C41 and Fuji Velvia

timpppa · Jul 8, 2006

Hello!

I'm planning to develop color films at home, but I have few questions.

I mainly use Velvia 100, can it be processed in C41 process?
Can anyone say something about Colortec C-41 developer,
is it good or bad?

--
Thanks!

Jerry Basierbe · Jul 8, 2006

timpppa said:
Hello!

I'm planning to develop color films at home, but I have few questions.

I mainly use Velvia 100, can it be processed in C41 process?
Can anyone say something about Colortec C-41 developer,
is it good or bad?

--
Thanks!

Velvia is a color slide film and requires E-6 processing. C-41 processing is for color negative film. I don't know anything about Colortech, I use Kodak C-41 and E-6 chemicals.

Jerry

Nick Zentena · Jul 8, 2006

You can cross process in C-41.

colrehogan · Jul 8, 2006

Velvia is typically developed in the E6 process. I don't know what cross-processed Velvia would look like. By cross-processed, I mean developed in C41 chemistry. I have never done any color developing myself, so I can't say anything beyond that. Yes, you can develop Velvia in C41 chemistry.

Stack8 · Jul 8, 2006

To get a transparency film in proper color balance, you must process in E-6 chemistry. If you were to process it in C-41 chemistry it would look very strange. Color negative film should always be processed in C-41 chemistry.

Claire Senft · Jul 8, 2006

You can do some testing to find out if having unmasked negatives that are printedon color RA4 is of interest to you. I am not familar with the brand of chemistry that you mentioned. Thre are some transparency films that work acceptably with this process while there are others that will give results somewhat worse than crap.. Usually you get high contrast and one or more stops of speed gain in doing this and perhaps rather extreme saturation. If you are not going to be doing your own printing then a lab will most likely charge you quite a bit for printing these photos.

If you are looking for nice natural color prints then I would avoid doing this and use either Kodak UC 100 or Fuji 160 S/C. These Velvia negatives processed in C41 are unlikely to even come close to having the qualities of a proper color negative.

In trying to print these "negatives" you may wish to use a unexposed but processed piece of color negative above your film to add some of the propeties of having a built in mask.

srs5694 · Jul 8, 2006

Just to lay out some basics:

"Cross-processing" is processing a film intended for one process in another one. Common types of cross-processing are E-6 film in C-41, C-41 film in E-6, and any color film (C-41, E-6, or K-14) in B&W chemistry. Some cross-processing, such as B&W or (I believe) Kodachrome in either E-6 or C-41, won't work at all; you'll get back a blank film strip because the bleach will remove the silver and there'll be no dyes left behind.

The result of cross-processing is, to a first approximation, like using a conventional film for the process you used. So if you cross-process Velvia (an E-6 slide film) in C-41 chemistry, you'll get negatives. There are differences, though. The orange mask of C-41 films is a characteristic of the film, not the process, so Velvia processed in C-41 will lack the orange color mask. Likewise if you cross-process a C-41 film in E-6 or B&W chemistry, it will retain its orange color mask. E-6/C-41 cross-processing also results in generally odd colors and contrast. Some people like the effect for certain types of shot, but it's not something you'd ordinarily do if you want "normal" negatives. It's certainly worth experimenting with cross-processing. For more information, try doing a Web search on "cross processing film" or a similar phrase.

Shane Knight · Jul 8, 2006

timpppa said:
Hello!

I'm planning to develop color films at home, but I have few questions.

I mainly use Velvia 100, can it be processed in C41 process?
Can anyone say something about Colortec C-41 developer,
is it good or bad?

--
Thanks!

What kind of photographs are you interested in pursuing? Landscape, people, abstract, etc.

timpppa · Jul 8, 2006

Shane Knight said:
What kind of photographs are you interested in pursuing? Landscape, people, abstract, etc.

I mainly take pictures from landscapes and people. And I usually
shoot B&W. Just curious about color film developing if I'll be
shooting more color...

timpppa · Jul 8, 2006

Claire Senft said:
If you are looking for nice natural color prints then I would avoid doing this and use either Kodak UC 100 or Fuji 160 S/C. These Velvia negatives processed in C41 are unlikely to even come close to having the qualities of a proper color negative.

You are also welcome to give any advice about what would be a good
film for landscape and such... C41 process would be nice, because
developers for that are easy to get here in Finland.

Shane Knight · Jul 8, 2006

timpppa said:
I mainly take pictures from landscapes and people. And I usually
shoot B&W. Just curious about color film developing if I'll be
shooting more color...

Are you wanting to do your own color darkroom printing also?

timpppa · Jul 8, 2006

Shane Knight said:
Are you wanting to do your own color darkroom printing also?

Not at the moment, I have scanned all my color negs. I only
have B&W enlarger.

frugal · Jul 8, 2006

I wouldn't recommend scanning cross-processed film, or at least slide film processed in C-41, that's all I've tried. Part of the fun of cross-processing is getting the strange colour shifts, super contrasty negatives and super saturated colours. Which of these effects you get, and to what degree, will greatly depend on the film you used and the shooting conditions. But, when you scan it, the software will usually try to balance out all of that fun stuff.

Printing it is great fun though. I had the opportunity to take Mr. Callow's cross-processing workshop at the APUG conference and he was the one who originally mentioned that it doesn't scan well. I still tried it for myself with a number of techniques and it just doesn't have the magic that you get from printing it in the darkroom. John mentioned that part of the process is the relationship between the film and the paper, and I believe he's correct.

timpppa · Jul 9, 2006

Btw, colortec C41 is from Tetenal, for those who didn't know.
Ring a bell for anyone?

Claire Senft · Jul 9, 2006

Tetenal makes good products. Use one of the films I mentioned ...Kodak UC 100, Fuji 160 S or Fuji 160 C. These films should be delightful for the type of work you wish to do.

Generally, unless you expose a goodly amount of film it does not pay to develop the film yourself. What I do is th have the film processed only for $2.50/roll and then view the negatives on a lightbox and make selections for 4x6 prints. Larger prints I develop myself.

Do you have any good 1 hour labs where you live?

timpppa · Jul 9, 2006

Claire Senft said:
Tetenal makes good products. Use one of the films I mentioned ...Kodak UC 100, Fuji 160 S or Fuji 160 C. These films should be delightful for the type of work you wish to do.

I'll keep them in mind...

Claire Senft said:
Generally, unless you expose a goodly amount of film it does not pay to develop the film yourself. What I do is th have the film processed only for $2.50/roll and then view the negatives on a lightbox and make selections for 4x6 prints. Larger prints I develop myself.

Do you have any good 1 hour labs where you live?

The thing is that we have two 1hour labs here at my home city,
but their quality has gone way down. There are heavy "burn" marks etc
on the negs. And the price is 5euros/roll. MF films are sent to another city for development. If I'll make them myself with tetenal stuff, price / roll is around 2euros.

Shane Knight · Jul 9, 2006

Timppa,

I do not have any experience with processing at home. It was always more practical to use a lab, but I have always had good sources around me. In your situation however, I would be looking for a Jobo and start considering which direction my photography is headed in the long run.

For example:
If I was only interested in digital prints of landscape and people from scanned film, I would shoot a flat but sharp E-6 film (Fuji Astia - which scans much better and more accurate than Velvia) and slightly bring up colors in PS. If you get tired of digital prints, you always have the positive to positive enlargement printing of Ilfochrome.

If you are still wanting traditional photographs and not interested in Ilfochrome, than I would use C41 processing which scans fine but not as well as transparencies. The C41 negatives make nice traditional enlargements using RA-4 materials.

Jobo USA at one time had a great website for Home C-41 and recommended chemicals, but I am not sure if it still exist With some research, I am sure there are some archives on the subject.

Re. Cross Processing:
I would not suggest until you have your variables to the minimum and your home process consistent to normal situations. Cross processing is tons of fun and is about breaking all the rules, but you must learn the rules before you can break them.
Re Scanning Cross Processing:
E6 to C41: I had to scan the film on transparency mode to get good results, but it's been years since I have done any scanning and I am sure specs have changed.

Shane
www.shaneknight.com

ZorkiKat · Jul 9, 2006

colrehogan said:
Velvia is typically developed in the E6 process. I don't know what cross-processed Velvia would look like. By cross-processed, I mean developed in C41 chemistry. I have never done any color developing myself, so I can't say anything beyond that. Yes, you can develop Velvia in C41 chemistry.

If you plan to cross process Velvia in C41, be sure to decrease the exposure by 2-4x (an EI of about 200 to 400 when working with Velvia 100). Velvia makes dense dyes. Often, but not always, great for colour transparencies (for punchy colours), but not great for negatives. The negatives from crossprocessed, "normally" exposed Velvia are so dense that subsequent printing becomes difficult.

roteague · Jul 9, 2006

timpppa said:
Not at the moment, I have scanned all my color negs. I only
have B&W enlarger.

Velvia 100 scans nicely, but the older Velvia 50 could be a real pain to scan. I know a lot of people will shoot Provia 100F if they are planning on doing a lot of scanning, or prints from scans, but from the scanning I've done so far I haven't found Velvia 100 to be a problem.

C41 and Fuji Velvia

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