Bleaching back overdeveloped negatives

I was cleaning up after a developing session, when I picked up a tank. It was heavier than it should have been. What is this, I thought to myself. Then I realized the bottle of D23 was only half full. And two rolls of 120 tri-x had been sitting there in the developer for who knows how long. At least 20 minutes. Anyway, the negatives look rather "robust". I haven't tried to print them yet, but is it possible to bleach negatives back if you overdevelop them?

Hi,

First, try to print the negs before performing any additional processes on them. That is always a good rule of thumb, IMO.

Next, you can bleach them. However, the bleach will not do much about the increased contrast; just increased density.

I was thinking that bleach would bleach the shadows just as much or worse than the highlights. So I didn't have much hope. I have some pictures from last summer that are absolutely toast from overexposure...I compensated for a filter factor in the wrong direction, leading to 6 stops of overexposure. That's probably a better candidate for bleaching, eh? Can you use farmer's reducer?

I usually do it with Farmer's Reducer, but I dilute it more than normal so that it moves very slowly. Going very slowly and bit by bit is the wise way to do it. You can always bleach more later if you need to. I don't know if pre-packaged Farmer's Reducer is still available, however I think you can make an alternate version it with potassium ferricyanide and potassium bromide, and follow it with a fixer bath (or maybe just mix the two like you do with Farmer's Reducer). The difference with this method is that the bleached silver is not removed as it is bleached, so you have to be very careful about how far you bleach. The neg just gets a little foggy, and does not clear till you put it in the fixer. I usually use the two-bath method if the bleach happens to already be made up (from bleaching prints).

P.S. it is also very easy to mix up the "proper" single bath Farmer's Reducer with raw chemicals...I just forgot how to do it of the top of my head. I think all you do is mix up some working solution is to make the bleach at the working solution dilution, then add some sodium thiosulfate to it. You can also make two stock solutions, like the "proper" Kodak directions say to do.

I once left the film in the developer for 48 hours and they printed fine. Ok maybe a little filter adjustment, but no bleaching.

Photogaphers Formulary has different types of reducers and one is supposed to be only for the highlights or shadows (I don't remember which). I haven't tried it before, so I can't vouch for it's effectiveness. If you only want to reduce a one end of the density range, it might be the thing to try.

It's been ages since I used Farmers Reducer; however I recall it was best to remove the negatives prior to them achieving the density you're after. Otherwise they'll be too thin and you won't be able to intensify them.

-30-

Do not use farmers. It is irreversible and hard to control. If your negative is to contrasty to print, bleach it completely in ferry and redevelope in D23 1+3 under artificial light until contrast is ok. If the redevelopment went to far, bleach again and repeat. Then fix and wash it.

Ferry-Bleach:
Water 900 ml
Potassiumferrycyanide 13,7 g
Potassiumbromide 27,5 g
Ammoniac 1,3 ml
Ad water to 1000 ml


It is not possible to safe underexposed AND overdeveloped negatives this way als you will always loose some shaddow-density.

AS above. (you don't need the Ammonia at all).

That gives far better results than just reducing.

Ian

OR

Ian Grant said:

AS above. (you don't need the Ammonia at all).
That gives far better results than just reducing.

Click to expand...

Before I played with the negatives I'd give latent
image bleaching of the print a try. That way each
negative can be treated individually. If the negatives
have not gone to extremes in density they may
print well. Is there any visible detail in the
high light areas? Dan