[LargeFormat] Enlarging negatives for contact printing

[Joe Tait]

How does everyone do this?

Duplicating film or digital?

Being a newcomer and techno-savvy type-person, I have been looking hard at
digital; it seems to be the winner as all I here about traditional
duplicating films is they loose so much quality regardless of 1-step or
multi-step methods. I was told that using litho film and developing it to
get a long tonal scale is popular, but haven't seen first-hand any examples.
Is this done to save money on film, easy availability, technically
superiority?

Nevertheless, digital appears overall to offer the best chance to preserve
quality.

A lot of what I have read has focused on using imagesetters to output the
negative. How much of a problem is the halftone visibility when using fine
resolution processes; specifically Ziatype, Kallitype & Albumen? I image
that for lesser resolution processes like cyanotype/gum bichromate that it's
a non-issue. I have done 1440dpi inkjets negs for these and they actually
work suprisingly well.

Does anyone here use lambda/lightjet transparencies instead? Are there any
other options besides imagesetters out there?

What B&W films/development techniques does everyone who scans their negs
suggest?

Thanks.

-Joe