Pretransferred silver deposit receiving element

Claim 2

In a process of preparing silver diffusion transfer printing masters for ink reproductions where a photosensitive silver halide element is exposed through a halftone screen and developed in the presence of an antiadhesion reagent to form a silver transfer image at an oleophobic silver-receptive stratum having an oleophilic underlayer, the antiadhesion reagent removing from this underlayer those portions of said stratum containing sufficient transfer silver, the improvement which comprises employing a silver-receptive stratum that has a substantially uniform deposit of metallic silver prior to diffusion transfer with a reflection density of from about 0.05 to 0.3, said deposit being sufficient to render removable by the antiadhesion reagent those gray image areas containing an inadequate supply of diffusion transfer silver to so removed, and being insufficient to render removable by the antiadhesion reagent the highlight areas of the image.

Claim 3

The process of claim 3 including the steps of wetting the unremoved portions of the silver receptive stratum and its underlayer with greasy ink and contacting this inked stratum and underlayer with sheet material to provide ink reproductions of the image.

Claim 4

A method of forming a lithographic printing master by the silver diffusion transfer process comprising uniformly depositing silver on a silver-receptive stratum, after exposure through a halftone screen, in a quantity sufficient to provide a metallic silver deposit having a reflection density of from about 0.05 to about 0.3, said deposit being insufficient to render areas wettable by greasy ink; exposing a silver halide layer; developing said exposed silver halide layer and forming, as a function of said development, an imagewise distribution of soluble silver complex in undeveloped areas of the silver halide layer; traNsferring said imagewise distribution of soluble silver complex to said silver-receptive stratum to provide a silver transfer image, the silver transfer image including portions wettable with greasy ink, which portions would not be wettable with said ink in the absence of said first deposited silver. 6 The method as defined in claim 5 wherein said first deposited silver is provided by silver diffusion transfer processing of a uniformly but incompletely exposed silver halide layer.