Fomaspeed Variant III is a variable-contrast, neutral-to-medium warm tone, black and white photo paper. The silver chlorobromide emulsion results in a paper with a rich half-tone scale over all contrast grades and saturated blacks. Coated on a 190 g/m² resin coated base, this paper produces great results. It is available in a glossy, matt and velvet surface.

The contrast grade of the paper can be varied in wide range from extra soft to ultra-hard by using colour filters, which allows prints to be made even from negatives with extremely low or extremely high contrast. The paper is designed for amateur, commercial and artistic photography as well as for other applications.

Developing agents incorporated into the emulsion layer facilitate rapid machine processing and a shortening development times in manual processing to 60–90 seconds at 20 °C. Due to the resin-coated paper base and a thin emulsion layer, the time necessary for development, fixing, washing and drying is considerably shortened and the consumption of processing baths and washing water is reduced. This makes this high-quality, high-speed all-round paper ideal for beginners or work prints and portraits.

Fomaspeed Variant III can be processed both manually in trays and automatically in roller developing machines approved for photographic papers on RC paper base. Suitable are common neutral-working or contrast-working developers as well as special developers for variable-contrast papers. The resulting image tone is influenced by developers used. The tone is technically classified as ‘neutral’, but all Foma papers tend to be on the warmer side of neutral.

The paper can be toned using a direct toning method, or an indirect toning method. For a standard process, the indirect method is recommended. The brown image tone is particularly very popular, being obtained using Fomatoner Sepia Set. By changing the temperature of the toning bath, a wide scale of shades from light yellow-brown to dark-brown or violet-brown can be obtained.

Fomaspeed Variant III is an orthochromatic sensitized photographic paper. Therefore, a suitable safelight differing from that for conventional photographic papers should be used. Dark-red safelight filters for orthochromatic materials such as the Kodak GBX-2 or Ilford 906 with a 15 Watt lamp are suitable. Alternatively, indirect safety illumination with wavelength of 625 nm and higher (Orange or Red) can be used. Because of its high speed, Fomaspeed Variant III should be exposed to this safelighting only for the time necessary for its processing. Length of exposure and the distance of the processed material from the illumination source should always be tested.

Fomaspeed Variant III is manufactured in three different surfaces: glossy (311), matt (312) and velvet (313) and in standard sheet and roll sizes.