Bob Schwalberg on developers?

[Gerald Koch]

PE agree entirely.

 

[john_s]

....... I don't think people appreciate the total amount of work in the cycle of compounding, testing, recompounding, retesting, involved in obtaining a useful product.

And also someone has to evaluate the practicalities such as production costs and margins, and storage life. The Xtol team (or at least someone at Kodak) got the packaging/storage issue wrong.

 

[sanking]

Yes, I pretty much agree also. Hate to say entirely because one needs to leave some room for a difference oif opinion.

Sandy

PE agree entirely.

 

[Mark Layne]

How did this thread degenerate from a new toothpaste formula to all this serious stuff?
Mark

 

[sanking]

Marketing and sales are issues not terribly relevant to most experimenters. Also, home brew experimenters don't have to be as concerned with environmental and toxcity issues as a large company like Kodak.

With regard to the Xtol team, irrespective of the qualities of developer, one of the major issues driving the project was a need to reduce toxicity to a minimum. I doubt very much that Kodak would market a pyrogallol based developer in this day and age, even if it were vastly superior to anything else on the market.

Sandy

And also someone has to evaluate the practicalities such as production costs and margins, and storage life. The Xtol team (or at least someone at Kodak) got the packaging/storage issue wrong.

 

[sanking]

Guess people need to be serious from time to time.

BTW, are you in Nova Scotia or Barbados?

If in Nova Scotia bet your best temperature won't match the 80F day we are having today in South Carolina. Just got my long run in and enjoying the weather on the deck with a cold one.

Sandy

How did this thread degenerate from a new toothpaste formula to all this serious stuff?
Mark

 

[gainer]

Serendipity does indeed happen. Edison, instead of looking at the properties of the elements, systematically tried each and every one when trying to perfect the light bulb. In doing so he created a lot of un-necessary work for himself but finally found tungsten.

But beside serendipity there is also the example of the forward pass -- three things can happen and two of them are bad. Before altering a developer one must consider all consequences. Those who added ascorbic acid rather than sodium ascorbate to Rodinal got quite a surprise when they came up with blank film. A perfect example of disturbing the balance of a developer. Mixing Rodinal and Xtol together, as suggested by some, is not going to produce supermicroultrafinegrainol. My comments also apply to throwing in a bit of glycin or pyrogallol or catechol. It's a lot easier if you are aware of the properties of the developer you wish to alter and of the chemicals to intend to add.

I'm not opposed to experimenting, it's fun. But before one can claim to have found the perfect developer there remains a lot of testing and measurement.

Personally, I think serendipity is most likely to happen to those who are treading known paths but keep their eyes on the surroundings. Those who added ascorbic acid instead of the ascorbate ignored my instructions. They probably never even read the original article.
The original definition of serendipity is not trial and error. It's an accidental discovery of something valuable that you were not looking for. It often happens during some trial and error process. It's really a consequence of Godel's Incompleteness Theorem. One who thinks theories are infallible will not likely suffer from serendipity. Neither will they suffer it in others. The fact is that almost every theory began with serendipity.

Certainly, any discovery should be verified. We have scientific journals as much to propose theses for testing as to propound accomplished facts. Those who stuck their heads out to announce cold fusion were quickly decapitated. I expect the same to happen to me here if I propose something outlandishand that doesn't come true. What I do not expect is out-of-hand rejection, on the basis of some theory, of a fact that I did observe. Someone may freely contest my powers of observation, but should repeat my experiments first.

Enough, already.

 

[sanking]

Personally, I think serendipity is most likely to happen to those who are treading known paths but keep their eyes on the surroundings. Those who added ascorbic acid instead of the ascorbate ignored my instructions. They probably never even read the original article.
The original definition of serendipity is not trial and error. It's an accidental discovery of something valuable that you were not looking for. It often happens during some trial and error process. It's really a consequence of Godel's Incompleteness Theorem.

I don't know anything about Godel's Incompleteness Theorem but I can say for a fact that I have made many unexpected but useful discoveries during the course of experimentation with such things as making carbon tissue, testing variations on developer formulation and in exposing negatives in the field.

Pat's experiments have been very useful to many people, if for no other reason they have shown us how to make high quality formulas for practically nothing that compare favorably with exisitng formulas, but with far greater stability because many of them are mixed in glycol or TEA rather than in water. I struggled for years with inconsistent results with D76 because of the pH issue introduced by the hydroquinone. Now wheneve I want to develop something in a non-staining developer I have on hand a bottle of PC-TEA that cost me probably about 1/20 of what I would have had to pay for a quart of HC-110, and it is still giving consistent results after more than two years. And the sharpness and grain are every bit as good as I used to get with D76 and HC-110. And if it does not satisfy me completely, well, I have the formula and can make adjustments. In fact, I did add some restrainer to my PC-TEA solution because I was not satisfied that the B+F was as low as it should be.

Sandy

 

[Mark Layne]

Guess people need to be serious from time to time.

BTW, are you in Nova Scotia or Barbados?

If in Nova Scotia bet your best temperature won't match the 80F day we are having today in South Carolina. Just got my long run in and enjoying the weather on the deck with a cold one.

Sandy

I'm in Nova Scotia getting third daughter through med school then I may make some decisions. We are in the middle of the worst cold snap of the winter thus far.
But careful now, my grandmother was a Culpeper and I'm sure you know we have some claim to South Carolina. If only our Minutemen hadn't been scattered.
I haven't made it down to SC yet but plan to
Mark