Efke 25 /100 in Rodinal

[Mark_Se]

I shot some efke 25 and developed it in agfa rodinal- I really like the results, good tonality and fine grain! The only thing I don`t like about this film is the lack of red sensitivity ( I need to darken the sky with a red filter sometimes- that doesn`t really work with the efke 25). I heard that the efke 100 has more red sensitivity, that would be good. But I also heard that the efke 100 is really grainy when developed in rodinal- is this true? Maybe someone has experience with efke 25/ 100 and rodinal.
(I use 4x5 sheet film)

[Drew Wiley]

Mark - Efke 25 is Orthopan, not pan. If you use a 25 red filter you can easily darken
skies in the normal manner without any adverse effects. But anything stronger like a
29 chops off part of the curve. I develop it in PMK and rate it at 25, with a 3-stop
exposure compensation for a 25 filter. The grain, acutance, and tonality are outstanding, although you do get a few more zits in open skies than with the
brand-name films.

[Bjorn Nilsson]

It's normal that a 2 stop faster film is grainier than the slower film. The Efke 100 film is still quite fine grained unless you compare it to modern films like fuji Acros, Kodak TMX or Ilford Delta 100. The Efke films are based on the recepies of the old Adox 14, 17 and 21 films from the 50'ies, thus quite old-fashioned films.
The Efke 100 doesn't have the same characteristics as the '25. While the '25 is a little bit "special" (I'm not paraphrasing Stephen Lynch here. ), the '100 is more "standard" but still a good film which also comes to life in Pyro if you are so inclined.
I havn't tried Efke 100 in Rodinal myself, but it should be a nice match. In short, you have to try the film with the developer to see if you like it.

//Björn