How long after exp. can print last without dev?

[brianmquinn]

I had the same ideas years ago when I discovered this issue. I always thought that the image on paper would be as stable as the image on film. I was wrong. When I was printing I would work late into the night and often I would take an hour nap and return to work. At first I thought I must have been too sleepy before and that is why my prints looked different. I did tests and even went so far as to mix up several batches of developer one every hour. I found that my paper developer would go bad in a few hours even without use. By bad I do not really mean bad but that it would not print EXACTLY the same as a fresh batch after as few as 4 hours in the tray (note that I was only mixing about 250ml per batch for the test and it was in an 8x10 tray so it had lots of chance to oxidize). The loss of developer strength as due to age alone, there was no usage.

Then I tested the latent image on the paper. I found that delaying developing the print by as little as 15 minutes altered the image. I later read ( I did not test this ) that the latent image changes rapidly during the first hour or so, then slower during the first day, then less for the next week then little after that except for the gradual loss of contrast and build up of fog. So the take home message I got is expose and develop paper ASAP. In your case it may be a few hours but that is ASAP in your case. It will work. But keep in mind that it is not a typical situation.

[keithwms]

Anybody know how the results differ for developer-incorporated papers versus others? RC vs. fiber?

I only work with matte fiber...

[brianmquinn]

Developer-incorporated papers? Good question. I can't recall exactly what papers I was using when I did my test.

[brianmquinn]

Here is a link to some graphs for the Latent image stability of AGFA MULTlCONTRAST PREMIUM. Not the paper I was using but the only thing I found on the web that is hard data.

http://www.plumeltd.com/artzone/paperzone/amcp.htm

Perhaps this paper is better than most and that is why they published these graphs.