Alternative Developers - Coffee and all

titrisol · Aug 26, 2004

Coffee is a very usable photographic developer for film and paper.
Research carried out @RIT showed that coffee, mint leaves, tree bark and othe rplant extracts were suitable for the purpose.

Shutterbug ran an article in it's September 2003 issue which sparked the interest of some people @the photo.net community.
http://www.photo.net/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg?msg_id=003aPB

The recipes that were developed then were ccalled Caffenol or Folgernol and included sevral variations of the original.

RECIPES
Basic Caffenol from the article:
8oz water 4tsp instant cofee 2tsp Na-Carbonate

Caffenol Plus Caffenol + 1 tsp table salt

Caffenol LC (low conrast for mini-film) by Donald Quails
8 oz water, 2tsp coffee, 2tsp carbonate

Bob Fowler has printed some great pics using J&C Classic 200,
I have tested it in FP4+, APX100/400, Arista.EDU 400
Don Quails has tested it in document film (microfilm)

titrisol · Aug 26, 2004

Donald Quails wrote:

Caffenol LC is 2 tsp. coffee crystals and 2 tsp. washing soda per 8
ounces
of water -- since I usually use it for 16 mm microfilm in my homebuilt
tank,
which holds two ounces, I mix it as 1/2 tsp. coffee and 1/2 tsp washing
soda.

For Imagelink HQ and Copex Rapid, 25 to 30 minutes at around 70 F seems
about right -- both films tend to thin negatives anyway, if they're to
have
proper tonal range, and the clear base makes them thinner still. The
same
process would likely apply to Tech Pan, but I don't know of anyone
who's
tried it.

The drill for both Caffenol and Caffenol LC is to mix in the soda and
stir
until all cloudiness and grittiness are gone, then add the coffee and
stir
until grittiness is gone again and the solution appears uniform.

John Koehrer · Aug 28, 2004

Decaf or not? Seems pretty alternative to me. Need some now!

titrisol · Aug 30, 2004

I have only tested the normal instant coffee.
The folger's crystals are reccommended but I bought Harris-teeter brand instant coffee and it worked as well.

According to the research carried out by Don Qualls, decaf should work to, since the main developer agent is caffeic acid and the tannins in coffee.

modafoto · Aug 31, 2004

titrisol said:
I have only tested the normal instant coffee.
The folger's crystals are reccommended but I bought Harris-teeter brand instant coffee and it worked as well.

According to the research carried out by Don Qualls, decaf should work to, since the main developer agent is caffeic acid and the tannins in coffee.

Will espresso increase contrast? And is steamed milk affecting the tonal curve?

titrisol · Dec 3, 2004

I decided to test Caffenol-c tonight...
500 ml of water (for 120)
1 gram Vitamin C
4 teaspponns washing soda
8 teaspoons instant coffee

I tested it on J&C Pro 100 film, exposed at approx 100 (I giuessed most exposures) for 25 minutes

The negatives look pretty good, the stain is there but les pronounced than my previous test that required longer times (30-45 minutes)
I think that some 10-15 extra minutes would increase the stain and improve the shadow density

I'll try to scan the negatives in a flat bed and let you know what happens

sanking · Dec 3, 2004

Human urine contains the toxic benzene known as pyrocatechin and can be formulated as a photographic developer for film and paper.

Possibly a cheaper and more effective alternative to caffenol?

And can most likely be made super-additive with daily ingestion of Vitamin-C?

Sandy

David A. Goldfarb · Dec 4, 2004

I think that post needs to be ported over to the "favorite beer" thread.

Ed Sukach · Dec 4, 2004

sanking said:
Human urine contains the toxic benzene known as pyrocatechin and can be formulated as a photographic developer for film and paper.

Hah!! I've got to remember this ... I'm only drinking all this beer to make developer!!!

Amazing how the most "off-topic" discussions finally loop back to photography!!

zenrhino · Dec 4, 2004

titrisol said:
Caffenol Plus Caffenol + 1 tsp table salt

http://www.photo.net/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg?msg_id=008Gqd

Not to sound needlessly wonky, but is that iodized table salt or uniodized?

titrisol · Dec 4, 2004

mon-iodized salt

zenrhino said:
Not to sound needlessly wonky, but is that iodized table salt or uniodized?

titrisol · Apr 4, 2005

Caffenol - C revisited

A while ago I tested adding 4 g/l of vitamin C to caffenol, reported my findings as not so pleasing initially. The stain dimisinhes and the image looked awfully thin.

BUT, after trying to print the negatives I was pleasantly surprised, it was very easy to print the images (despite long times due to stain), and the low contrast was no problem, tonality was long and soft.
Sharpness was a bit better than standard caffenol.

Claire Senft · Apr 4, 2005

For Mr King with tongue in cheek.

If I drink strong coffee follwed by orange juice will a better quality of pee result? Since agitation and temperature are important can I develop negatives directly from the stream? Does doing so while being pissed off shorten tne develpment time? Is my old prostrate going to prove to be a liability? For all the fellows out there is this a method for stand developing?
Should the ladies consider getting their feet wet with this method?

garryl · Apr 4, 2005

Claire Senft said:
If I drink strong coffee follwed by orange juice will a better quality of pee result? Since agitation and temperature are important can I develop negatives directly from the stream? Does doing so while being pissed off shorten tne develpment time? Is my old prostrate going to prove to be a liability? For all the fellows out there is this a method for stand developing?
Should the ladies consider getting their feet wet with this method?

Accually someone made a developer formulated from Urine. Human urine contains small amounts of Pyrocatchenol. So it might , coffee and pee, work.

Ole · Apr 4, 2005

Claire Senft said:
... Does doing so while being pissed off shorten tne develpment time?...

No, ascerbic acid has been shown to have damaging influence on all development.

David A. Goldfarb · Apr 18, 2005

And for more on that subject, see this article--

http://www.cmaj.ca/cgi/content/full/172/8/1002

nspatel · Feb 9, 2006

Coffee/ Ascorbic Acid Print Developer

In case anyone is interested I have been playing around with coffee for a print developer. I kind of blended Gainer's Ascorbic Acid developer with coffee to get pretty good results. Basically it improves the develop rate compared to just using coffee and helps to preserve the solution a bit longer. The end result is pretty good with some warm tones in the greys. Here is an article with more details.

http://www.nspatel.com/article1.php

srs5694 · Feb 9, 2006

nspatel said:
In case anyone is interested I have been playing around with coffee for a print developer. I kind of blended Gainer's Ascorbic Acid developer with coffee to get pretty good results.

You basically ended up with a conventional phenidone/vitamin C (PC) developer plus coffee. You might want to consider E-72 instead; it's fairly simple (five ingredients, including water) and it's lasted me through multi-hour sessions. I've also used DS-14 with good results. It's more complex, though.

htmlguru4242 · Feb 10, 2006

I've also heard about developers fropm tree bark / nut galls (Gallic acid or tannic acid, I'm assuming).

Does anyone know how to make one of these?

avandesande · Feb 10, 2006

Fortunatly I pee dektol.

nspatel · Feb 11, 2006

srs5694 said:
You basically ended up with a conventional phenidone/vitamin C (PC) developer plus coffee. You might want to consider E-72 instead; it's fairly simple (five ingredients, including water) and it's lasted me through multi-hour sessions. I've also used DS-14 with good results. It's more complex, though.

Thanks. I'll check out the E76. I thought sodium sulfite was toxic so I was avoiding it.

srs5694 · Feb 11, 2006

nspatel said:
srs5694 said:

You might want to consider E-72 instead

Click to expand...

Thanks. I'll check out the E76. I thought sodium sulfite was toxic so I was avoiding it.

E-76 is a PC variant of D-76, the film developer; E-72 is a PC variant of D-72/Dektol, the paper developer.

As to toxicity, I'm far from an expert, but my understanding is that sodium sulfite isn't a big risk compared to other chemicals you're likely to have in your darkroom. It's hard for a non-expert to evaluate this, though, since MSDS sheets and whatnot are typically so thorough that they make the most innocuous substance sound like it's a life-threatening toxin. (For instance, check out Dead Link Removed

Gerald Koch · Feb 13, 2006

Sodium sulfite is not dangerous in small quantities except to certain asthmatics whose conditions are aggrevated by it. It is used to preserve wine and certain foods.

titrisol · Feb 13, 2006

Water? you mean hydrogen hydroxide?
Or dihydrogen oxide?

Photo Engineer · Feb 13, 2006

The original URLs posted by Titrisol of the work done at RIT refers to recent work.

This entire subject has been known about 100 years, and is reported on in the Haist Book, "Modern Photographic Processing" and has also been mentioned in Anchell and Troop.

PE

Alternative Developers - Coffee and all

titrisol

titrisol

John Koehrer

titrisol

modafoto

titrisol

sanking

David A. Goldfarb

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Ed Sukach

zenrhino

titrisol

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Claire Senft

garryl

Ole

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David A. Goldfarb

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nspatel

srs5694

htmlguru4242

avandesande

nspatel

srs5694

Gerald Koch

titrisol

Photo Engineer

Alternative Developers - Coffee and all

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