sharpest 8x10 black and white film?

[Jay DeFehr]

It seems to me that you pose questions and make criticisms that are best addressed by testing the stuff.

Hi Tom.

I thought I had made it clear that I have tested it, and many other variations, and have concluded based on my testing that there is no advantage to adding anything to the catechol/ascorbate pair. I appologize if I was ambiguous. I'm not surprised that Pat likes the Pyrocat-MC, and I liked the original version of Hypercat, but the new version without phenidone or metol, or BZT, and with much reduced ascorbate is better. Good luck with your testing.

Jay

[Tom Hoskinson]

Hi Tom.

I thought I had made it clear that I have tested it, and many other variations, and have concluded based on my testing that there is no advantage to adding anything to the catechol/ascorbate pair. I appologize if I was ambiguous. I'm not surprised that Pat likes the Pyrocat-MC, and I liked the original version of Hypercat, but the new version without phenidone or metol, or BZT, and with much reduced ascorbate is better. Good luck with your testing.

Jay

Thanks, Jay. I'll post the results.

[Jay DeFehr]

I look forward to it, Tom. Since you have all the ingredients, you might consider testing the new Hypercat as well, and decide for yourself wether the metol adds anything of value to the formula. I've been in close communicatrion with a photographer who uses the original version of Hypercat as his standard developer, and is testing the new formula. He's reported developing a roll of Delta 100 in a working solution of Hypercat made up of 0.6 ml Hypercat A solution, 12ml of 20% sodium carbonate, and 300ml of water. Development was around 20 minutes @70F with 30 sec. initial agitation, and 20sec. agitation @ 10 minutes. I'm guessing this represents complete development, or development to exhaustion with such a dilute solution. He reported good shadow detail at EI 80, and I suspect he could have used an EI of 100 or even a little higher, based on my own testing with a 1:10:300 dilution. He characterised the acutance as "extreme", and I'm inclined to agree, given the development regime. Hypercat produces very acute negs with rotary development, and resorting to semi-stand development is likely to be too acute for some subject matter and/or tastes. Good luck, and I'll watch for your report.

Jay