My issues with x-ray film have come from its soft, two sided emulsion. Do you strip away one of the emulsions with bleach, or keep both sides?
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My issues with x-ray film have come from its soft, two sided emulsion. Do you strip away one of the emulsions with bleach, or keep both sides?
A search of the forum posts will give you that answer in great detail, but from what I have read and observed, stripping one side of the emulsion does not produce a sharper negative.
Vaughn,
The image #2 is typical Xray caracteristic, plenty of contrast and sharp.However the the shadow lost details because of its hight contrast so I usually placed at zone IV. The soaking time for Xray is crucial , soaking time for larger neg raised accordingly. Please remember to use latex glove when handle ULF neg , avoid crossed contamination handleling during processing.
I've been working with Kodak High Speed Green X-Ray film for a few months. I think it's mostly the same as standard speed green X-ray film, except it's supposed to be twice as fast. If most people are shooting the standard speed film is around EI 80, then this should be about EI 160. Maybe because of the developer I'm using, I have to give it a lot more exposure, about EI 50. This negative was exposed at 1/10 sec @ f32 under sunny sky and developed in a 16X20 tray using a developer made with:
2 liters water
2 grams metol
8 grams sodium sulfite
3 grams borax
Development was about 8 minutes with continuous gentle agitation.
The negative was contact printed onto Arista.EDU Ultra VC RC glossy paper using grade 2 filtration. The light source was an Omega color enlarger and the filtration was yellow and magenta using the settings from an Ilford Multigrade IV FB data sheet.
The print was scanned at 100 DPI resolution and cropped in Gimp, because when I do a scan I get the whole scanner bed. I think the contrast was adjusted slightly to match the print a little better. Then it was uploaded to Photobucket with no other changes. Unfortunately, the scanned print loses a lot of fine detail, even thought it's slightly larger than original size on my screen.
For this and the next several images, I used an 8X10 Improved Seneca View and an 8X10 Turner-Reich Triple, a late one with the Fairport address. The TR does a lot better job than these scans show. :o
http://i257.photobucket.com/albums/h...e_driveway.jpg
For this one I drove out to some volcanic basalt cliffs near Lucky Peak Dam, not far from Boise. A Sunpak Y-2 yellow filter was used to darken the sky somewhat. Based on previous experiments I gave it two more stops exposure, 1/2 sec @ f32. Processing and printing were as the previous image.
I guess I could try to pass off what's in the sky as thin, whispy clouds, but it was actually clear, blank sky in the scene. What I thought was a good processing routine turned out to be no good at all when there was a lot of blank sky.
Back to the drawing board, to find a way to get more even development.
http://i257.photobucket.com/albums/h...eak_cliffs.jpg
Great information. Thanks. Nice to hear all of the information regarding exposure, processing, printing etc. Keep it up folks!
My next attempt back at home was to try to get more even development. After doing a little research, I decided to try longer development with a less active developer. So I dropped the Borax from my favorite recipe, and went with just Metol and Sodium Sulfite:
2 liters water
2 grams metol
25 grams sodium sulfite
This would be similar to D-23 diluted about 1:6. Developed for 11minutes with continuous, gentle agitation. Still using a yellow filter over the T-R, in the hopes I might get a future shot with some clouds in the picture. Clear skies again when I took this shot. Results were a little better, but not much. Back to the drawing board again.
http://i257.photobucket.com/albums/h.../House_sky.jpg
Woot! Finally got a shot with some clouds in the sky. The yellow filter helped bring them out, I think. Did some more research, and thought maybe I was agitating too much. This time, used the same developer as the previous image but reduced agitation down to 5 seconds of gentle agitation in the tray every 1minute. Developed for 14 minutes. Things are looking up! By the way, I exposed 3 sheets of film for each of these shots, and sacrificed 2 of them getting development times down, as I was changing things between shots. A little uneven density can still be seen in the sky by careful inspection, but I think the clouds saved this shot. Without them it would be more noticeable.
http://i257.photobucket.com/albums/h..._sky_house.jpg
Thanks for posting the images and explanation. I think it is good to show the problems as well as the successes. I have found that uneven skies can be a development issue and I think that to much agitation can be the cause.
Thanks, Jim. It seems the less I agitate the negatives, the more even development I get. Uneven density would be a very bad thing on a medical x-ray, and the standard process obviously overcomes that, so I did some research on how it's done. I downloaded the data sheets for the Kodak x-ray films.
They are developed in tanks using a proprietary Kodak developer for 7-8 minutes with no agitation after initially tapping the film hangars to dislodge bubbles. It looks like stand development for 7-8 minutes.
I might try stand development or switch to Pyrocat, which has a reputation for even development.
It looks like I might be able to get where I want, which is to use the green x-ray film for landscape photography and print it on variable contrast enlarging paper. The variable contrast filtration seems to work OK, even through the blue base of the film. When developed to the lower density used for enlarging papers, the grain isn't so bad. It's a little grainier than Plus-X, but a lot less grainy than when I got some dense negatives by overdevelopment. I can see the grain in a contact print with 10x magnification, but it doesn't show up in the contact print scans due to poor scanning resolution. I think the last negative could withstand 2x or 3x enlargement and still look not bad.
I scanned the last print again at 600 DPI and cropped out some small insets to give a better picture of the resolution I'm getting. Even at 600 DPI, the grain isn't visible on the scan and the smallest and finest detail on the print isn't visible either.
You can see how the highlights bleed out into the surrounding dark areas just a bit. I'm pretty sure this is halation because there is no anti-halation backing on the film. The second emulsion layer is there instead.
http://i257.photobucket.com/albums/h...imney_tree.jpg
http://i257.photobucket.com/albums/h...Bench_deck.jpg
http://i257.photobucket.com/albums/h...ch_flowers.jpg
I've only seen those kind of marks (mottling) when the developer barely covered the film and agitated once every 30sec...2 litres of developer in a 16x20 tray is about half inch deep, if it's a flat-bottomed tray...but you were giving the film continuous agitation.. very strange, indeed. Anyways tonally, especially the last image you posted, looks great!
How about this. I most often use HP5 but for this one I used Kodak Mammography film.
Don, great use of x-ray film
If you want to use x-ray film for traditional photography I would suggest mammography film. Standard x-ray film is coated on both sides and mammo film is coated on one side only. I use it for x-ray work with the appropriate screens like the image above but can't remember if it's blue or green sensitive. I don't think I'll stick my head in the machine to find out ;)
Stripping reduces the contrast. Imaging exposing two pin registered negs and then trying to print with both of them against the paper. That's what the double coated x-ray is like. And if you're shooting at 80, then you're definitely getting density on both sides. The stuff does NOT have an anti-halation coating and for all I know is just a single coating on either sides. Just like the first films.
I shoot the green stuff at iso 200. "green" acts like blue/green sensitive (orthochromatic), and blue means only blue sensitive. Blue looks VERY old school, zero sky detail. Both give results that look like stuff from the silent film days. Both work very well with soft focus lenses -- much closer to the film for which the lenses were designed.
If you've gotten used to developing the stuff by inspection, you'll be disappointed the first time you strip off one side and see almost 1/2 your density disappear leaving a grainy mess. I just arrived at this point. Develop by inspection is wierd because one thinks they're overdoing it. I'll have to get a feel for the 'right look' if I'm going to strip off one side.
"Stripping" consists of pasting the film to a piece of glass (larger than the neg) using blue painter's tape, spritzing clorox all over it, then smushing around the clorox until all the emulsion is gone. Wash it off and take a look. If you're lucky, it's all gone, but most times there'll be stuff left behind (it looks like really bad mottle). A 2nd spritz and smush gets the rest. The painter's tape is what keeps the clorox away from the 'good' side, so pay attention to how you paste the the neg down.
Stripping is an artistic decision. X-ray has a really unique look. Sometimes it's appropriate, and sometimes it isn't. I stripped a shot taken with a soft lens that looked right out of a pictorial book. Then I stripped off one side and it looked awful. Practise, practise, practise.
I'll put up some of my stuff later tonight when I get back home.
George
Oh, and I've been using Dektol 1:12, "by inspection." Then it's like developing lith film.
Here's one done with a verito 14.5. Not 'stripped'.
Not a print, I don't have the equipment to do pt/pl much less gum, but I could get close to the look in P.S.
http://www.largeformatphotography.in...5&d=1314971721
Here are some shots on "green latitude" film.
All scanned. My darkroom is only usable after the sun goes down, so prints are rare.
The 2nd one shows the effect of overcompensating for the uber-contrast. I'll post some actual prints next.
George
The brownish one is a scan, the other a silver print.
again, brown -- scan, other -- silver print.
This silver print was done on VC paper with a 00 filter and alternating Dektol 1:3 and water bath -- in other words, it was really hard to get it to look like what you see. The contrast was just about uncontrollable. Also, I'm not a very good wet printer :) .
Question: How finicky are holders for nominal film sizes? Mammo film is available in 24x30cm, but not 10x12". How close is close enough?
George, you're stripping the back emulsion, right? Great scans you're getting.
No, those are not stripped.
But, here is a "before/after" example -- before on the left, after on the right. As you can see, the striping took away about 1/2 the density, which was not a good thing -- the result is now an underexposed neg. Getting any character in the window over her left shoulder introduces really ugly grain now. My next attempt at exposure/dev/stripping will have to keep that in mind.
I might try the film at ISO 80 and stripping that. All of this is really worth the effort if you're going to shoot with old soft focus lenses as they were designed to work with older film, and I think stripped X-ray film acts just like the older stuff.
George
Gotta do your own homework on that one, probly. Close enough for hand grenades surely.
But 10x12in is 25.4x30.48 cm so it doesn't sound all that close to us former engineers.
Now if there is about that much extra space in a 10x12 holder, you might just have a serendipity, by not having to sliiiiiide the film in, but tape it at the edges under the safelight. no wait, set it under the thingy on one side and get more tape room , less tape on the other. [ that's my fantasy plan for a 14x36 inch holder -did I say fantasy?]
http://www.foma.cz/foma/dokumenty/RadioProdukt.asp
http://www.foma.cz/foma/produkt/ndts...p?seznam=indux
Are Foma X-ray films available in the US? They have medical (including mammo) and industrial types: what is the difference?
George,
I stripped my first sheet of X-Ray film, using soapy bleach and a foam brush. The sheet was developed in a tube with rotary agitation, and the results are very good, but next time I'll develop more. The phrase, Gamma Infinity comes to mind. My first sheets of X-Ray film were exposed with my Verito, and a print from one of them hangs on my wall.
I've already posted this in September Portrait thread, but it also belongs here :)
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Nwk30LnEXr...rekTryptyk.jpg
My first ever photos made on an X-ray film :)
Globica 13x18
Lens Zeiss Tessar 250/4.5
KODAK Medical X-Ray Film , Rodinal 1+100 tray processing
I had these interesting light streaks also when I shot a model some time back. It is a nice effect. I couldn't figure out what caused it but it was nice as are these images. Thanks for posting them.
George,
I think W.M. might have liked X-Ray film. The creative possibilities seem endless, and it's cheap enough to play with. I want to try my hand at negative retouching, among other things.
I think I did overdevelop this shot. The shadow details (hair) is ok, but the highlight is too bright. Am I right? Or because there is only one light source (sun light)?
http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6062/...360a84df_z.jpg
Harvard Univ. says someone stole 500 to 600 lbs. of old X-ray film.
http://boston.cbslocal.com/2011/09/0...of-x-ray-film/
Watch out for deals in the Boston area which seem too good to be true. Chances are they're just trying to get the silver out, but you never know!
Mike
@ Scott: their Indux films do come in 10x12, but I don't know yet (I asked Foma) what these Industrial X-Ray films are!...
Plain Jane Green xray 8x10 film from CSXOnline.
Shot ISO 80. Schneider Symmar-S 300mm. Shadows on III. A dull day, easily within 5 zones.
Developed D76 1:1 in a Uniroller (kinda like a Jobo) for 20 minutes.
Stripped.
Not prints -- scanned, then P.S. edited and pseudo-toned.
I like the results. It's an aesthetic thing. Definitely not something you'd get from modern Pan film.
George
An enlarged section of the previous post (pic #1).
ISO 80 and stripping gets you a result that is much more controllable.
George how do the prints look? Scans look nice.
I'm getting scratching (I think from loading, as my film changing bag is too small), and I'm working on my development time (this was about 2.5 minutes in Ilfosol 3 1+9).
It prints better than it scans!
http://www.grahamcase.ca/blog/images/xray001.jpg
...a try on 8x10"
B Fuji 14x17 cut to smaller
out dated film
Aero Ektar 300mm f:2,5
10 sec exposure
Dev:D76 6 min 20°C
I am sure there must be something I do not remember...:)
Looks great to me!
Green latitude exposed with Wratten #12 (minus blue) filter. Pyrocat-hd.
Andrew, fantastic feeling of light in the photograph! Love it.