lith film testing progress

[erie patsellis]

I finally got around to establishing some basic establishment of film speeds and development times for the huge lot of lith film I have.

First, the bad news: it appears that, at least on the box of 10x12 I'm starting with, there is some substantial fogging on all 4 sides. the good part is that it's less than 1" and I can cut to 8x10 easily enough. I'll have to open the 16x20 at some point (2 boxes of 300 sheets) and snip the 4 corners and see what I'm working with.

Now on the results:

film: Kodak Graphics / Polychrome CGP
Film speed is ASA 6 (for the time being, I'll update as I get some of the processing bugs worked out and fine tune my process)
Development was in D-76 1:1, 6 min; though quite honestly I'm not crazy about the way the negs look yet and I'm sure it will change.

I shot a few sheets of 4x5 and 8x10, cut before I found out about the fogging issue, i.e. the easy way to get an 8x10 out of a 10x12 sheet..

I posted a couple of quick scans, only inverted, corrected levels and converted to jpg. (ignore the fingerprints, dust and scratches, it was a late night last night, I hung up the last neg at 2:30). They can be found in the photo gallery of my website: www.eriepatsellis.com filed under the film test folder.

As usual, if anybody has any advice/suggestions, etc. I'm all ears.
erie
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[Ole Tjugen]

Erie,
I've used other lith films (last was something Russian that came with a 30x40cm camera from Sibir-Sergey) in camera, and ended up using dilute paper developer. Ansco 130 gave fine results.

I'm also using some old Agfa Gevarex, an variable-contrast graphical film. The filtering has exactly the opposite effect of VC paper - more magenta gives softer results! The variability is fairly small, so it works fine as an almost-orthochromatic film.

[Brian Ellis]

When I used lith film I developed it in either D76 diluted 1-6 or in Dektol, I think at 1-3 but possibly 1-2.

[Richard Kelham]

When I used lith film (it was many years ago) I used PQ Universal or some other very active dev. so as to get the max contrast. Your usage may vary....



Richard

[erie patsellis]

Richard, I'm not using it for it's intended purpose, I'm usign it for continuous tone images, I have ~1000 or so sheets of it, mostly 16x20. It would be a shame for it to go to waste.


erie

[Paul Fitzgerald]

Erie,

Why not try D23 / carbonate 2 bath and see if you like the results. Start at 6 min each bath (pretty hot) and tone it down from there. This works fairly well with Aerocon II duplicating film.

Just a thought.

[Glenn Thoreson]

I've used D-76 at 1:9, Dektol at 1:3 and greater, and Technidol. I still had more fun with lith film in Dektol 1:2, giving a high contrast graphic look.