Page 2 of 4 FirstFirst 1234 LastLast
Results 11 to 20 of 39

Thread: Ideal Developer for Film to be Scanned

  1. #11

    Join Date
    Sep 2003
    Location
    Seattle, Washington
    Posts
    3,020

    Re: Ideal Developer for Film to be Scanned

    Thank you all for your very interesting and thoughtful contributions. I've been debating internally over staining v non-staining, single bath v two bath, and sharpness v grain minimization. Caffenol is indeed an interesting option, since it is both a staining developer, and a low-toxicity one, too. I haven't used it much because it's awful to work with, in my opinion; black and horrible-smelling, long development times, and I didn't get very consistent results from it, so I never considered it very seriously. I wonder if it is a tanning developer? It has other disadvantages, too, like shelf life. Still, interesting.

    I don't have time to respond appropriately to all the great contributions now, but I'll tponder overnight and try to post again tomorrow. Thank you all!

  2. #12
    Beverly Hills, California
    Join Date
    Feb 2000
    Location
    Beverly Hills, CA
    Posts
    1,108

    Re: Ideal Developer for Film to be Scanned

    Jay, my intuition tells me pyro negatives scan best.

  3. #13

    Join Date
    May 2009
    Location
    Vermont
    Posts
    253

    Re: Ideal Developer for Film to be Scanned

    Since most of my b&w work has been with T-Max films, I do find T-Max developer to work best. No experience with Xtol or Pyro.

    Tom

  4. #14

    Join Date
    Nov 2006
    Location
    Denver, CO
    Posts
    30

    Re: Ideal Developer for Film to be Scanned

    Quote Originally Posted by sanking View Post
    There are plenty of two-bath developers out there but most I have tried, divided D23, divided D76, and Diafine, don’t produce edge effects. Not important, however, with consumer scanners because you cannot capture them anyway with this type of equipment.

    Sandy King
    Sandy - may I ask which two-bath developer you would recommend to produce edge effects? Although I currently use a consumer HP scanner, I may now and then want to have an image drum-scanned.

    Thanks,
    Duane Gabel

  5. #15

    Join Date
    Sep 2003
    Location
    South Carolina
    Posts
    5,506

    Re: Ideal Developer for Film to be Scanned

    Quote Originally Posted by dagabel View Post
    Sandy - may I ask which two-bath developer you would recommend to produce edge effects? Although I currently use a consumer HP scanner, I may now and then want to have an image drum-scanned.

    Thanks,
    Duane Gabel
    Duane,

    I use two-bath Pyrocat-MC, and am going to refer you to an earlier thread on the subject.

    http://www.largeformatphotography.in...bath+developer

    Whether other two-part staining developers would also work and give the same acutance I don't know, but I believe that the key is the *poor* buffering of the carbonate accelerator, which causes very sudden local exhaustion. I suspect that two-part forumulas that use metaborate would not produce as much acutance with this method of development, but don't know this for a fact as my own testing of these procedures has been fairly limited.

    Sandy
    For discussion and information about carbon transfer please visit the carbon group at groups.io
    [url]https://groups.io/g/carbon

  6. #16

    Join Date
    Feb 2005
    Posts
    2,955

    Re: Ideal Developer for Film to be Scanned

    Quote Originally Posted by Andre Noble View Post
    Jay, my intuition tells me pyro negatives scan best.
    Yes, but some Pyros may scan better than others. Well have to wait and see how this thread develops (Pun intended).

  7. #17

    Join Date
    Sep 2003
    Location
    Massachusetts USA
    Posts
    8,476

    Re: Ideal Developer for Film to be Scanned

    Intuition is "the apparent ability to acquire knowledge without inference or the use of reason."

    May I contact you privately for some investment tips ? All I need is a few lottery numbers

  8. #18

    Join Date
    Sep 2003
    Location
    Seattle, Washington
    Posts
    3,020

    Re: Ideal Developer for Film to be Scanned

    I think Stoeckler's two-bath formula is an interesting candidate. Stoeckler's is simple, just metol and sulfite in the A bath, and borax in the B bath, and the sulfite can be adjusted to fine tune the grain/sharpness characteristics. A metol-only developer with very low sulfite content would be similar to Beutler's classic acutance developer (edge effects), and metol with high sulfite content would be similar to Kodak D23 (soft working, fine grain), with the full range between these two extremes possible by adjusting the sulfite content, and in the case of low sulfite, adjusting the pH of the A bath by the addition of a small amount of borax. I didn't use sulfite in my experiments with a metol/ ascorbate two-bath developer, but it seems to me the same principle would apply. I think a metol/ ascorbate/ sulfite developer with borax as alkali would be most similar in composition to Xtol. In my experiments, I added sodium ascorbate in place of sulfite to provide short term preservation of the A bath without adding sulfite, generally following Pat Gainer's line of thought, but I think I used enough ascorbate, to make a superadditive developer, which might not offer any real sharpness advantage over a metol/low sulfite developer like Beutler's.

    I think what is wanted for scanning is a highly compensating developer. I think all two bath developers are essentially compensating, regardless of composition, but I want a good reason to make a developer more complicated by adding a secondary developing agent.

    Andre-

    In my experience, stained negatives do scan best, but I'm not experienced enough with non-staining developers to know if this holds true for non-stained negatives developed to moderately low contrast, or if so, to what degree. Does the practical difference in quality justify the use of a more toxic developer? I don't pretend to know the answer to this question, and I suspect there is no clear answer, but a range of conditions and preferences that favor one over the other.

    I make something like an improved version of Pextral's two-bath catechol-only developer from my Hypercat concentrate. Hypercat is essentially a 10% solution of catechol in glycol, with a little ascorbic acid added to preserve the working solution and control non-image stain. 15-30ml of Hypercat in 300ml of water approximates Pextral's two bath, with a 1% solution of sodium hydroxide as the B bath. A 10% solution of sodium carbonate also works as the B bath, and might be more appropriate for film to be scanned.

    Caffenol should be considered as an alternative to catechol or pyro based developers, if toxicity is important, and I think it is, in an ideal developer. Caffenol has a lot of disadvantages to be overcome before it resembles an ideal developer, but it also meets many of the criteria I set for an ideal developer for film to be scanned. I think hydroquinone or metol might represent compromises between coffee and pyro or catechol, since either will make a staining developer in absence of sulfite, and neither is as toxic as pyro or catechol.

    Lots of questions! Thanks to all for posting!

  9. #19

    Join Date
    Sep 2003
    Location
    South Carolina
    Posts
    5,506

    Re: Ideal Developer for Film to be Scanned

    Quote Originally Posted by Ron Marshall View Post
    Yes, but some Pyros may scan better than others. Well have to wait and see how this thread develops (Pun intended).
    Perhaps, but I have had very good success scanning both PMK and Pyrocat-HD negatives, which are quite different visually. This leads me to believe that all modern pyro formulas will give negatives than scan well. I think it would be very difficult to prove that one developer or another is clearly superior, perhaps even more difficult than it would be to clearly show the superiority of one developer over the other in printing in the darkroom. This is because the choice of scanner, and how it is used, is a wild card that throws even more variability into the equation than darkroom printing skills. I have had the opportunity to compare scans of some of my select LF negatives made with consumer flatbeds, high end professional flatbeds, and three different drum scanners. The results in terms of grain were remarkably different, much more so than I believe than than most people would imagine possible.

    Sandy King
    For discussion and information about carbon transfer please visit the carbon group at groups.io
    [url]https://groups.io/g/carbon

  10. #20

    Join Date
    Sep 2003
    Location
    Seattle, Washington
    Posts
    3,020

    Re: Ideal Developer for Film to be Scanned

    Sandy,

    You make a very interesting point. The appearance or rendition of grain by scanners seems so much more variable than in darkroom printing, and I don't know enough about scanning hardware to account for these variabilities, or combat them. Julia scanned a roll of Ultrafine + MF film developed in GSD-10, and I was struck by the difference in the appearance of grain depending on the exposure given the various frames. It seemed a little more exposure produced a disproportionate increase in the appearance of grain, and I wonder if the scanner might have contributed, somehow. I'm very interested in the grain v sharpness relationship for film to be scanned. Excessive grain seems to be a bigger potential problem than relative sharpness. I was interested in your comments about the differences between sharpness enhanced by USM compared to sharpness enhanced by edge effects in the negative. How would you characterize these differences? Would you say the sharpness resulting from edge effects is so superior to that resulting from USM that the additional grain produced by the kinds of developers that produce edge effects represents an attractive compromise?

Similar Threads

  1. Ideal film/developer-drum scanning B&W Landscapes
    By Jack Brady in forum Darkroom: Film, Processing & Printing
    Replies: 38
    Last Post: 23-Mar-2010, 12:08
  2. Ideal Developer for Delta 100
    By brian steinberger in forum Darkroom: Film, Processing & Printing
    Replies: 6
    Last Post: 12-Jul-2006, 18:43
  3. Old Formulas : Film
    By Paul Fitzgerald in forum Darkroom: Film, Processing & Printing
    Replies: 6
    Last Post: 19-Mar-2005, 21:31
  4. Developer shelf life
    By Neal Shields in forum Darkroom: Film, Processing & Printing
    Replies: 11
    Last Post: 22-Jul-2004, 09:43
  5. Developer Quantity
    By Ron Bose in forum Darkroom: Film, Processing & Printing
    Replies: 7
    Last Post: 27-Apr-2004, 10:49

Bookmarks

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •