Negative Masking

[JMB]

Dear All,

I am trying to track down three articles written by Dennis NcNutt and Mark Jilig re: negative masking. I ran across an old post by Rob Champagne, in which he kindly offerred to send out copies. Are you sill out there Rob?

Thank you,
Joe

[ChuckP]

You might try contacting http://www.phototechmag.com. They may still sell back issues or reprints from the former magazine.

[JMB]

Thank you. I will check.

[Seabird]

These articles are also reproduced as part of Lynn Radeka's "masking kit". That kit also goes into some detail about how to create various other different types of mask in addition to those discussed by McNutt and Jilig.

See http://www.maskingkits.com/maskingkits.htm

(Disclaimer: no relation to Lynn, just a satisfied customer)

Cheers

Carey Bird
http://members.iinet.net.au/~cbird/index.html

[Dennis McNutt]

Yes, the original series of three articles Mark Jilg and I wrote in 1989 on various types of masks to control contrast in B/W photography are reproduced in Lynn Radeka's Masking Kit.

For more info, see: http://www.maskingkits.com/maskingkits.htm

The three articles are a sturdy introduction to the subject. Other than taking one of Radeka's workshops, I believe they are the best starting point for masking enthusiasts. (Not that I might be a tiny bit biased!)

While there is much good info in the APUG forum discussions on masking, sadly the good is randomly mixed with information that is quite wrong. And in other cases the information is incomplete.

For example, in most discussions of Contrast Reducing Masks (CRM) the authors don't mention that by varying the exposure, one can easily design a CRM that will have an overall effect; 2) reduce contrast in the lower and middle tones, but not the upper tones, and: 3) reduce contrast in the middle and upper tones while protecting tonal separation in the lower tones.

Also, even when using a CRM that excessively flattens the shadow tones, a properly made Shadow Contrast Increase Mask is more than powerful enough to punch the lower tones back to the desired degree of black.

Good masking!