FomaPan 100 4x5 Sheet Film & Kodak HC-110 Question

[IanBarber]

My work-flow consists of scanning the negatives as I do not own or use a traditional darkroom so my question is really geared towards those that use a similar work-flow.

Issues: After scanning, I always feel that the highlight areas are to bright with very little tonal separation.

Scanner: Epson V800
Scanning Software: Silverfast AI and Vuescan
Developer: Kodak HC-110
Film: FomaPan 100 4x5 sheet film

Using this film at ISO 100 seemed to produce darker shadows than I really wanted so I now use ISO 64

I always spot meter the scene, placing the shadows (2 stops under) what the meter told me.
I then check the brightest area of the scene to make sure I am not exceeding 5 stops

I mix 16ml of HC110 (syrup) and 984ml of water in a Paterson tank
Total development time is 12 minutes
I agitate slowly for the first 30 seconds and then do 3 slow agitations every minute.

Would I be better to reduce the amount of agitation ( 3 slow agitations every 2 minutes) or reduce the overall development time to try and prevent such bright highlights.

Would there be any side effects to the shadow and mid-tone areas if I did this.

[RSalles]

Hello Ian,

You're using Foma 100 with HC-110 dilution H, and seems to me to be a good choice - I have tried that too, and finally prefer another dev. combo exactly for the same reasons: better highlights control. But: in the actual scenario I would suggest you to:

a) Use a Yellow K2 or stronger filter if you're dealing with highlights blowing in landscape scenes.
b) Take your time and test your development time to N-1 and N-2 development, and place the highlights in 3 different negatives for the same scene at N, N-1 and N-2. Scan and compare.
Try another developer if you want to use Foma 100 (I have arrived to more controllable highlights with Foma 100 with Rodinal AND X-Tol.
For a side-by-side approach take a look at this link with the tests I made using Shanghai GP3 in 4x5: http://madeinthewet.blogspot.com.br

In general, scan results are better with "thinner" negatives then I normally use to develop for whet printing, some "more dense than wanted" negatives prints wonderfully using paper grade #2, and requires more work on the computer to adjust curves in the highlights.

If you're lazy as I am, try to shorten development time at 25% as a starting point and if you like the results go ahead with a more controlled procedures.

Cheers,

Renato

[zsolt]

Greetings Ian!
Foma is a contrasy film,that builds up contrast pretty fast(and blocks highlights)i would suggest testing your development times,and film speed..it comes really handy.its one of the first thing i do if i start with new film.it doesnt take long,and after you are done you have total control.do you know someone with a darkroom,maybe a densitometer?(if you know darkroom people,but no densitometer,send the exposed-developed film to me,and i can measure for you,if you dont find anyone around you..no biggie,im glad to help!)
if you want to walk this road,than you can write me a P.M.,and i can help you with the test..no problem at all!but im sure others will help you as well here,and you can find different methods on testing your film online too,or search this forum..
if you are "lazy",than you could try cutting development 20%,and see what you get, or try stand development..it works on blown out highlights too.in my opinion agitation should stay as is..
"Using this film at ISO 100 seemed to produce darker shadows than I really wanted so I now use ISO 64"
remember..if you expose more you should develop less..in general people say cut ISO in half and develop less(-15-25%).
i would recommend you to test your film..it makes life easier both in scanning,or wet darkroom..
not for the testing haters of course..for them its a waist of time-film..i see it as a sacrifice for better density control in the future.
what is 6 sheets of film compared to the great photographs that you make in the future,and cant print-scan easily?
but im just one guy..and im sure others will have different opinions!
Good Luck!

[IanBarber]

Thanks for the replies.

When cutting film development time down by say 20%, does this equate to 1 stop less brightness in the highlights

[jumanji]

One thing to bear in mind is Fomapan (100) doesnt favor overagitate and overdevelop.

[Alan9940]

Ian, could be the scanning software causing the excess contrast...just sayin'.

[zsolt]

"When cutting film development time down by say 20%, does this equate to 1 stop less brightness in the highlights"
i truly dont think ANYbody can answer this exactly Ian.not even if they use the same thing..it depends on sooo many things,things that YOU make.this is why i recommended you a test.
...to know.
Cheers!

[IanBarber]

One thing to bear in mind is Fomapan (100) doesnt favor overagitate and overdevelop.

I cannot rule this out Alan simply because both Vuescan and Silverfast do seem to give different results

[interneg]

You may well have exceeded the Epson's ability to see through the highlight density - a better scanner (Imacon/ drum/ high end flatbed) can handle astonishingly dense highlights. The Epsons in my experience are pretty poor at handling even correct highlight densities.

I also suspect that 12 mins in HC-110 is way too much - 10 minutes or less might be better.

[Tobias Key]

I had similar problems when I was trying to set up my workflow with HC110 and FP4. There are so many variables that it's hard to know whether anything I did is relevant to you. I know that I started by trawling the internet for advice, and by the end of my testing I had altered almost every aspect of my processing workflow from when I started. I cut both development and agitation, and spent a lot of testing time making sure my shadows were exposed well too. So generally speaking I found a fairly low contrast negative worked best for me.

I scan on a flatbed (an HP G4050) with vuescan and just scan the negative as a raw file. I don't use any scanner software to invert or alter contrast on the negative, I don't even invert it and I have found that this yields the most information. I then do everything with the colorperfect plug in in photoshop, which seems to yield the best conversions.