Vitamin C Developers - motor honey, cough syrup?

[Ed K.]

Once again, while browsing a well known local store, I noticed an odd little bottle of NC-2 Vitamin C film developer for 4 bucks. Hmmm, I thought, looks more like cough syrup and the description sounds like yet another motor honey cure-all or patent medicine. Well, being the experimenter from time to time, naturally I had to buy it.

Recently, I wanted to find a low-contrast but hopefully full speed developer that would allow me to make easily scannable negs from HP5 with low grain. I've been out shooting handheld with my Gowland Aerial again, and every bit of film speed is useful as the lens is only F9 and somewhere between 16 and 22 makes a good fStop for the combo. Impossible it seems, but braced on various street firmaments such as a pole or building, it actually works out fine. While it might sound like sacrilege to some, I'm presonaly no great fan of HP5 most of the time, and most of my work has been in the slow film department except for my early 35mm days.

Developed for 15 minutes, 20:1, four sheets in 500ml working solution, I was quite amazed at the fine grain, decent sharpness and good representation of shadow through highlight. Very promising juice indeed, and naturally a joyous occasion to get those couple of extra stops in speed. Oddly enough, the HP5 in this juice looks a lot like Fp4 in Rodinal 1:50 (but with finer grain), however I like it a bit more tone wise.

With no manufacturer's credits on the bottle, I'm hesitant to adopt the particular blend because who knows if I can get it again in the future. The stuff smells like isopropal alchohol mixed with old Pelecan ink, and it has a reddish brown color in concentrate.

I'm shooting 8x10 here, so the end print will not be a very large blowup. From time to time, the end result my just be a contact print, using traditional silver process ( no alt process prints in this case ). Slightly flat/compressed tone is good for me in this case ( scanning ). If I can get a long term supply of it, it's worth going through the rest of adding it to my kit.

Okay you chemically adept experts and experimenters - any ideas as to the formula of this stuff, or any suggestions as to how to get a similar set of qualities from another brew? Or, does anyone know the origin of this stuff?

[Oren Grad]

Well, if you like the taste of vitamin C, have you ever tried Xtol? The active ingredients are isoascorbate and phenidone. It behaves more or less like D-76, except that for a given dilution it tends to deliver a touch more speed and slightly finer grain. There are other ascorbate/isoascorbate recipes floating around too if you want to brew your own.

[Jason Greenberg Motamedi]

I haven't tried it extensively, but Mytol, a homebrew Xtol, seems to work very well. Fast (but even) development, low grain, nice speed.

www.jackspcs.com/mytol.htm

[Henry Ambrose]

What Oren wrote.
Xtol is cheap and easy to find.
Its great with most films, totally wonderful with HP5.

[Ed K.]

Thanks guys.

Funny I hadn't considered XTol, as I had bad experiences with some lab-developed XTol stuff in the past, however I'm not positive that they actually used real XTol instead of something else.

Isn't it amazing how often the lowly D76 comes is mentioned as a standard/reference point, or gets a revist after testing the other waters? Seems like I'll have to try visiting the old D76 1:1 days again too.

As to the NC2 - The claimed hypoallergenic properites of the NC-2 along with supposed environmental friendliness are nice, but less critical to me with a Jobo than trays. I suspect that some tray processing folks might like NC-2 except for the long processing times and need for continuous agitation.

Easy to do - I shall try some XTol then, and thanks for the suggestions. Other suggestions if anyone has them are of course always welcome.

[Oren Grad]

Isn't it amazing how often the lowly D76 comes is mentioned as a standard/reference point, or gets a revist after testing the other waters?

I started with D-76 more than 25 years ago, spent years wandering around developer-land, and finally settled on... D-76. If you haven't tried HP5 Plus in good old-fashioned D-76, and have formed your impressions of it based on results with punchier developers that emphasize grain, you may be selling it short.

[Ed K.]

Yes Oren, I too started with D76 more than 25 years ago. At that time, I shot 35mm using the venerable TriX in the green and yellow box from the local Thrifty Drug store counter, usually purchased around 3-4 in the morning before shooting. Ah, those days... To me at the time, I thought the old Ilford films were neato keeno, but I always bought the green/yellow, purple/yellow and brown/yellow boxes and loved what I got. ( TriX, PlusX, PanatomicX). Trouble is, back then I didn't care technically about some of the things I now care about, because the shooting was journalistic in nature then, sort of F8 and be there, or set it at 1.4 at 1/30th and hold one's breath while the motordrive churned.

There is wisdom and simplicity in what you say though - I must revisit the old simple way, which is also inexpensive. Haven't tried "real" D76 with any modern version fast films yet simply because the slow films in large format have done the trick. Recently, I got a chance to look at many old negatives taken by Mr. Gowland. Every single one of them would be a joy to print. Veripan film, or something like that, most likely in D76. Nothing but great mid tones, fine grain and tack sharp. In his usual modest and self-efacing humor, he said that he just used it because it was cheap and didn't do anything special to process the stuff.

J Motamedi - thanks for the recipe link. The comments say that the formula yields results equal to XTol, however there is no mention of any advantage to self-brewing it. Forgive me for asking, but why might somebody use Mytol instead of XTol, given that XTol is available retail for not too much money? I'll take your recommendation as meaning "try XTol, and if you must home brew, here's how", right?

OT:
I wonder what would happen if we packaged a set of old standby developers into mysterious new packages and didn't reveal the ingredients, then had a series of photographers comment on their properties. Sure, many would not be tricked, however a good bet would be that many would wander down what can be another chase of the fabled "magic bullet".

I confess I have wandered in developerland, and along the way I have seen first-hand just why there are pyromaniacs, rodinites and others. For so many things, rodinal just worked, worked easy and worked well, so that became a favorite. Same goes for DDX with designer films. Those are two paint cans so to speak. Nice to have some more. I still take those walks into developerland here and there; if nothing else, it helps to appreciate the options and the hard work of others. Ultimately, I may settle on, well, D76 - who knows?

Just two suggestions for these old stand by developers should keep me off the streets for a bit.
But darn, that little red bottle looked like it might have been a magic bullet. Negs were good too.

[Oren Grad]

I too started with D76 more than 25 years ago. At that time, I shot 35mm using the venerable TriX in the green and yellow box from the local Thrifty Drug store counter

TX in D-76 1+1 is the staff of life, the very meaning of "film". I use HP5 Plus for LF because TX is not now and never will be available in cut sheets, but my photo-brain will forever be calibrated for the genuine article...

[Henry Ambrose]

Ed and Oren,

A year or two ago I was looking at a friend's prints (from scanned Hasselbald negs printed 4x4 feet on an Epson) he was making for a show and we were talking about his negatives. I asked him what they were and he said "TriX". I made some casual remark like "nothing looks like TriX" or some such - to which he replied, "it looks like pictures".

His comment has stuck with me since that day and I often think about how very true it is. For an entire generation (maybe more) TriX and D76 defined "pictures".

(TriX looks good in Xtol too)

[Jason Greenberg Motamedi]

Ed,

The only reason I am using Mytol is that I can't get Xtol easily.

As an important aside, Xtol is more septic system friendly than most other developers.

jason