think he used some kind of liquid and and it’s still on the surface. Or next time polish it much more longer.

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[Bakody]

Hi,
I think it’s grey because you checked it in room light (and maybe fogged, but we will see if next time you won’t check it…)
Marks: Did you clean the plate during polishing with any liquid (maybe still some left)? or did you polished it well enough after you got it back from silver plater?
You can make an in camera copy about it as well if you print out the photo on paper and just take the photo about it.

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[Bakody]

Thank you! I will try to silver plate soon (1 or 2 month). I will post the result in here.

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[Bakody]

Thank you for your answer, I was really waiting for it!
I can images that because you had to produce AgI the bath was expensive. When you used the KI based bath, after you polished the silver plate, is the yellow stains disappeared totally?

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[Bakody]

Mike,
(if you can read this one day…)
Did you use KI AgCl or KI AgI silver plating bath? I found just KI AgI based formulas with calcium nitrate? Is it the one what you used? How yellow will be the silver after polishing? Is it has any affect on the final image (tone)?

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[Bakody]

Thank you! Yes, an old Puli 🙂 I’m using double sided tape to hold the plate. Don’t use too much, because it will be difficult to take it off.

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[Bakody]

ohoo, I will start more seriously experience with this just later. Now for me it’s more important to figure out how to silver plate at home (see in other topic…)
I have read about Lippmann plates as well in this case. So you think the key is the wavelengths (distance change) and not the way to find other sensitizing?

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[Bakody]

(I just submitted 2 times this writing and disappeared, strange, so again:)

I just found again Mike Robinson thiosulphate based formula. No adhesion between copper and silver. http://www.cdags.org/forums/topic/could-someone-tell-me-how-to-galvanize-a-sterling-sheet/ But he was talking about a KI based formula. I already read about this in an old book, but in the book they wrote, that after silver plating and before polishing, the surface will be a little bit yellow.

Mike, if you can read this: How yellow will be and after polishing is it looks better, yellow tone will disappear? Can you tell me more about this? In the book they used KI and AgCl. How good is the adhesion in this case? Or if it’s too yellow, use this as a pretreatment and then silver plate with thiosulphate based formula?

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[Bakody]

(I just submitted this writing and disappeared, strange, so again:)
I just found again Mike Robinson thiosulphate based formula. No adhesion between copper and silver. http://www.cdags.org/forums/topic/could-someone-tell-me-how-to-galvanize-a-sterling-sheet/  But he was talking about a KI based formula. I already read about this in an old book, but in the book they wrote, that after silver plating, but before polishing, the surface will be  a little bit yellow. Mike, if you can read this: How yellow will be and after polishing is it looks better, yellow tone will disappear? Can you tell me more about this? In the book they used KI and AgCl. How good is the adhesion in this case? Or if it’s too yellow, use this as a pretreatment and then silver plate with thiosulphate based formula?

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[Bakody]

Finally I found this Mike Robinson thiosulphate based silver plating http://www.cdags.org/forums/topic/could-someone-tell-me-how-to-galvanize-a-sterling-sheet/ It’s not useful for pure copper plates, need a pretreatment or something like that.
He talked about a KI based formula. I already read read about this in an old book. This is a working formula, but after silver plating, before polishing the silver surface will be matte and a little bit yellow. And after polishing is it sill yellow? How much? How good is the adhesion? Or if it’s too yellow use this as a pretreatment and then use the thiosulphate based formula?!
I hope Mike you can read this, I’m interest, whats your experience with this KI formula!

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[Bakody]

Thank you for sharing this. I’m really interest for this colour daguerreotype possibilities as well. I’m still just reading and studying about this…
How Burder made those dags? Is he used Cl, Br and I for sensitizing or just like in the writing about helichrome “…They were made by coating silver plates for 3 minutes in 3.0 or 4.5% FeCl3 solutions which also contained 2.2 or 2.6% CuSO4 respectively followed by a 5 second rinse in distilled water. …”? Do you know any other try just with Cl, Br, I sensitizing?

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[Bakody]

I don’t want to order ready made chemicals because of the price and the cost of the shipping, so I’m still searching for cyanide free silver plating solutions, silver electroplating. I found some publications in the topic, this is the most promising:
http://infohouse.p2ric.org/ref/18/17422.pdf

http://metalfinishing.epubxp.com/i/49721/244

Both of them using about the same amount of:

silver chloride 30-50g/l
sodium thiosulphate 500g/l
sodium or potassium metabisulphate 30g/l
for pH: sodium bisulphte or hydroxide
0,5A/dm2

The only problem with this is the poor adhesion between copper and silver, so need to do pretreatment, like use silver strike or for a few min in ammonium thiocyanate. Ammonium thiocyanate will produce on the polished copper plate: copper thiocyanate.
When I create copper thiocyanate on the copper surface or/and If accidently I don’t wash it down properly and I put it in to the sodium thiosulphate solution, can cyanide gas produce?
Is any other oxidizer will be fine or need to have copper thiocyanate on the plate for good adhesion? What do think about Nitric acid as a pretreatment?

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