Your Thoughts on Pre Soaking Sheet Film Prior To Development

**IanBarber** · 11-May-2018, 04:45

Just interested in your thoughts on pre-soaking sheet film prior to development.

Does pre-soaking help to reduce/prevent uneven development

**Willie** · 11-May-2018, 05:06

I learned from a few old line guys who had been doing tray processing for decades and the pre-soak was part of their method. So, I use it. It works and the negatives look good. As good as if I don't use it? I don't know as I have stuck with what works.

The biggest jump in quality was when my Uncle gave me some lessons in Brush Development of the LF negatives. Pre-soak and then into developer. Use a Hake and stroke up and down, then side to side. Then down and up, and side to side the other way. All with emulsion side up. Since changing to this type of development I have had no uneven areas of density in skies and large single tones in a negative. No scratches or dings. Even and clean development.

New chemistry for each negative and use Sandy King's Pyrocat HD which I learned from my Uncle. I go along with what he and others taught me. If it works and gives the results you like, why change? I can concentrate on the creative side of things when I photograph rather than experiment and live with another uncertainty in the chain from visualization to finished print.

For me, it works.

**Neal Chaves** · 11-May-2018, 05:15

The only time I pre-soak is before shuffling multiple sheets in tray processing. I put sheets slowly one at a time into the plain water and then bring the whole stack over to the developer tray and start shuffling. This pre-soak prevents any sticking of sheets in the stack. I add thirty seconds to the development time.

**Randy** · 11-May-2018, 05:58

I have always pre-soaked regardless of film format or brand - just because that is what I was taught. I have a suspicion that if I did a comparison test of pre-soaked - vs - not pre-soaked, I would not be able to tell the difference.

Willie, I tried the hake brush method on 8X10 X-ray film and got very faint scratches from the brush coming in contact with the very fragile emulsion of the X-ray film. I have not tried it for my 5X7 or 4X5 Ilford films yet. I am very curious how it would work on Jason Lanes dry glass plates. I am thinking it would be best to make sure that the bristles do not come in contact with soft / fragile emulsions.

**uphereinmytree** · 11-May-2018, 06:09

The presoak water always has a deep blue color with the film I use. I thought that it may be more important with short development times as the film can instantly and maybe more evenly start developing.

**IanBarber** · 11-May-2018, 06:19

Doesn't pre-soaking pen up the pores so to speak allowing the developer to get to work for quickly

**mdarnton** · 11-May-2018, 06:22

It might be good for tray processing, to help keep film from sticking together. I never knew about it until this forum--that's about 50 years of successfully not doing it--so I certainly am not going to start now. One would have thought that if it were really all that common, I would have stumbled on it before, in all of the photo mags I read previously to stopping reading photo mags around 1985, and in the labs I've worked in, so I'm forced to believe it's a local article of faith, not the common on that it's been presented as here.

**Alan9940** · 11-May-2018, 06:28

Originally Posted by IanBarber

Doesn't pre-soaking pen up the pores so to speak allowing the developer to get to work for quickly

Just the opposite really. Allowing the emulsion to "swell" from a pre-soak, theoretically, allows the developer to sink more evenly into the emulsion. Slower vs faster when you don't pre-soak. Ilford doesn't recommend pre-soaking their films. I've been doing it for nearly 40 years and it has worked fine for me. All that said, it probably doesn't matter.

**RJ-** · 11-May-2018, 07:00

Being British, the tendency to pre-soak has become standard, more as a quality control aspect of development technique for me.

I'm not sure I follow the same rationale (as above pre-soaking developing photographers). Here, our temperatures vary during season. The darkroom temperature I work in fluctuates between 8 - 32 degrees Celsius. For this reason, pre-soaking equilibrates the film and developer to the correct temperature for black and white. Maybe years of doing manual reversal development, this tends to be a more standardised practice.

Secondly, the removal of air bubbles in low agitation techniques, is superior for quality control when presoaking vs non-presoaking. This is particularly important for very short development cycles (of less than 5 minutes) where agitation is undesirable.

The adsorption of water onto the dry film surface, remarked by Ian, is indeed important for consistent film development (manual techniques). It is not necessary, just like stop bath which some photographers fore-go, however it is beneficial - practically and psychologically

Where pre-soaking has not been advantageous, is stipulated clearly in the Ilford literature: the use of continuous rotary developers where faster agitation cycles, cancel out any benefit from presoaking and risk overdevelopment. Pre-soaking is also disadvantageous for soft emulsions with long standing development times, running into an hour, risking emulsion lift.

It's coming back to me - this is all in the Ilford Monochrome Darkroom Practice manual. The other references were cited recently in other posts questioning the problems of development in film. Generally, presoaking offers more advantages for consistent quality control, than not presoaking although perhaps Ian may need a specific example of a work flow method, to clarify if presoaking is indeed helpful, advantageous for quality control or redundant.

Kind regards,
RJ