Developing my 1st negative

[Rick-okc]

I'm about to develop my first 4x5 B&W negatives. I've shoot some Fortepan 200. Exposure was 1/4 at f32 and another 1/2 at f32. These times were recommended by my exposure meter. I made no other corrections. Subject was pretty much at infinity so bellows extension shouldn't be a factor. I'm shooting with a Shen-hao and a 90mm f6.8 lens. I'm using D-76. Tank is the HP Combi-plan. Until I get comfortable, I'm doing one sheet at a time.

My question is: In the past, 25 years ago, when I was developing 35mm B&W, I used the recommended times out of my Kodak Darkroom Dataguide. I never thought about film reciprocity. At a 1/4 and 1/2 second exposures should I be adding any time to my development.

Next question: Should I discard the developer and fixer after using it or pour them back in their gallon jug? What's the procedure for reusing chemicals?

Any other suggestions are welome.

[steve simmons]

Reciprocity Failure for film generally starts at about 1 second. For some films you would slightly shorten your dev time.

You can replensish D76 if you have the replenisher chemicals. Otherwise dump it and use fresh next time.

Fixer can be reused.

I am not sure there is an advantage to processing film one at a time in that tank. Go for broke, do both. In fact I would be concerend about agitation problems with just one sheet.

Since you are new to large format may I suggest some reading

User's Guide to the View Camera by Jim Stone

Large FOrmat Nature hotography by Jack Dykinga

Using the View Camera that I wrote.

Try your local library.

Also, try

www.viewcamera.com

and go to the Free Articles Section.

steve simmons

[cyrus]

As far as I know reciprocity failure comes into play when making an exposure, not really during development. I am not familiar with your film so I can' t tell you how long of an exposure raises a reciprocity failure concern but I would bet that at 1/4 or 1/2 of a second you need not worry about it.

D-76 is one-use. Straight D76 in a stoppered bottle keeps for a while if stored right (I never keep it past a month myself) but once you mix up a working solution for use (1:3 dilution with water, or whatever) it doesn't keep well at all and will be useless in an open tray in a few hours. You can extend the life with replenisher but not by much & not really worh it. Some other developers, like Acufine, you can keep using day after day forever.

Fixer can be reused a couple more times perhaps, but ONLY to fix film. Don't reuse fixer that was used on film, to fix your photos. Not a good idea.

Stop bath (simply vinegar and water) can be resued as long as it is milldy acidic but why bother keeping any of this stuff around since it is so cheap, and why risk bad develpment just tp save some pennies on chemicals?

[Jan Pedersen]

Exiting time in the darkroom, nothing like waiting to see the first sheet of film.
Should not be any need to add time until you are at 1 sec or longer. For belows extension that is only using real long extension and when using macro lenses, still with long extension.
If you are going to develop 1 sheet at a time in continuous succesion you can use the D76 again unless you intend to use a very dilute mix (1+3 or more). The combi plan hold enough chemistry so exhaustion is not an issue. I would however not pour used developer into a container for later use. I use all film developer as one shot.
Hope this helps and good luck.

[Ron Marshall]

For ease of use I dilute D76 1:3, one part D76 plus three parts water. If you are using it straight it can be reused, but as Steve said above, you should add replenisher in accordance with the number of rolls that have been processed.

Fixer should be reused until the clearing time has doubled. Find clearing time with fresh fixer by placing a piece of unprocessed film in the fixer and noting how long it takes to clear.

[Jiri Vasina]

I don't use D-76, but the amount of chem needed for the HP Combi-plan tank is large (1l or 1.25l depending on how much you fill), so IMO it would be a waste of chemistry to pour it out after developing one single sheet (as you stated). I think it could be justified after developing the full 6 sheets in one go, but even then it could be used for another go.

It all depends on the keeping properties of mixed D76 and how soon you would need it again, IMO.

(I usually use R09 [Rodinal] several times for developing sheets in the HP tank, sometimes with as much as 4 weeks in between, but then for non-critical images only. Still good results though).

[Frank R]

For ease of use I dilute D76 1:3, one part D76 plus three parts water. If you are using it straight it can be reused, but as Steve said above, you should add replenisher in accordance with the number of rolls that have been processed.

Fixer should be reused until the clearing time has doubled. Find clearing time with fresh fixer by placing a piece of unprocessed film in the fixer and noting how long it takes to clear.


As a person who is in the same position, I find advice like this a little confusing. I have read that I can develop my EFKE 100 film in straight D-76 for 8 minutes or a 1:1 dilute solution for 12 minutes. Now a recommendation of 1:3 is fine, but for how long?

Advice about adding replenisher may be fine also for someone who has more experience. But for a beginner wouldn't it be best to just encourage the use of a standard recipe (film, developer, fixer, dilution ratios, times, temperature)?

I have had to piece together a recipe for developing by sorting through a lot of information on these forums.

[Ron Marshall]

Now a recommendation of 1:3 is fine, but for how long?


http://www.digitaltruth.com/devchart.html

[cyrus]

As a person who is in the same position, I find advice like this a little confusing. I have read that I can develop my EFKE 100 film in straight D-76 for 8 minutes or a 1:1 dilute solution for 12 minutes. Now a recommendation of 1:3 is fine, but for how long?

Advice about adding replenisher may be fine also for someone who has more experience. But for a beginner wouldn't it be best to just encourage the use of a standard recipe (film, developer, fixer, dilution ratios, times, temperature)?

I have had to piece together a recipe for developing by sorting through a lot of information on these forums.

Development times aren't written in stone and the "recommended" recipe time can be varied to suit your particular negative. You can find "recommended" development times in various development charts and data guides and websites.

While using these recommended times is fine for newcomers, they should also be aware of the fact that there are good reasons to vary the standard recipe. Do you want contrasty or soft negs? Well, the dilution, development time and agitation will all affect that. There are lots of variables, and you can tweak all of them.

Doing experiments should not be ruled out. No one said you have to stick to the "recommneded" recipe.

[Donald Qualls]

Generally, reciprocity failure isn't an issue (with most films) as long as metered exposure is 1 second or less. Kodak recommends reducing development to correct the contrast increase that accompanies low-intensity reciprocity failure (the kind that occurs with long exposures), but my experience has been that with exposures under sixteen seconds metered that is unnecessary (caveat: my experience with reciprocity failure is almost entirely related to pinhole photography, which tends to self-compensate by a lower inherent contrast due to light scattered from the pinhole's edge, amounting to flare).

In any case, the exposures you described shouldn't require any correction in processing, because they are short enough to need no correction in exposure.

[Rick-okc]

Thanks everyone for all the advice. I finally had enough time and worked up enough nerve to develop my first 4x5 negative. It came out fine, but one thing I noticed when I opened the tank. My one negative had popped out of its grooves and was sitting diagonal in the tank. I think my agitation was more aggrevation.

[Jiri Vasina]

If using the HP tank, the direction of agitation is really important - (hopefully I'll explain it well to be understood) - the axis of rotation must be the shortest edge of the tank, so as the moving fluid inside hits the edge of the film, definitely not so that it hits the face of the film - then the force of the move will push the film out of the groves, and if several films developed together, they'll stick together and be damaged.

[Ron Marshall]

I agree with Jiri's advice; the HP tank does work well, but proper agitation is important.

I have only had sheets come loose once. That was not due to incorrect agitation, but because I did not press the retaining clip on tightly enough. Practice using developed sheets and count the clicks or get used to the correct pressure to hold the sheets tightly.

[Frank R]

Development times aren't written in stone and the "recommended" recipe time can be varied to suit your particular negative. You can find "recommended" development times in various development charts and data guides and websites.

While using these recommended times is fine for newcomers, they should also be aware of the fact that there are good reasons to vary the standard recipe. Do you want contrasty or soft negs? Well, the dilution, development time and agitation will all affect that. There are lots of variables, and you can tweak all of them.

Doing experiments should not be ruled out. No one said you have to stick to the "recommneded" recipe.

All this is true but it misses the point. Would you tell a person who is learning a musical instrument all about the various things you can do with it when they are first practicing their first notes? They are already aware that their are more possibilities. They need to master the basics first, then additional information is added.