How much to push/pull

[Sorin Varzaru]

I am compensating for reuse (6:15 for 1st, 6:30 for 2nd and 6:45 for 3rd use) and they come out identical (150ml for a sheet). I do have the E6 pretty much under control. I've been doing it for a while (for 35 and 120) and aside from major screwups (when I made mistakes because I wasn't paying attention) I get consistent results. According to the chemistry manufacturer at least 160mm should be used for a sheet but I found out that the number is fairly conservative. Since my shooting is mostly experimental at this pount I don't particularily care about colors. If I did, I'd use more chemistry. Those were exposure issues. I can tell because I had good exposures on the same roll. Like I said before, my problem is not the processing, is evaluating how many stops or fraction of stops I need to push/ pull to get the "right" density.

[kthompson]

Okay...hmm...I was going to ask if you had access to a densitometer, and have ever thought about running control strips, BUT, I'm not exactly sure how to answer your question. I think I understand what you're asking here, but I just don't know how to answer it. It may be a purely subjective thing, how it looks to you, not something written in stone. Let me think about this a bit, and discuss it with "the E6 guru" here...

[kthompson]

Sorin, here's something you can try, although it might use up several sheets of film, we were thinking what might help you would be to make a ringaround of different exposures. Like set up a nice evenly lit shot, where the light isn't going to be changing rapidly, and maybe include some good tones for reference. Like a gray card, a white, black, and maybe a specular highlight. Meter for a normal exposure and bracket in third stops up to +1 over, and -1. So, that'd be like 7 sheets total. Then run all this film, take good notes, be consistent. Now, you should have a visual reference for your process, and when you're looking at a CT on your light table, you can consult the ringaround as to which direction to go. This should also tell you just how consistent your E6 is as well. Of course, you could also do this with roll film, as someone else has already suggested earlier, but at least with the sheet film, it'd be what you were using anyway. To make it a little simpler at first, I'd suggest sticking to one kind of film. Hope this helps in some way.

[Jan erala]

Be careful with your lightbox, I've found many of the new smaller items on the market are so bright they will make the slide looking brighter (also looking better because of good shadow detail) that is possible for good printing or reproduction results. As is earlier said, look for the highlights, there should always be some definition in them.

As I feel it, the E-6 process is standardized more for film speed than for good tonal result and natural reproduction. If you expose for only half of the film speed and develop for that (in a normal pro E-6 it means 5 minutes instead of 6 minutes) you'll achieve a larger exposure latitude and lower contrast. After getting accustomed with this you'll find a film developed "normally" very harsh and contrasty. I shoot myself only 8x10 slide film, making lightjets and cibas, and done this pulling for years. Couldn't never think of getting back to the standard developing scheme. For ten years I developed E-6 daily with big d-a-d machine as I owned a custom color lab and got from this work a lot of references over time.

[Sorin Varzaru]

Jan, in your experience, how much do you gain in latitude by pulling a stop? I like too shoot Astia. Speaking if Astia, anybody here knows what is it's latitude when processed normally. It seems to be a lot more then Velvia. DK and everybody else, thank you for all your help. I'll let you know if I come up with a reproductibile procedure.

[kthompson]

Sorin, I was starting to feel like I was interrogating you about your proc. techniques! Sorry about that, but for me E6 isn't exactly as enjoyable as b&w...I love running our own film in-house, while a set is still up and all that, but it can be a real pain sometimes.It seemed so much easier when we just sent out. I'm glad you asked that question about what Jan was saying because I was wondering about that myself. It sounds like the old b&w wisdom of exposing for the shadows, and dev. for the highlights. I've only shot Astia a couple of times, our main film is Provia 100. Compared to Velvia though, Astia should be a very neutral, low contrast film. I know you've said that you don't want to do much testing, and I understand why with film costs, but even if it's just shooting gray cards, this should give you someplace to start...plus you'll have the card in your hand for reference...

[Jan erala]

If you half the film speed, you'll have to expose about one f-stop more. Because changes in development times have more effect on the highlights, the one f-stop will give about the same amount of light to the shadows. On the other hand, shorter developer time prevent highlights from beeing blocked, so there will also be more definition in the light end. When compared side by side the differences are so clear and logical, that I have never felt any need to measure the densities. There sure are differences between different films, but generalising, I'll say the exposure latitude expands with one and half to two stops.

Pulling E-6 is a critical thing, because if you do it even a little too much, you'll get a greenyellow colorshift. Often this shift can be better, because slide films generally creates some magenta when exposed in natural light. I am very critical with the colors in my own work, so I use most often a 81B filter (in rear of lens) with EPR- 64 film, which I prefer in outdoor use. I must also apologize for my limited english, but hope you got the main thing. Jan.

[kthompson]

Jan, thanks. I may try that next time we shoot a contrasty scene. We routinely shoot things like old dark wooden washstands with marble tops...alot of flagging off lights. Maybe we can squeeze out a bit more latitude this way? So, you're just cutting back about a minute in the first dev. right? I guess the actual amount of that pull would rely on the type of chrome film you were shooting though. (Kodak vs. Fuji) We can figure out the color shift. We really only mess around with the densitometer if our color starts getting way off. As we're using a Wing-Lynch (one-shot) it's not like we have the same controls that you probably have in a tank line. Thanks for the tip, it might save the day for us sometime.

[Ellis Vener]

DK you really should be running color control strips with your process and charting the results, at least daily if not with every run. I used to run a one shot E-6 process at the studio I apprenticed at (we used a Merz processor) and keeping a line that was in control was vital to superior processing and eliminating that that as a variable when odd color things would happen. It saved a lot of time.

Another tool you can use to reduce contrast are the Tiffen "Ultra Contrast" filters. These can lower the subject contrast without any obvious diffusion effect, but I don't advice that using them as a substitute for good lighting inthe first place. Still I'd rather use the UC filters than pull process E-6 or C-41.

[kthompson]

Ellis, yeah I know that's a bad habit...we really don't have that much of a problem with control. It's frustrating in a way with a one-shot machine, because so much of your "control" is lost anyways. We have to occasionally correct the pH of certain solutions, and we're really meticulous with mixing, as far as no contamination (everything in it's mixing containers), and we check sp. grav. with hydrometers. We had the most problems, for about a year at least we seemed to be running about 5 pts. magenta, we were running plots daily, and were on the phone with Kodak/Fuji guys alot. We got it down finally to 2.5 pts., and then Kodak changed their chemistry to the new 1.5 liter kits (we have a 5 gal. Wing Lynch), and we get this chem. really cheap on a state contract. So, we had to retune it all to this new stuff. But actually it seems to be so much better. There are some new changes in the process (ha ha, don't you hate it when they do that?), so our card won't work exactly the same (we have to step over a wash between the color dev. and the pre-bleach!), but this new stuff runs really good. So, long story I guess (boring too), but we've gotten a bit lazy. The biggest problem we have now, is with our Intellifaucet, which has gotten real buggy...

I'll look into the filter. Both of us (2 photographers) did our prerequisite stint in the High Point furniture studios, so we do some fancy flagging of the lights with all sorts of home-made dots & fingers...but we shoot strobes instead of the hot lights you'd find over there. Some antiques can really suck up alot of light, it's amazing really. Thanks for the advice, I'll chastise my boss on Monday about the E6 proc. control!