Black & White Photo Printing
Our B&W prints are ‘true’ black and white, without the colour cast you would usually find in C Types and Giclées, due to their colour printing process.
Our genuine B&W Silver Gelatin papers can be printed up to 108 x 48 inches / 2.7m x 1.22m.
Please contact us if you would like more information.
- Genuine Black & White papers.
- Order online or in person.
- Over 40 year’s experience.
© Terry O’Neill / Courtesy Maddox Gallery.
Metro’s professionalism, quality & genuine dedication to photographic talent make them our number one choice for exhibition production & printing.
— Lisa Farrell, British Journal of Photography
I’ve worked with Metro for over twenty years – retouching and printing for exhibitions, both in UK and internationally. The team have always been great in producing my work to a high level.at makes them a pleasure to work with.
— Sarah Jones, Artist
It is not only the superior quality of the prints produced – whether they be silver gelatin, c-type, or archival pigment prints – but also Metro’s high level of customer service that makes them a pleasure to work with.
— Iconic images
At Vogue and National Portrait Gallery we can say, without any question, how much we appreciate the quality of the work and service provided by Metro.
— Robin Muir, Vogue 100
Our Archival Black and White Photographic Papers
Fibre-based Gloss
HARMAN GDS Fibre-based Baryta paper has a double-weight semi-gloss finish and slight texture. The panchromatic emulsion is based upon traditional B&W silver halide technology, has excellent D-Max, sharpness and surface finish delivering superb continuous tone. Our FB paper is also great for pairing with Giclée Fine Art Baryta prints.
Fibre-based Matte
HARMAN GDS Fibre-based paper has a double-weight Baryta matte finish. It is a silver gelatin, premium quality, panchromatic photographic paper. This paper has been designed using the very latest black & white silver halide emulsion technology optimised for digital exposure, and presents a neutral image tone.
Resin-coated
HARMAN GDS Resin-coated paper is a premium quality paper with a bright base tint. Along with the Fibre-based paper, RC prints are genuine B&W prints with no colour cast, and are the perfect paper for cooler toned images. It has a semi-matte finish, and contains fine tonal benefits of subtle highlight detail and strong blacks.
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Bespoke
- Come in or work remotely
- Leave the work to us
- Support of our expert technicians
- A one-on-one relationship
Bespoke is our premium service – we do all the work for you. You will have a one-on-one relationship in person or online with one of our expert technicians.
Self-Service
- Great value online solution
- Easy to use automated service
- Secure online payments
- Rated ‘Excellent by Trustpilot
Our Self Service option is great value, and ideal if you are confident preparing your own files for print. You can also add mounting and framing.
For more information about our services, or for help ordering, please get in touch
Turnaround times
Printing
C-type Matte & Gloss Prints: Normal service 48 hours. Please contact us for larger sizes or quantities.
C-type Metallic & Supergloss Prints: Normal service 48 hours. Please contact us for larger sizes or quantities.
C-type Duratrans: Normal service 48 hours. Please contact us for larger sizes or quantities.
Black & White Photo Prints: Within 7 working days.
Giclée Fine Art Prints: Normal service 48 hours. Please contact us for larger sizes or quantities.
Unstretched Giclée Canvas: Normal service 48 hours. Please contact us for larger sizes or quantities.
Stretched Giclée Canvas: Within 5 working days.
Direct to Media: Normal service 48 hours. Please contact us for larger sizes or quantities.
Mounting and Framing
Foamex, Foamboard, Kapamount & Card, Aluminium & Dibond, MDF, Reverse Perspex Mounting: Turnaround time by negotiation.
Framing: Turnaround time by negotiation.
Scanning
Drum Scanning: Turnaround time by negotiation.
Flatbed Scanning: Normal service 48 hours. Please contact us for larger quantities.
Frequently asked questions
Traditionally a darkroom printing process, Ilford Imaging (now HARMAN Technology), together with Metro’s own Steve Macleod, developed their B&W papers in order to be exposed via digital output printers such as our Durst Lambda and Océ Lightjet and Metro Imaging are the only UK lab to offer this service. This development meant that silver gelatin prints could quickly and easily be produced at a much larger scale. Producing B&W prints digitally allows for incredibly consistent results, especially for large format editions and print runs. Both FB & RC papers produce prints up to 108 x 48 inches at their maximum size.
Digital B&W silver gelatin prints are a Premier Service only on both Bespoke and Self-service. Our Bespoke printing can include (as part of the print cost) a one to one appointment with an expert technician, a test print and archiving the file for future editions.
Both of our C Type (Chromogenic) and Digital B&W prints are produced with archival photographic, light-sensitive papers exposed digitally. When printing a B&W image using a colour paper there will always be a colour cast of some degree, usually green or magenta. Whilst the C Type process uses colour papers and chemistry, our HARMAN GDS B&W papers contain no colour dyes and are exposed with B&W chemistry, resulting in ‘true’ blacks with no colour cast.