8mm Reversal staining/odd results

[Sam_D]

Hi all. I got some 8mm film for Christmas to play around with, and I'm going to try self developing, but improve upon my results from the last time I tried (last spring). Then and now I use a Morse G3 rewind tank with a caffenol 1st developer, permanganate bleach, and a clearing bath/chemical reexposure/2nd developer step of a solution of Iron Out (which contains metabisulfite if I remember right for clearing, and whatever the other ingredient is that precipitates silver).

What was odd last time I did it was that spots that should have been black like the leader were more of a cloudy grey, and what should have been white was a light brown/yellow, almost like the color of a street light at night, however there wasn't really a contrast issue in normally exposed images.

What's even odder is that the very end of the film (~2 inches) that was behind the reel clamp (and therefore always in fresh solution) was clear as it should be. I know it's not due to bleach residue, because by visual inspection the film is the correct cream color after bleaching and clearing.

I've included a few pictures of the last roll I did. They aren't high quality, it was just my phone aimed at the projected image. The more yellower ones are under daylight balance (which is closer to what it looks like in person, though less intense color wise), and the more b&w ones are taken with auto white balance.

Any help or suggestions appreciated!

 

[John Salim]

I have to tell you the worst processing tanks have to be any rewind tank like the Morse.
The trouble with these is, chemicals acting on the emulsion gets exhausted and can't be replaced with fresh because the tight wind up effectively 'seals' access out.

I recently observed a 16mm ( B&W neg ) workshop using a Morse tank, and results were utterly terrible - with very obvious under-development and under-fixing ( resulting in very dense footage with blotchy patches all the way through ).... except the head and tail !

Get yourself a Lomo tank Sam ....and dump the Morse.
John S

 

[Sam_D]

I know the Morse tanks by design are flawed, or at least increase the number of variables you have to juggle, but I don't have the dough at the moment for a lomo tank, and also I have a Bolex H8 and do 100' rolls of 8mm (so basically a regular 16mm roll), and would have to split it in a lomo tank. Also the morse tanks I believe can take more of a beating than the lomo ones that are somewhat notorious for breaking and being useless.

With 25' rolls (which is all I've done so far) I don't think exhaustion was an issue, but it may be with 100' rolls. I actually figured out I had to do multiple batches of 1st developer and bleach though, because the solution would exhaust itself from all the agitation in air for 40+ minutes before it had been developed enough, or in the case of bleach needed a clearing before it would continue to be effective because it was covered in the brown scummy stuff the clearing bath removes.

Maybe I'll try and just make everything more concentrated.

Another thing I didn't note was that the first time I tried this I used a citric acid-hydrogen peroxide bleach that worked flawlessly in a 35mm patterson tank, but made 8mm in the morse VERY brown, deeper than sepia, and also lifted the emulsion everywhere, but not enough that it flaked off, it just looked like a drawing on paper had been crinkled up and flattened out again. THIS I believe was due to exhaustion, as I was using rather low concentrations of peroxide, and decreasing the amount in solution made the lifting emulsion issue worse.

 

[guangong]

With Morse tanks, count winds rather than time. That is, if development time is 12 min., do 12 winds and ignore time. If necessary adjust the number of winds. As for developer, I use D-19. Easy to make from scratch so I only mix the amount I need. Prepackaged D-19 makes a gallon and usually goes bad by the time I get around to another processionals session. Permanganate would not be my choice.
However, first I would do a test roll using different apertures and send to competent lab in order to establish a desired result for home processing.
You’re right, Even with Lomo professional tank a 100ft roll must be split into two 50ft rolls. I have one that I use for Super8, but have not used for 16mm yet.
Keeping all equipment, from camera to development tank, scrupulously clean in cinematography is of the utmost importance, since, unlike still photography, little can be done with image after exposure and development. Absolute worst is an undetected hair in film gate.

 

[Alan Edward Klein]

8mm or super 8mm?

 

[Sam_D]

I'm doing regular 8mm. I do do it by winds or 'cycles'. For 35mm my caffenol recipe is 14g of Instant coffee, 38g of washing soda, and 5g of vitamin C for 10 minutes agitating every 2, but if I remember right I bumped it up to 20g of coffee and 8g of vitamin C for movie film because of the exhaustion issue in the morse tank.
I had to do more cycles than 'normal' because a standard roll of 8mm film is 33' long with the leader, or 1/3 the length of a 100' 16mm roll. I went off the estimate that one pass (1/2 a cycle or back and forth wind) would be a minute or so with 100', so I would do 10 passes or 5 cycles for 100', or 30 passes for 33' (though in reality I found 26 or so to be the best).
The reason I use caffenol is because when I got into film like 4 years ago I was a freshman in high school without a credit or debit card to buy stuff online. I can buy everything, even sulfuric acid and potassium permanganate for bleach locally, so I don't bother to order it. I also try to keep everything as non toxic as possible, which is why I looked into the peroxide based bleach, and haven't even considered dichromate.
The first two rolls of 8mm I ever shot were in a brownie movie camera, and I sent them out to cinelab to get them developed. I realized the fixed focus was horribly off and the camera was basically junk because of it, but the exposure was spot on as far as I could tell. Those two rolls are what I'm comparing my results to, in terms of clarity, contrast, any residual stains, etc.
I'm halfway through my first 100' roll with the bolex, so I'll post results here when I finish it and develop it. I may try using distilled water. I've only ever used tap water, and for stills has been perfectly fine. The water at my house is from a well that runs through a paper filter and water softener, not sure if that has been playing bad with the bleach or Iron Out, but I'll give it a go and see if it changes anything.

 

[Alan Edward Klein]

I still have my 8mm Revere with a three-lens turret. I got it in 1958. It's spring loaded. You wind it up and get maybe twenty seconds. So you cut your 8mm film from 16mm? or what?

 

[Sam_D]

I use Foma R-100. Usually you can only get it in 25' rolls, but Foma's Norway branch sells them in 100' rolls. As far as I know the Bolex H8 is the only 8mm camera ever made to take 100' rolls though.
https://www.fomafoto.com/index.php/shop/b-w-film/cine-film

 

[Europan]

That’s correct. There was a small number of cameras that take 50-ft. rolls. GIC 8, Pathé Lido 8, Fairchild Cinephonic Eight