Anybody still fooling around with X-ray film?

[nze]

Don't need to stick the film to the glass. glass will not scratch film and the second emulsion helpp to build up density even in the low light.

 

[Whiteymorange]

I guess I must have figured I needed to end the year with one more bone-head move.

After cutting down a sheet of 8x10 green-sensitive x-ray film (repackaged Kodak, if the seller is to believed), I shot a few table-top set-ups in 4x5 to test exposure - regular room light, 8 sec. exposure. Shot at 100, it went in the Uni-Color drum with a couple of sheets of Foma 100 and some Rodinal 1/50. Everything seemed to work out fine. So... figuring the usable starting film speed as ASA 100, I set up the 8x10 to test a lens or two for coverage at infinity. This time I shot out the door of my studio at the new fallen snow. Same development process, two seriously cooked negatives! Gee! do you think the blue and green light outside might be a bit stronger than that old yellow bulb hanging over the table??? Gotta be at least 2 stops overexposed. Doesn't do much to tame the contrast that way either.

Of course, I may have made some other errors along the way as well, using a packard shutter on the 8x10, but the meter was the same and I used the "instant" setting.

Ah, well.. live and learn. Happy New Year

 

[PHOTOTONE]

No doubt about it, your outside exposures should be less, to compensate for the much higher degree of light in the blue end of the spectrum.

 

[MVNelson]

I used xray film from agfa and another from dupont for some time because i got it free (the end of the roll of xray cine film we used for coronary angiography) . I posted an image for you in the main gallery titled "orthopods". I don't know how to put it here . I use a light red filter outside so that the inside and outside e.i. were close... about 160 with this agfa shot ...


Miles

 

[Tom Hoskinson]

A lot of radiography work these days is not done with film (or with digital semiconductor arrays, either). Image Plates (often flexible) are coated with Photostimulable Luminescence Phosphors (PSP), (PSL). These Image Plates can be exposed with any Xray source. They are then DEVELOPED by laser photostimulation. This technology was pioneered by Fuji in the 1980s and is now in widespread use. Kodak and AGFA adopted this technology as well.

 

[DeBone 75]

Film speed

Gee! do you think the blue and green light outside might be a bit stronger than that old yellow bulb hanging over the table??? Gotta be at least 2 stops overexposed. Doesn't do much to tame the contrast that way either.
I came to the same conclution. I too shoot the Kodak Green stuff. For outdoors I rate it at 200 and I found that indoors under 300 watt haligon light it was closer to 50.

 

[Brian Bullen]

I've been shooting Kodak and Konica green at 25 to 50 ASA outdoors but almost always in overcast conditions. I usually develop with Caffenol C or D-76 1:1 and the Caff negs are always heavy but that is from the staining and not over exposure. Staining with x-ray film is quite pronounced. With D-76 my negs are pretty standard looking except of course for the film's blue base.

 

[dosilverhalide]

I just got a large box of Agfa Ortho xray film, and I need any information anyone has on what chemicals to develop/fix it. Thank you.

 

[Vaughn]

I have some Agfa X-ray film also -- I just used my regular developer (Ilford Universal PQ developer...granted not everyone's "usual" developer). Treat it just like any other film and do some testing with whatever you normally use. I haven't nailed down the ASA, but my particular type has an ASA of about 400, give or take a couple of stops (seems to have a high rate of reciprocity failure).

Vaughn

 

[PHOTOTONE]

I just got a large box of Agfa Ortho xray film, and I need any information anyone has on what chemicals to develop/fix it. Thank you.

Just use your regular film developer. I personally use HC-110. Use regular fix with hardener. x-ray film is very prone to scratching if you don't harden it. The machines at hospitals and clinics that process X-ray film uses fix with hardener.

 

[Murray@uptowngallery]

Chris(tian) Nze uses Agfa Curix (double-sided emulsion) and some kind of Kodak (probably double-sided) X-Ray film. I think he uses high dilution Rodinal and to avoid scratching, a sheet of glass on the bottom of a developing tray, then lifts both the glass and film out to transport to the next processing tray.

Look up his work - it's excellent - you may have to ask him which ones were done with xray film and which were conventional.

I think he uses the negs for platinum or platinum/palladium printing, fairly large...11x14, 14x17 or so...I figure he really has it figured out to risk such costly chemicals...

 

[nze]

As already wrote by Murray ? I use Rodinal with agfa and also with some kodak film. With kodak film I also have good film with paper developer dilute 1+29 or even PMK . MY goal was to lower the contrast of the film. When I develop the gafa film curix in another developer than rodinal 1+50 I get a DMAX 4 in 2 minute and can't print it in palladium.
and hardened it.

 

[Stuggi]

Any sources for 35mm "X-ray" film, be it green or blue?

 

[jfish]

wow, Murray@uptowngallery, those are nice. Thanks for sharing the images and the dev. formula.

 

[Murray@uptowngallery]

Credit goes to Chris - his work. I just like to share my awareness of his work.

 

[Silverhead]

If anyone is interested, there is an adult student--meaning not 20-something--down at Cypress College in southern California named Fran Matthews who is combining X-ray photography with lith printing. She was (still is?) an X-ray technician and she is quite proficient with this technique...her lith prints of X-rayed flowers are quite remarkable. You can see some of her stuff down at Cypress' campus (in the Photography department, natch) as part of a show called "Emerging (I) 3", which is a collection of student works from various SoCal schools.

 

[DeBone 75]

I'm one of the ones playing with the x-ray film. Up until now I've been having a hard time controlling the contrast of the negatives and still have it dense enough or not too dense. Then after reading a little on Ansco 130 for film and the post by Jim Galli on how he does Ortho Lith film I got to experimenting. I tryed the 130 at 1:20 dilution. Look pretty good but came up too fast and a little to contrasty. So remembering what Jim said about the Benzotriazol, I added about 25ml of 1% and tryed again. It extended the dev time to 5.5 min. Negs look very good. Contrast looks good and they look like a very normal negative. Very sharp also. I have not printed them yet. The film I have is the Kodak ortho green stuff. It expired in 1998. I was able to get 4 8X10 negatives before I had to extended the dev time to 6 min. At that point I tossed it. Nice thing about doing x-ray film is you can wath it under red light and tell what you are doing.