I am hoping that this is the final installment of the saga concerning my trials and tribulations with this paper and its twin Fomabrom Variant III.  So is Arista EDU Ultra the evil twin.  Sadly, in my experience, the answer is yes.  Over the recent holiday week I finished my Arista paper and went through an entire new box of Fomabrom.  And the results … the same icky molting of emulsion on the Arista paper’s edges with several prints during the hypo and selenium toning steps. And sure enough, again one print was ruined as the pealing went into the image itself!

How about the Fomabrom? One hundred sheets and not one bit of cosmic debris (for you Frank Zappa fans) floating in my trays from the final ones that made it to the toning process. So I guess that settles it for now. Both are incredibly fine papers that enable magical prints. And both cost $99.95 for a box of 100 8×10 sheets.  Seems like a simple decision. I will be using Fomabrom Variant III exclusively going forward … or will I?

I just checked on the Freestyle website to confirm pricing and noticed that both the 25 and 100 8×10 sheet boxes are “out of stock” and other Fomabrom papers are mostly listed as “out of stock” or in “low stock”. #$@%^$#%^&!  The Arista paper appears to be in stock, but I’ve been to this rodeo a few too many times and I hope this isn’t a replay of those experiences.

Stay tuned.