Cy DeCosse

[David A. Goldfarb]

Cy DeCosse and his printer Keith Taylor are making some of the best hybrid prints I've seen starting with film (often 6x6), making a digital interneg, and ending with platinum and multilayer gum prints. I think they are also using a multilayer technique for the platinums, which I suspect they were doing with traditional enlarged negs before going hybrid. They get beautiful tonal separation in every range.

http://www.cydecosse.com/Site/Homepage.html

If you're in New York, you can see his prints at the John Stevenson gallery.

[John Voss]

I've been amazed to see DeCosse's work. My wife particularly loves the photogravures and we someday hope to make those ourselves (we have the press...now we need the UV box, the acid bath tank etc, etc.). I've not seen any of his work in person (the web versions simply don't come close.) that I wasn't totally impressed by. I second David's suggestion to visit the Stevenson Gallery. It's a haven for fans of alternative processes.

[Keith Taylor]

Cy DeCosse and his printer Keith Taylor are making some of the best hybrid prints I've seen starting with film (often 6x6), making a digital interneg, and ending with platinum and multilayer gum prints. I think they are also using a multilayer technique for the platinums, which I suspect they were doing with traditional enlarged negs before going hybrid. They get beautiful tonal separation in every range.

http://www.cydecosse.com/Site/Homepage.html

If you're in New York, you can see his prints at the John Stevenson gallery.

David,

Thanks for the kind words. Although virtually all of Cy's work is now shot digitally (Canon), my work is still film based (6x6-Mamiya 6 and Rolleiflex). Our platinum negatives are all printed on Pictorico OHP, on either an Epson 4000 or 2200. The three-colour gum dichromates however, because of their size (20x27" and larger), are normally output as imagesetter negs.
It's truly liberating to be able to combine digital with the historical processes. I would never have been able to have made separations in the past using a wet darkroom, so the whole process of three-colour gum has been made possible, for me anyway, because of new technologies.
Similarly, the photogravures were possible because I used polymer plates, rather than the traditional copper plate method.

Keith.

[David A. Goldfarb]

Thanks for the details! I have to say that these are the first hybrid prints I've seen that are interesting enough to make me think I might want to try working with digital negs.

[Don Bryant]

David,

Thanks for the kind words. Although virtually all of Cy's work is now shot digitally (Canon), my work is still film based (6x6-Mamiya 6 and Rolleiflex). Our platinum negatives are all printed on Pictorico OHP, on either an Epson 4000 or 2200. The three-colour gum dichromates however, because of their size (20x27" and larger), are normally output as imagesetter negs.
It's truly liberating to be able to combine digital with the historical processes. I would never have been able to have made separations in the past using a wet darkroom, so the whole process of three-colour gum has been made possible, for me anyway, because of new technologies.
Similarly, the photogravures were possible because I used polymer plates, rather than the traditional copper plate method.

Keith.

Keith,

Have you been using PDN for making positives for photogravure?

Also I noticed on your website that you mentioned you are using a color managed workflow for producing tri-color gums. So did you get an ICC profile made for soft proofing only?

And so you have a unique adjustment curve for each seperation negative?

Thanks,

Don Bryant

[Keith Taylor]

Keith,

Have you been using PDN for making positives for photogravure?

Also I noticed on your website that you mentioned you are using a color managed workflow for producing tri-color gums. So did you get an ICC profile made for soft proofing only?

And so you have a unique adjustment curve for each seperation negative?

Thanks,

Don Bryant

Hi Don,

No, I haven't used the PDN system for gravures, just platinum and some smaller gum negs.
I work with Rick Haring here in Minneapolis and he's created a custom profile for my set of pigments as well as a separate soft-proof profile. So I edit in Adobe RGB using the soft-proofing profile, convert the file from Adobe RGB to our custom print profile, split the channels into 3 grayscale files and send them to the imagesetter. The separation from the Red file is printed in Cyan, the Green channel with Magenta and the Blue with Yellow (although the actual printing order is YMC).

Keith.

[Don Bryant]

Hi Don,

So I edit in Adobe RGB using the soft-proofing profile, convert the file from Adobe RGB to our custom print profile, split the channels into 3 grayscale files and send them to the imagesetter.

Keith,

I find this very interesting. I've developed individual curves for each of the CMK seperations and unique color fill layers for each CMK negative using Nelson's PDN method. The results are quite good, at least to my eyes though not as perfect as I might like.

On the other hand some gum printers prefer some level of unpredictability; intergrating traditional gum printing methods such as brushing parts of a layer or altering development times for one layer or another.

I'm sorry if I have asked this before, but why do you print the color layers in the order that you mentioned in one of your previous posts?

Thanks,

Don Bryant

[Keith Taylor]

Keith,

I find this very interesting. I've developed individual curves for each of the CMK seperations and unique color fill layers for each CMK negative using Nelson's PDN method. The results are quite good, at least to my eyes though not as perfect as I might like.

On the other hand some gum printers prefer some level of unpredictability; intergrating traditional gum printing methods such as brushing parts of a layer or altering development times for one layer or another.

I'm sorry if I have asked this before, but why do you print the color layers in the order that you mentioned in one of your previous posts?

Thanks,

Don Bryant

Don,

The yellow I prefer to use (Cadmium Yellow Deep) is opaque, so that has to be printed first, whereas the others are transparent. I know some other printers work in reverse, using cyanotypes for the blue, but my order works well for me - especially with the profiles - and I just haven't wanted to change things!

Keith.

[SusanV]

Hi Keith,

I seem to have read that there is to be a new Cy DeCosse exhibition
at John Stevenson this Spring (2007). Now I can't seem to find the
reference, and wonder if I dreamed it

Can you clear that up for me? I certainly hope it's true, because I
would absolutely LOVE to get to see your amazing prints again.
Timing would be great for me also... I just yesterday bought a NuArc,
and on the same day got my shipment of polymer plates. Now I have
to find a good source for an "aquatint" screen. Any advice about that?

My plans are to first tackle polymer gravures, since I already own
an intaglio press... then on to gums. By the way, I blame this
obsession all on you and seeing your exquisite gravures and gums
for Cy at John Stevenson!

susan

[Keith Taylor]

Hi Keith,

I seem to have read that there is to be a new Cy DeCosse exhibition
at John Stevenson this Spring (2007). Now I can't seem to find the
reference, and wonder if I dreamed it

Can you clear that up for me? I certainly hope it's true, because I
would absolutely LOVE to get to see your amazing prints again.
Timing would be great for me also... I just yesterday bought a NuArc,
and on the same day got my shipment of polymer plates. Now I have
to find a good source for an "aquatint" screen. Any advice about that?

My plans are to first tackle polymer gravures, since I already own
an intaglio press... then on to gums. By the way, I blame this
obsession all on you and seeing your exquisite gravures and gums
for Cy at John Stevenson!

susan

Hi Susan,

There is to be another show at John Stevenson's which will be late Spring/early Summer - no firm dates right now. I have 2 or 3 images to print in the next couple of weeks and then that's the show finished. They're all three colour gum dichromates, ranging in image size between 20"x20", 20"x27" and 25"x25". I'll keep you informed of the dates when they've been decided.

As for the aquatint screen, I bought mine from Dan Welden www.solarplate.com and never found a need to try any others - it works beautifully. What plates did you finally buy?

Keith.