Color Processing Issue?

fresnel10 · Nov 15, 2014

Hi everyone. This past Monday, I tried my hand at C-41 developing for the first time by developing two rolls of Kodak Ektar 100 120. I used a Jobo processor. Overall, it seems to have worked, but upon scanning, I noticed some odd dark drops. Did something go wrong with chemistry? Or could it be something else? Any ideas/advice would be appreciated. Thanks!

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Photo Engineer · Nov 15, 2014

Can you give your process? That would help.

PE

fresnel10 · Nov 15, 2014

Sorry...I used the Tetenal C-41 Press Kit. Everything was done at 38 degrees Celcius (100.4F) except the stabilizer, which was room temperature. This was all the process as the directions that came with the press kit instructed. I won't be able to give much more detail, as the instructions are back at the darkroom. Following that, I squeegeed with my fingers, then hung them to dry in our negative dryer with the heat blowing.

I hope that's enough detail...

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Photo Engineer · Nov 15, 2014

Nope! Did you use a prewet and did you use a stop between dev and bleach/blix? Did you use a bleach then fix or a blix?

Light Guru · Nov 16, 2014

fresnel10 said:
but upon scanning, I noticed some odd dark drops.

Are the drops also in the negative?

It to hard to say from the low res scan that you posted but it could be from the scan.

fresnel10 · Nov 16, 2014

Sorry.,..I didn't realize how low-res the photo in the post was. Here it is again:

You can make out where the spots are, and the big drop to the left of the lighthouse really jumps out at you. The only way I can think to describe it is that it almost looks like a water drop that melted its shape into the negative.

As for the Tetenal kit, here is the link to the one I purchased from B&H: http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/109267-REG/Tetenal_T109306_C_41_Press_Kit_for.html

It came with four chemicals: developer, Blix A, Blix B, and stabilizer. The mixing instructions call for the Blix A and Blix B to be combined into one, resulting in three mixed chemicals once everything was prepared. They were used in the following order:

1.) Prewet
2.) Developer
3.) Blix
4.) Rinse
5.) Stabilizer

I will say, I did two rolls, and I didn't find evidence of anything like this on the other roll. They were processed on the same reel in the same tank at the same time.

Thanks everyone and sorry for the lack of clarity before. I hope this provides more information.

EdSawyer · Nov 16, 2014

Looks like stabilizer dried on the neg.

bvy · Nov 16, 2014

EdSawyer said:
Looks like stabilizer dried on the neg.

That crossed my mind too. I would ditch whatever stabilizer comes packaged with the kit and invest in Kodak Final Rinse. It's cheap and it works every time.

Photo Engineer · Nov 16, 2014

Looks like water spots on the film before processing began, or spots of chemistry being left on the negative during processing.

Did you make 2 runs? If so, was this set of negatives in the second run? That would suggest wet droplets on the reels which got onto the film before processing began.

If it were dried on stabilizer, you could wash the negatives and get it out. Then reuse the stabilizer and make sure that you wipe it off thoroughly with a sponge dampened in the stab.

PE

Mark Crabtree · Nov 16, 2014

Photo Engineer said:
Looks like water spots on the film before processing began, or spots of chemistry being left on the negative during processing.

Did you make 2 runs? If so, was this set of negatives in the second run? That would suggest wet droplets on the reels which got onto the film before processing began.

If it were dried on stabilizer, you could wash the negatives and get it out. Then reuse the stabilizer and make sure that you wipe it off thoroughly with a sponge dampened in the stab.

PE

I would do the rewash to make sure that is not the issue. Give it a decent soak time.

BTW, what is the stabilizer now? I don't think they use formaldehyde any longer.

Rudeofus · Nov 16, 2014

In my opinion this is the kind of unevenness you get with 120 type roll film and Tetenal's C-41 chemistry, if you don't insert a stop bath step between CD and BLIX. Sorry, your negs are messed up, and unless you are willing to spend hours on digital editing of a shot, you might as well write them off. Use a stop bath in your next dev run (regardless of what Tetenal's instructions may say), and these artifacts will be gone for good.

Mark Crabtree · Nov 16, 2014

I use the Fuji and other C41 in a Jobo without a stop or wash after the developer and have never had an issue like that. That includes 10inch x 60 inch Cirkut negs.

Rudeofus · Nov 16, 2014

Mark, am I correct that the Fuji kit uses separate bleach and fixer steps? With an acidic bleach you won't have these issues. I had these yellowish streaks in blue sky regions with Tetenal's kit until I put a stop bath step between CD and BLIX. And I am (there was a url link here which no longer exists) ...

Mark Crabtree · Nov 16, 2014

Rudeofus said:
Mark, am I correct that the Fuji kit uses separate bleach and fixer steps? With an acidic bleach you won't have these issues. I had these yellowish streaks in blue sky regions with Tetenal's kit until I put a stop bath step between CD and BLIX. And I am (there was a url link here which no longer exists) ...

Yes, you are correct. I should have noticed that you said blix. All of the commercial C41 chemicals I've seen had separate bleach and fix. I wonder why they combined them for that kit?

railwayman3 · Nov 17, 2014

Mark Crabtree said:
Yes, you are correct. I should have noticed that you said blix. All of the commercial C41 chemicals I've seen had separate bleach and fix. I wonder why they combined them for that kit?

I thought that, apart from convenience in having fewer baths, it might have been to do with overcoming patent issues on the "original" processes as used by Kodak and Fuji ? I believe there was, IIRC, a kit supplied by Speedibrews that had just two baths! (Having said that, I use the Tetanal kits with good results.)

Lamar · Nov 17, 2014

I've been using the Tetenal kit for years along with the Digibase kit. I use a small tank. For the Tetenal kit I have not seen an issue quite like this, however, I use a water rinse (8 x fill & drain) between the developer and blix. In addition I add 3 ml of PhotoFlo 200 to the stabilizer. From my personal experience I believe the Digibase kit gives slightly less pronounced grain. The Tetenal kit is just a bit more convenient and less expensive so I've been using it now and, for scanning, I find the results are fine.

Additional notes: I use deep well water for rinses and mixing all chemicals except the stabilizer which I mix using distilled water.

Rudeofus · Nov 17, 2014

Mark Crabtree said:
Yes, you are correct. I should have noticed that you said blix. All of the commercial C41 chemicals I've seen had separate bleach and fix. I wonder why they combined them for that kit?

Convenience only. Most amateurs are deadly afraid of color processing, and fewer bathes means more people willing to give it a try. Since C-41 is ancient by now, there are most definitely no patent issues driving vendors away from BLIXes, quite to the contrary, Kodak and Fuji researched heavily into BLIXes before giving up on the issue (except for RA-4). Ask PhotoEngineer, aka Rowland Mowrey ...

David Lyga · Nov 18, 2014

Something strikes me as poor agitation. I would agitate by either lifting the reel out of the tank or turning the tank upside down at least every 30 seconds. First 30 seconds, agitate continuously. - David Lyga

fresnel10 · Nov 18, 2014

Wow! Thanks everyone for the suggestions and advice. I will try a rewash when I'm back at the darkroom next week and see if that makes a difference.

barzune · Oct 3, 2015

Rudeofus said:
Convenience only. Most amateurs are deadly afraid of color processing, and fewer bathes means more people willing to give it a try. Since C-41 is ancient by now, there are most definitely no patent issues driving vendors away from BLIXes, quite to the contrary, Kodak and Fuji researched heavily into BLIXes before giving up on the issue (except for RA-4). Ask PhotoEngineer, aka Rowland Mowrey ...

Rather harsh. "Amateurs"' as opposed to PROFESSIONALS, are possibly limited by the availability of small quantity, collective "kits" of processing chemistry with reasonably clear information of application.

It is abundantly clear that the major suppliers of the required chemistry are interested in only the large-volume commercial clients, chain-store and mini-mart processors, who have largely abandoned film.

Understandably, the corner drugstore can no longer depend upon the trade of the neighbourhood snapshot trade, but in order to supply the necessary product to any sector of the market, the product must be manufactured in quantity.
Would it be economically unfeasible to divert a small part of the production of this pure product from tank-car to litre-bottle? Would the home-consumer market be able to absorb the relative expense ratio?

Photo Engineer · Oct 3, 2015

Tank car lots of photochemistry are a ting of the past. Now it is in barrel lots or less.

PE

Mr Bill · Oct 4, 2015

barzune said:
Understandably, the corner drugstore can no longer depend upon the trade of the neighbourhood snapshot trade, but in order to supply the necessary product to any sector of the market, the product must be manufactured in quantity.
Would it be economically unfeasible to divert a small part of the production of this pure product from tank-car to litre-bottle? Would the home-consumer market be able to absorb the relative expense ratio?

I don't think the corner drugstore ever COULD make it on the neighborhood snowshoe trade. My company (employer) once owned a chain of minilabs, always thinking that if they could get large enough, then they could become profitable. Never did (to any worthwhile extent). A big problem was, my company was trying to be profitable in photofinishing, whereas the competition could often exist on a breakeven basis as a tool to bring foot traffic into a large store.

Regarding the cost of diverting some of the process chemicals into home user sizes, well, my guess is that the customers are generally too "expensive" and unreliable. If they don't know what they're doing, they might use up a couple half-hour sessions of tech support for $5 worth (cost) of chemicals. And just wait till they ruin an important roll of film and blame it on your chemicals.

And if customers don't buy enough on a predictable basis, the manufacturer may have to recover and dispose of a certain amount of chemicals, while possibly being subject to hazardous material shipping regulations. The relative profit potential may simply not be worth it. I'm just guessing, of course, but based on more process experience than you would probably guess.

Rudeofus · Oct 4, 2015

I would like to enter three tidbits into this discussion:

Some time back I asked a large analog photography retailer whether they would be interested in specialty developer products for C-41 processing, e.g. for lomo style colour effects, CD-3 based colour negative developers for properly cross processing of E-6 materials, .... Their reply was very clear: the only thing we'd be interested in would be room temp processing and fewer concentrates. They claim their customers are unwilling to try C-41 because they'd have to mix three concentrates with water to make C-41 CD, why can't it be just one concentrate?
Some people here sound quite adventurous regarding self mixing of colour chemistry, but practical experience casts a very different picture: how many here have tried Stefan Lange's C-41 and E-6 formulas so far? Has anyone tried my BLIX--->bleach&fix conversion, except for those who's BX2 went bad or who's BLIX failed to work? And you do realize that the APUG colour chemistry forum already represents a tiny (and likely the more dedicated and sophisticated) fraction of the market for C-41/E-6 home processing products, yes?
Minilabs work with replenished chemistry and constant process monitoring. If anything was made in tank car lot sized quantities, it was replenisher, which is unsuitable for home processing. Therefore it is not possible to fill a few gallons from the tank car into some small bottles and sell it as C-41/E-6 home processing kits. Add to this the cost of first timers calling their hotline with questions and complaints ...

Mr Bill · Oct 4, 2015

Rudeofus said:
Minilabs work with replenished chemistry and constant process monitoring. If anything was made in tank car lot sized quantities, it was replenisher, which is unsuitable for home processing. Therefore it is not possible to fill a few gallons from the tank car into some small bottles and sell it as C-41/E-6 home processing kits. Add to this the cost of first timers calling their hotline with questions and complaints ...
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Rudi, the replen and "tank solutions" are not that different; for developer the replen just needs a bit of dilution and "starter solution." So it should be easy for the supplier to add this to their kit. Since they already do this for larger users, it ought to be easy enough for them. So this leaves me thinking that it is just not profitable for them, possibly just because of liability issues with the certain number of "idiots" who would buy kits.

Speaking of mini-labs (or even larger labs), if anyone who wants to do home processing has access to one, these labs are always discarding excess "tank solution," aka exactly what the home user wants. So if you can get an operator to collect some of their overflow, or even collect a bit from each tank when they have the lid open, you can use this for your home processing. Well, except that the fixer is silver-laden.

Color Processing Issue?

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