Hi John,
Always nice to hear from you...
My "agitation scheme" is what I'd call "classic": raise tilt left, lower, raise tilt right, lower. At each tilt, I pause for about 2 seconds to let the developer drain off and I at the end of the cycle I raise the hanger straight up just enough to "drop" it against the tank top. I do this to prevent air bells, but I've never been sure if it's really necessary because I've never tried not doing it. The agitation cycle is completed in a somewhat slow, very smooth motion. This is the technique I evolved to because of getting surge marks along the bottom edge due to the developer "spirting" up through the holes. So, I know what surge marks look like and what I saw, yesterday, was definitely not that.
I did have the passing thought, yesterday, that it could have been a bad piece of film...it is Foma, after all!
That said, though, I've been shooting 8x10 Foma 100 for many years now and I've never seen any quality issues with the film. I've heard and read stories of folks having quality control issues with Foma films, but I've never personally seen it.
Anyway, I'm going to try another test sheet today with OA and see what happens. If I have the same or some other issue, I'll move on to some other development technique when using OA. Other than the issue I had, I am very impressed with the results from this developer.
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