Fixation-free bleached silver halide transmission holograms recorded on Slavich PFG-01 red sensitive plates

Bleaching is one of the most widely used techniques in the production of ph ase holograms of high quality on photographic emulsion, particularly in reh alogenating techniques without a fixation step. These techniques were very well understood when Agfa 8E75 HD emulsion,vas used for the recording. Prod uction of Agfa material for applications to holography ceased in 1997, so t hese techniques must be optimized for the silver halide materials which are currently available. In this paper we present experimental results for fix ation-free rehalogenating bleached holograms derived from the Slavich PFG-0 1 emulsion, a red-sensitive fine-grained emulsion from the Slavich Company. The influence of the potassium bromide concentration in the bleach solutio n on the final quality of the holograms is studied. The concentrations of t he different components of the bleach solution are adjusted to obtain the h ighest values of the diffraction efficiency. A comparative study is also ma de with bleached holograms recorded on Agfa 8E75 HD plates. We will show th at high diffraction efficiencies can be obtained when fixation-free rehalog enating bleached holograms are recorded on Slavich PFG-01 plates.