It is much
more economical both in time and in chemicals to process one 8 x 10”
piece of Cibachrome than four 4”
x 5” ‘s, so if you
have several 4 x 5’s to do it ~makes sense to do them on the larger sizes. I use
a Paterson Orbiter for. most of our processing and a home made
masking-frame to do our 4 x ~ pictures, either from one slide or from separate slides, it
consists of a hardboard frame with four doors Each door is numbered
and painted white on the top so that the picture can be arranged and
focused on it
and then removed for exposures.
To make the
frame you will need two pieces of hardboard 12” x 10” The first piece
in the base and this should
be rough side up. The second piece must be cut as follows Two long strips 12” x 1” and two
short strips 8” x 1”, this leaves a piece 8” x 10” which must be
cut in half both ways giving you four 4” x 5” pieces. Stick the two
long pieces along the long edges of the base and the two smaller strips
along the short edges forming a. frame, not forgetting to leave a small
gap in one edge for a finger hole so that the paper rnay be removed more
easily in the dark. To make sure your paper fits snugly into the 8” x
10”space in the middle, use an old piece of Cibachrome as a pattern but
leave a cardboard thickness gap on each side as otherwise the paper will
be difficult to remove after the exposure.
‘Glue a
button on to each door. and fit them into the space so that they fit
together nicely in’ the middle and then attach each’doortothè long
strip on the edges of the frame with insulation tape to form a hinge.
Arrange your slides for printing before placing the Cibachrome paper into
the frame and with the first one in the enlarger and all lined up with the
edge of the door No.1 and focused, in the dark fit the Cibachrome paper
into the frame and close all the doors. ‘If not make test prints to find
the correct exposure, use your usual method and make the first exposure.
Then. you can replace the door and use the enlarger light to change the
slide and continue to the next door for the second exposure and so on.
Then the whole sheet can be processed at one time.