Caffenol-C, my blog

@ Reinhold: man, you're right, fixed the avatar thing. Best - Reinhold

@ Sandra and jnanian: I don't recommend colour film for bw-photography. With C-41 CN-film you will always have a massive orange-brown tint, no matter which bw-developer you use, it's not a caffenol thing. Grain will be ugly probably and tonal range is mostly crap. Wet prints are a real pain in the ass. It doesn't make a difference whether you use Caffenol-C or any other developer. It only makes sense if you like the "special" look. I don't.

I never tried color slide film. BW-slide film should work with Caffenol.

Caffenol without Vit-C may cause a decent yellow stain with regular bw-film, but much much less than a C-41-film with the difficult to handle orange mask. Adding Vit-C eliminates the stain up to 100 %.

Caffenol-C-L still shows a nice, very decent stain, FiatluX compares it to a pyro stain. I can't see any drawbacks.

Best regards - Reinhold

I developed my first roll of 120 Acros 100 in Reinhold's Caffenol-C-M. Due to mostly snowy scenes I rated the film to EI 50-80, which works fine for TMAX, which I 'm more familiar with. I developed for 15min @20C/68F, which was before I read that Reinhold and friends typicaly used 11-12 minutes for EI 200 exposed film. As one would expect the negatives are dark. Half are however well within reasonable contrast levels, the other half however are probably too much for my lowly scanner to penetrate. Had this been TMX, I'd have been able to salvage all, or at least I've yet to have such a mishap with that emulsion. Is Acros more sensative to overexposure, has less latitude than TMAX? Any and all views welcome.

P.S. I'd have liked to post some examples, but given that the worst of the frames won't scan its not much point. And more importantly my Mac died on me during scanning of the very first frame, so I'm out of luck it would seem.

I've since found out that there was not much wrong with the exposure or the development. The culprit being the leaf shuttered lens. The shutter gave in. Acros in fact seems to be on par with, if not better than, TMX - at least to my eye. Lovely smooth midtones, good shadow and highlight detail, coupled with fine grain. Seems to both push and pull well. What's not to like?

Hi,
I read your blog and was very intersted by the caffenol.
So with the respect of the recipes I prepare caffenol l ans therafter caffenol h. I used the 60 minutes developement and the 15 minutes one.
I tried with 3 rolls: 4x5 shanghai 100 iso, 120 acros 100 iso and 135 adox 125 iso.
I'v got major failure. Blank blank images.
I don't understand where is the problem.
I used ascorbic acid and Kbr buyed in pharmcy, instant cofee (2 differents ) and washing soda.
Can you help?!!!!
Tahnk you
Serge

Hi Serge. I suspect Reinhold will add his advice soon. I've had not had a brush with utter failure yet, but I do know what can contribute to it.

The main reasons for complete failure would be:

- wrong measurement of ingredients, especially for Caffenol-C-L (60-70 minute stand development version)
- ingredients are not quite what they claim to be. Washing soda may be crystalline (contain water), instead of anhydrous (no water), or indead not sodium carbonate at all, the ascorbic acid could contain all sorts of other stuff (though would should not contribute to completely blank negatives), or the coffee doesn't contain enough caffiene acid (not very likely, if you've bought the cheapest there is)
- incorrect methodology. Wrong temperatures, agitation scheme, timing wrong (though yours seem OK), mixing in the wrong order (though should not be catastrophic), not letting each solution settle before mixing together.

I would look at the contents first. Check that they are what they seem. A bit difficult with coffee, just make sure its the cheapest there is and it will contain coffee from robusta beans, much more active than the more expensive arabica beans.

For ISO 100 films and short and agitated development, use Caffenol-C-M first (no KBr), you won't need it - and you'll simplify the process (and rule out one possible source of error).

Check your measurements again. For Caffenol-C-M and C-H its not quite as critical as for C-L. However too much KBr will wash your negatives clean. Which is why its a good idea to start without (use C-M version and slower films (ISO 100 etc))

And finally
- grossly underexposed negatives. But then you should be able to read the frame numbers and manufacturer's markings along the borders (if developed OK)

EDIT: I develop Acros 100 for 12 minutes in Caffenol-C-M by the way. EI from 80-200 on the same roll seems to work OK for me.

Thank you Erik for your assistance. I would have said exactly the same.

@ Serge: most suspicious is always the soda, check if it's pure soda not containing additives like bleach. Should be no prob in Belgium to get clean washing soda. I once had an inquiery and the reason for failure was that baking soda (without converting) was used. Also check wich kind of washing soda you got if not declared expicitly as "waterfree", "monohydrate" or decahydrate": http://caffenol.blogspot.com/2010/03/soda-myth-and-truth_07.html

If you miscalculated the KBr, f.e. 10 g/l instead of 1 g/l, you probably won't get any development. No decaffeinated coffee. And like Eric said, start with Caffenol-C-M. And please do me a favour, use correct names and capital letters. There is neither a caffenol l nor a Caffenol-L on my blog, it's Caffenol-C-L. Your name is Serge and not serg. Thank you and good luck - Reinhold

CAFFENOL FAILURE

My ascorbic acid and KBr are pure (comming from a pharmacy and I read the content of the bottles, I'm doctor and chemistry is not secret for me).
The instant cofee are from the cheapest one.
The washing soda perhaps ? I'll trie to find a another one (it's curious because I take from mys wife's powder for washing it's in french "cristaux de soude").
I forget to mention in my first post that I tried it with paper ans there I get an image ! It was not a perfect one very clear but there was an image (I used anton's recipe from galerie photo).
So I'llgive a new trie this WE.
I don't like failure

hi serge

you might take baking soda and put it in your oven
on a cookie sheet at about 300ºF ( 150C ) and evaporate the water
out of it. it might work, unless there was something in the washing soda you used, besides sodium carbonate?

i had a really hard time finding washing soda in france
and had to go to a pharmacy to get pharma-grade soda ( cost me a fortune ! )
if i had known i could evap baking soda i would have been happy

(there was a url link here which no longer exists)
(information about dehydrating the soda )

sorry for the failures !

john

There's a big difference between drying hydrated washing soda and transforming baking soda to washingsoda:
2 NaHCO3 (baking soda) -> Na2CO3 (washing soda) + CO2 + 2 H2O.

Soude cristeaux should be a hydrated washing soda, see the link John posted above. My friend Mike uses such a "soude cristeaux" and it contains 50 % of water, so you need twice the weight as for waterfree (anhydrous) soda. But better check what you have at hand. If you use a hydrated soda with the amount given for waterfree soda you can't get a result with Caffenol-C-L. It must fail.

That's what I wrote on my blog more than 1 times: "But remember, the amount of soda in C-C-L is small, the pH is low. Be sure to measure exactly and use waterfree soda or adjust properly for hydrated soda! No teaspoon measuring allowed at all in my very humble opinion for this low pH Caffenol-variant."

Please don't mind that I quote myself for a second time: "Important note for recipes: when I say "XYZ" I mean "XYZ" and not "ABC"."

Good luck and don't give up. Caffenol-C-L is the best coffee based developer I ever used.

Best - Reinhold

CAFFENOL

Hi,
Thank you very much for your answers.

First of all I would like to appologize for the mistakes I've done:
- Ok I'll use the true names of the developers (CAFFENOL-C-H etc.)
- my soda is hydrated soda, I make the test and I find 50% of loosing weight after heating at a temperature > 120°C
- I readed caffenol blog and the only post I did'nt read was the one talking about the kinds of soda

So I make a new test today and it was a "bonheur" for me. I see my images on the negs.

I tried the CAFFENOL-C-L with semi stand developement (70 min) respecting the recipe. I put 2.7x the weight for the soda and it works !!!

It was Shanhai 4x5 negs and I tried 100,200,400,800 and 1600 iso. Under 400 iso the results were very good. Above I think it's diffcult to use the negs.

I'll post he images soon.
I'm going to do further tests with my favorite negs and begin shooting.

Once again thank you for the replies and sorry for my beginner (caffenol) mistakes.
Serge

Hi Serge,

you exactly confirme what Mike got with his french soude cristeaux. So I guess you can simply use the double amount of your soda compared to the waterfree given in the Caffenol-C-L recipe. But a little bit more to be on the safe side probably will not hurt. Good to hear that it works for you.

Shanghai GP3 at 1600 is too ambitious, I like it most at about 200 and 400 is still fine. At 800 there is already some loss in shadow detail as far as I can report. But for a 2 stop push the result is extremely good imho.

Best - Reinhold

Hi all,

I would like to try reinhold's recipe of caffenol but since I can't find KBr and ascorbic acid easily (and for some reasonable price) here in Indonesia, I just mix 50 g of instant coffee with 40 g of washing soda (Na2CO3 anhidrous) just for experiment.

I kept the development temperature at 22 deg C and used regular agitation for 30 minutes. And now here is some frames I got with that mix.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/51045099@N03/5552187609/in/photostream/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/51045099@N03/5552768792/in/photostream/

I'm using Lucky SHD 100 film for this shot. In another frames I still notice much fog, and the negative result aren't quite sharp in my opinion. So, overall I still can't get what I want with caffenol. Does anyone has similar experience with coffee developer (without vit c and KBr)? and is there any alternative solution? thx...

Here is my first ever Caff developed shot. TMax 100. I used the same formula you did, didn't have any Vit. C yet. I was fairly pleased, but have to admit any image was a pleasant surprise to me. A couple of subsequent attempts, though they produced printable images, didn't impress me as much.

First I'd like to thank Reinhold and John for their unfailing support in all questions Caffenol.

Since no-one's posted results with Shanghai GP3, I thought I'd share my initial results.

Another Caffenol enthusiast sent me a couple of rolls as thanks for a few tips I gave him, and I thought I'd give it a go. I trawled Reinhold's blog, the Scandinavian Caffenol thread here on Apug, flickr caffenol groups and other sites. I adhere to metric weight measuring methods, and therefore use variants of Reinhold's C recipies (C-C-H, M or L). I have however not used C-C-L, and wanted to use an M or H variant. Unfortunately most examples I found either used C-C-L, or recipies I find hard to reproduce with certainty (a teaspoon of this and a pinch of that). Finally I found examples of Mike's (mentioned by Reinhold earlier in this thread) GP3 films souped in low sodium carbonate versions of C-C-M on flickr. They looked nothing less than fantastic. I took his recipe as a starting point.

C-C-M (RS) RS=Reduced Sodium carbonate recipe
40g/l Sodium carbonate (down from 54g/l)
40g/l Instant coffee
16g/l Ascorbic acid

4min presoak, 12min agititated development (1min initially, 3 inversions per min thereafter), 1min water stop bath/wash, 5min fix (TMAX fixer), 15min wash.

Hard Rock Cafe by Eirik0304, on Flickr

Grand Hotel by Eirik0304, on Flickr

What do you gain from reducing the amount of Sodium Carbonate? The consensus seems to be finer grain, better tonal graduation and microcontrast. I think I might finding myself subscribing to these opinions, if the results from the first roll are anything to go by.