Breaking the rules with Rodinal

Hello All,
Back in the late 1960s, guys like Bob Schwalberg and Bill Pierce preached the use of sulfited Rodinal as a general purpose developer which (mostly) cut down on excess grain and (mostly) keep the sharp edge effects for which Rodinal was noted. It was sorta counterintuitive, but seemed to work well for me at the time.
Now, i understand the newer versions of Rodinal are "finer grained" and it is superfulous to add sulfite.
I went back to my old notebook and souped a roll of Tri-X 120 in 4.5% sodium sulfite and Fomadon R09 at 1:85, 12 minutes at 68F. The negs look ok--perhaps a bit soft in contrast. It's a combo worth fine tuning, methinks.
I would attempt to scan the negs and post them here; but all I have is a run-of-the-mill hp office jet scanner. Can anyone advise on whether or not it can be used to scan negatives--and if so, how? TIA

Wirelessly posted (BlackBerry 8300: BlackBerry8300/4.5.0.55 Profile/MIDP-2.0 Configuration/CLDC-1.1 VendorID/102)

It must have a transparency thingy (not sure what it's called)...basically a light on the lid so the scanner can see the negative. Then you need some kind of negative holder to keep the negs in shape and at the proper focus. On my HP, you can remove the pad on the lid and it will be a light that can be used for transparencies.

Wirelessly posted (BlackBerry 8300: BlackBerry8300/4.5.0.55 Profile/MIDP-2.0 Configuration/CLDC-1.1 VendorID/102)

What model# is your scanner? That should tell us if it can do negs or slides. Not every scanner can.

Also, if your question is about a scanner then you may want to rename, since it appears your question is regarding Rodinal. You may get more responses this way...just an idea.

Hello Kodachrome,
It's an hp psc 1310 all-in-one. Thanks for the advice. I'll post another thread.

Rodinal

It's unlikely that the current version of Rodinal has finer grain. There is a small amount of sulfite in Rodinal but that's just to preserve it. It's the film which has become more fine grained. If you want a high sharpness long lasting developer which has no sulfite at all, make up some PC-TEA.

I'm with dyna on the opinion that Rodinal is just as true-grained as ever. Yes, there's sulfite in Rodinal, but it's potassium sulfite, not sodium sufite. I'm not sure what the difference is on silver, but when you mix up Rodinal, even at 1+25, it's pretty diluted.

Funny how you brought up the topic of sulfite with Rodinal. I'm using up my last 100' roll of Forte 400; a film I've come to hate! It's grainy and takes 18-19 minutes in D-76, 1+1. However, I've been souping it in Rodinal 1+50 with 2 tsp. of Sodium sulfite for 12 min. and I'm getting a beefier neg with less grain.

dynachrome said:

It's unlikely that the current version of Rodinal has finer grain. There is a small amount of sulfite in Rodinal but that's just to preserve it. It's the film which has become more fine grained. If you want a high sharpness long lasting developer which has no sulfite at all, make up some PC-TEA.

Click to expand...

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So then, two identical Tri-x shots of an identical subject (say a grey card) and developed to the same degree in current Rodinal and in Fomapan R09 would not show a difference in amount of apparent grain?

Some folks say that Rodinal has changed over the years (R09 is close to the original???); it now has bromide and Anchell says that if p-aminophenol was the only dev agent, there would be no need for the bromide. Perhaps it is more fine-grained, but I can't see it.

Here's a link to a good article on unblinkingeye. You may have already read it, (this link is thrown about a lot) but it's still good. It explains the sulfite thing.
http://unblinkingeye.com/Articles/Rodinal/rodinal.html

Older films often looked better with softer grain, and sulfite would help in this regard. 4.5 percent is 45 grams per liter, which is on the low side for most fine grain developers of that era, but probably still effective. (Note that D-76 1+1, used with most modern films, has 50 grams per liter.) !:85 is also a pretty low dilution for Rodinal, but obviously it works decently. Modern films probably do not need the fine grain treatment, and they would do well enough in Rodinal alone. But if you want to soften the grain edges a bit, this route sounds fine.

Regarding the grain, in the 1990s I did a bunch of testing between Rodinal and Beutlers to find the grainiest and Beutlers was always grainier. However with the Rodinal I get now at Freestyle, it is grainier than Beutlers. So I would have to say it is grainier than it used to be in my experience.

Another possibility is to add sodium or potassium ascorbate to Rodinal instead of sulfite. When I tried this some years ago I reported that I thought the ascorbate was better than the sulfite. If you want to try it, mix 1 teaspoon of ascorbic acid with 1/2 teaspoon of baking soda (NaHCO3) in a little water and when the effervescence subsides, use it and 20 ml of Rodinal concentrate to make a liter of working strength about equal to Rodinal at 1+25. You may want to add some bromide if you're using home brewed Rodinal.

Hi Gainer,
Rodinal with about 9% sodium sulfite always seemed to work for me. Do you remember: it came in those neat, narrow necked brown glass bottles, with a kind of hollowed rubber stopper, supposedly so one could use a syringe to withdraw the concentrate without admitting too much air.
When that disappeared I went to FG-7 with the same amount of sodium sulfite, which I really liked. Not as "sharp" appearing, but at least I could buy it then.
When Rodinal came back--Made in USA--it seemed to me the dilutions were half what had hitherto been the norm. I have rarely used it since; but what I have was back to being made in Germany.
When R09 became available through Freestyle, I though "What the heck!?" I first tried it as related above. Now, I have found from Robert Vonk in the Netherlands that R09 is being replaced with a "new" R09.
Sheesh!. It seems as if life were simpler in ye oldene dayz..........(vbg)

Anscojohn said:

Hello All,
Back in the late 1960s, guys like Bob Schwalberg and Bill Pierce preached the use of sulfited Rodinal as a general purpose developer which (mostly) cut down on excess grain and (mostly) keep the sharp edge effects for which Rodinal was noted. It was sorta counterintuitive, but seemed to work well for me at the time.
Now, i understand the newer versions of Rodinal are "finer grained" and it is superfulous to add sulfite.
I went back to my old notebook and souped a roll of Tri-X 120 in 4.5% sodium sulfite and Fomadon R09 at 1:85, 12 minutes at 68F. The negs look ok--perhaps a bit soft in contrast. It's a combo worth fine tuning, methinks.
I would attempt to scan the negs and post them here; but all I have is a run-of-the-mill hp office jet scanner. Can anyone advise on whether or not it can be used to scan negatives--and if so, how? TIA

Click to expand...

Tried Rodinal with sulfite in the 1960s - didn't like it. Still use Rodinal occasionally, diluted (with water) 1 plus 50 or 1 plus 100.

[mix 1 teaspoon of ascorbic acid with 1/2 teaspoon of baking soda (NaHCO3) in a little water and when the effervescence subsides, use it and 20 ml of Rodinal concentrate to make a liter of working strength about equal to Rodinal at 1+25.
******
Hello Gainer,
Can I use Vitamin C Crystals from General Nutrition Center? The label says it has 2000 mg. "Vitamin C (as ascorbic acid) per 1/2 tsp serving."

I am completely unaware of what all these different chemicals do to your negatives, but one thing is for sure: Rules in photography are BORING! Break them, every single one. Play and have fun.

- Thomas