120 colour processing at home

[Ronald Moravec]

I would not try without the lift. Color neg gets marks very easily where the developer first hits it. You need to run at high speed when the developer first enters to wet the film evenly and fast as this is a short process. You may reduce speed ater 30 sec.

Pouring the developer into the tank will wet the bottom of the film and that is all that will be wet until you make it horizontal and rotating. I would predict severe development marks.

The 2500 series tanks and reels are best. The smaller 4/5 " diameter reels seemed to mark more easily with c41, although they work ok with black and white and E6 perhaps because the process time is longer . The black reels that fit the 2500 series are improved over the previous design.

 

[gbroadbridge]

I would not try without the lift. Color neg gets marks very easily where the developer first hits it. You need to run at high speed when the developer first enters to wet the film evenly and fast as this is a short process. You may reduce speed ater 30 sec.

Pouring the developer into the tank will wet the bottom of the film and that is all that will be wet until you make it horizontal and rotating. I would predict severe development marks.

The 2500 series tanks and reels are best. The smaller 4/5 " diameter reels seemed to mark more easily with c41, although they work ok with black and white and E6 perhaps because the process time is longer . The black reels that fit the 2500 series are improved over the previous design.

There is something else wrong with your process if this is happening.

I have processed well over 1500 rolls of 120 c41 film in a jobo over the last 5 years without a lift and even when I was a beginner never had any strange marks on the film.

Perhaps the problem is that you switch to slow rotation (something that is not recommended either by Jobo or by developer manufacturers. All c41 processing should be with a lot of agitation.

Perhaps you have hard water or something else wrong with the water, but I can tell you for a fact that 9 out of 10 jobo users have never had problems such as those you're stating.


Regards
Graham.

 

[Ed Sukach]

I would not try without the lift. Color neg gets marks very easily where the developer first hits it. You need to run at high speed when the developer first enters to wet the film evenly and fast as this is a short process. You may reduce speed ater 30 sec.
Pouring the developer into the tank will wet the bottom of the film and that is all that will be wet until you make it horizontal and rotating. I would predict severe development marks.

Odd. I've always used constant rotation in my CPP-2 Processor (Set at "P") and have never experienced uneven development. The only reason I could think of for the uneveness at the bottom of the roll would be that, for some reason, the tank was not level after becoming horizontal, but that should be the case at any rotational speed.
Without the lift, the two-three -- five second time between pouring into, and "horizontalizing" the tank should not be of any concern.

 

[haris]

Is processing of C41 or E6 films with same method as b/w film (agitation by hand), but of course at correct temperature (about 38 degree) good way. I would like to try it. slide in particular, but I don't know if I will use that much colour films (I am mainly b/w shooter) to justify buying Jobo or other processors...

Thanks

 

[srs5694]

Is processing of C41 or E6 films with same method as b/w film (agitation by hand), but of course at correct temperature (about 38 degree) good way.

It's certainly do-able, and in fact I've been doing it myself for a couple of months. Getting the temperature right is a bit of a nuisance, and there's less information on the Web to help you get started, but otherwise it's not really any harder than doing B&W.