Ultimate 08nm and 15nm holographic recording materials
RECOMMENDED PROCESSING FOR CONTINUOUS LASERS:

NOTE: IT IS OF THE UTMOST IMPORTANCE THAT ULTIMATE PLATES BE PROCESSED WITH ULTIMATE CHEMISTRY. WE CAN NOT GUARANTEE THE RESULTS USING ANY OTHER CHEMISTRY.



Ultimate 08nm after                      in the bleach after                    after bleach totally          After the bleach looking
developer shows a pale            2 minutes the hologram    transparent with no diffusion         through the plate
orange color                             starts to appear "floating"    The red sensitive material
(exposure 200µJ/cm² HeNe)             in the bath                      still has the blue color of 
                                                         (I have put a black                         the sensitiser dye. 
                                                  background to see it better) 
 

                                                   
        
                                                           Ultimate 08 nm
                                                                           Dry hologram -- extremely bright
                                                                         saturated & defocused digital camera

                                                                               
                                   

Ultimate 15nm after developer                                                                                       Ultimate 15 -70 (preshifted)
black color where exposed,                                                                                                  recorded with a HeNe and
transparent where not exposed                                                                                          reconstructed in white light
(see the uper corner)
(exposure 90µJ/cm²HeNe) 
                                                                                 
                                                                                 

Exposure:
Direct expose the plate removed from the box (after a stabilization period of 30 minutes at the room temperature, if the plate was just removed from a fridge). For a given power of your laser, you must adjust precisly the exposure time, which is the ONLY parameter you can and have to play with. See the curve above to understand better. For a given emulsion and laser set up, you must find the correct exposure. Extremely bright images, totaly noise free, with more 90% diffraction efficiency, can be obtained with ULTIMATE plates in almost any recording set up, including Denisyuk records, if you use the correct exposure time.

Safe Developer:We have adjusted our emulsion for the developers we supply.
It is a fine grain developer, totaly safe to use, delivered as a concentrate. For the 4"x5" plates/film, just before use take 5cc from the concentrate bottle and add 50ml water (Ultimate 15nm and Ultimate 8nm). For a 30x40cm, take 40ml plus 400ml water. After processing, we recommend disposing of this dilluted developer although some users say you can re-use it within 6 hours: please test this if you'd like and let us know your results.
Processing time: 6 minutes @ 20°C for Ultimate-15 and 8 minutes @ 20°C for Ultimate-08 .

The developing generally starts after 20-30 seconds with new plates or immediatly with older plates. It gives a reddish color on the plate for Ultimate 15nm , and pale yellow/orange color with Ultimate 08nm, due to the very small grain size (Mie diffusion), very likely much smaller than any emulsion you've used before. It is normal that you get NO DENSITY at all (for 08nm) or can not increase the density to dark black like on old Agfa material (for 15nm), so do not expose or try to process more. After this recommended time, you can be sure that all exposed grains are processed. There is no possible density control in this step (comparing standard photofilm or current larger-grained holographic plates like AGFA) that is why the exposure time is THE ONLY VARIABLE PARAMETER.

Important Notice:  An unexposed area can become yellow in the developer. (look at the demo photo after developer and note top edge which had black tape on the edge to prevent light transmisison though it). This is a normal characteristic of our material when processed in our developer. It does not mean the material is fogged at all. When bleaching, the unexposed part (which is in fact only "colored" by the developer) should become totally transparent in a few seconds. It is easy to see if there is fog or not by processing the plate in a transparent tray and look during the processing at transmission from a white paper, using a safe green light (even for green sensitive material).

It is very important that an unexposed part should remain undeveloped. In practicality you are able to push the developement of the plate until an unexposed part starts to be developed (especially when you want a master that is extremly bright with wide bandwidth). This threshold  depends how old the plate is, it becomes lower and lower when a plate is older. But by at same time, the sensitivity of the plate increases, so you need to expose less and to process less. The key to using these plates successfully is to stay BELLOW the "fog level"

For ultimate 08nm

Sensitivity at 10 days after coating - 300µJ/cm² at 20°C 6min - Fog threshold very high - impossible to have fog

Sensitivity at 2 months after coating -150µJ/cm² at 20°C 6min - Fog threshold whould appear at 2 minutes in a developer at 40°C, but the plate whould appear too milky.

Sensitivity at 3months after coatting -110µJ/cm² at 20°C 6min

Sensitivity at 6months after coatting -90µJ/cm² at 20°C 6min