Back in business with color developing and printing

RichardH said:

Hey Mike
I am going to give it a try this weekend. I have never used vinegar. Easy enough to get at the grocery store. I have a lot of botttles of B+W indicator stop. I am going to try that also.
I looked at your website and saw you just got a RB67. I love that camera but they are heavy to carry around. I used one for years and years in the studio. I have one with the newer KL lens. Sharp as a tack. I also read you have a F3HP. I wish I had the lenses you have. I have the F4S but I don't shoot much with it. I just don't like small negatives. That's just me on that part. Nothing wrong with small but I can't seem to vision what I am wanting through the viewfinder.
There was a post earlier in this part about mixing 1 part to 4 parts water for vinegar stop. I'll play around with it and see what comes of all of it.
I have never printed color in trays either, so it is going to be an interesting weekend getting a standard setup on chemical and printing.
By the way, where are you in VA? And also your shots on the website look very good.

Thanks
Richard

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Thanks! I'm really loving the RB67. It is a beast of a camera and it's taken a bit to get used to using. I was really lucky with the lenses (and bodies) for my Nikon collection. My father-in-law is VERY VERY generous. I recently had to get my 85mm lens cleaned. It wouldn't stop down correctly and luckily it was an easy CHEAP ($45) fix at a shop in Asheville.

I can understand the distrust of small negs as I've been exploring MF. I printed from my last roll of Ektar 100 120 tonight and am amazed by the quality versus the 35mm version (which is incredible in its own right). The grain is so minimal in MF, it took me over 5 minutes to really focus the image. I could barely see the grain.

I live in Marion, VA which is about 45 miles northeast of Bristol on I-81. I can get on the Appalachian Trail at almost an infinite amount of places around here. That is helpful for getting the nature shots. It also helps that this area is highly diverse. There are basically two sets of mountain ranges surrounding the valley I live in that are completely different in most ways. They were formed and created completely different and have different geological and biological histories.

Thanks for the compliments on the shots. I feel very amateur-ish on a site like this with so many fabulous long-time professionals. At the same time, this place gives me ideas and gives me determination to overcome challenging types of photography or techniques which I think is good and helps to make me a better shooter. I originally stuck with film not only for quality and "cheapness," but also for the frame of mind it creates. You do NOT know the outcome of your work immediately and you are limited in how many frames to shoot. I think it makes you stop and really look at something beyond the, oh that looks great, lets shoot it a million times and hope I get something cool. That has even gotten more extreme now that I'm shooting these 10 exposure rolls of MF film.

Good luck with your ventures....I absolutely love the print tube system and will not turn back to trays for color.

Hey Mike
Well we aren't that far from each other. Probably a couple hours drive. I don't like digital, but thats just me. I bought a high end Nikon digital camera a few years back and didn't like the way I felt it was controlling me. I am and have all ways felt in control of what I was doing with the camera. Not with digital. I wound up giving it to my daughter and son in law. He uses it to shoot the Hickory Crawdads baseball team. They are the farm team for a major league team and he is the official and only photographer for them. I guess digital is good for that type of shooting.
My billfold stays so financially broke, I can't seem to want to spend what Jobo is going for now. I might look into the various old tubes with a roller base system. I will give trays a good going through before I go that route. I did a lot of work in VA. back in my working days. I think I know the mountains you are talking about. The Appalician trail is a good ways from me but I can be at Grandfathers Mountain in about 20 minutes. I love the mountains.
We'll chat later.

Richard

I have yet to go and shoot at Grandfather Mountain. Once we had kids, the trips of strenuous hiking have been put on pause till they are old enough to endure it a little. That is cool about your son-in-law. I am hoping to get out of retail and snag a job being able to use my cameras. We'll see.

Richard, interesting what you feel about digital. I don't shoot it, although i have a point and shoot camera I occasionally use for snapshots. I work as a color corrector for a lab that processes school sports photos from photographers all over the country and in the 13 years I have worked there I have seen thousands of both film and digital photos and this has made me decide never to shoot digital. When we used to do film the images were reasonably consistant and we had very few problems color correcting due to exposure problems. With digital, however, exposure, white balance, color, saturation, and contrast are all over the place and greatly increase the difficuly in color correcting. The medium just seems be difficult for photographers to use to produce a properly exposed image, and the images don't have the natural look of film to me. Is this similar to what you experienced?

As far as trays vs. drums goes, I prefer trays, since with drums or tubes they must be washed and dried after every use, and with trays you can make small test prints but with some drums to have to make prints the size of the drum. With a drum you have to wait until it has gone all through the process to see if the print is acceptable but with a tray you can see the results in the blix tray as soon as you turn on the lights. I used to use drums years ago but as soon as room temperature developer became available I switched to trays and my productivity increased greatly. But many still use drums, to each his own.

RPC said:

Richard, interesting what you feel about digital. I don't shoot it, although i have a point and shoot camera I occasionally use for snapshots. I work as a color corrector for a lab that processes school sports photos from photographers all over the country and in the 13 years I have worked there I have seen thousands of both film and digital photos and this has made me decide never to shoot digital. When we used to do film the images were reasonably consistant and we had very few problems color correcting due to exposure problems. With digital, however, exposure, white balance, color, saturation, and contrast are all over the place and greatly increase the difficuly in color correcting. The medium just seems be difficult for photographers to use to produce a properly exposed image, and the images don't have the natural look of film to me. Is this similar to what you experienced?

As far as trays vs. drums goes, I prefer trays, since with drums or tubes they must be washed and dried after every use, and with trays you can make small test prints but with some drums to have to make prints the size of the drum. With a drum you have to wait until it has gone all through the process to see if the print is acceptable but with a tray you can see the results in the blix tray as soon as you turn on the lights. I used to use drums years ago but as soon as room temperature developer became available I switched to trays and my productivity increased greatly. But many still use drums, to each his own.

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Hey RPC
I didn't like digital simply because it controlled me instead of me deciding what and how to shoot. Auto focus, auto this, auto that. You are right about not knowing how they have their camera setup for white and color balance. I can imagine trying to print from that format. I don't like 35mm, simply because I can't see through the viewfinder what I have in my mind of what I want the scene to look like. It's hard to explain, but it's just me and my vision. I have 35mm, but I very seldom shoot with it. Maybe grandkids since it is fast.
When I had the studio, I shot 3 high schools cap and gowns, and getting their diploma and ball teams. I shot all with a hasselblad. I had my son loading backs while I fired away. Good times back then. Then I worked a long time printing them.
I have never used trays but this weekend will be the test. I have just finished mixing the chemicals and I'll start with a simple negative and get the color and system down pat. Wish me luck, I might need it. Been a long time from printing color. I might be drinking the bleach fix before the weekend is over. HAHAHA :munch:

Catch you later.

Richard