D76 Minimum Volume ....... Again?

Sal Santamaura said:

Aw, come on, why believe the manufacturer when "some" tell you different?

D-76, Perceptol, D-23, etc.: 250ml of stock per 80 square inches of film. Confidence or crap shoot, the choice is yours.

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If you recall, Sal, I started a thread sometime ago on what Ilford told me in reply to a specific question of what was the minimum quantity of Perceptol needed for a 35mm film if I wanted to dilute at 1+3 and its answer was 70ml. This was its actual answer and not my interpretation of Ilford's instructions or having to deduce an answer from an Ilford reply that did not directly answer the question.

It is clear that on this issue we have our own beliefs in terms of what is right. I can only say what Ilford said

pentaxuser

pentaxuser said:

If you recall, Sal, I started a thread sometime ago on what Ilford told me in reply to a specific question of what was the minimum quantity of Perceptol needed for a 35mm film if I wanted to dilute at 1+3 and its answer was 70ml. This was its actual answer and not my interpretation of Ilford's instructions or having to deduce an answer from an Ilford reply that did not directly answer the question.

It is clear that on this issue we have our own beliefs in terms of what is right. I can only say what Ilford said

pentaxuser

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Yup. And Ilford's answer is completely compatible with shooting craps.

The question here is that, anyone has ever had issue with just 100ml or 150ml D-76?

RedSun said:

The question here is that, anyone has ever had issue with just 100ml or 150ml D-76?

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They'll say "No. It worked fine."

Sal Santamaura said:

They'll say "No. It worked fine."

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Is there not a scientific test with say a densitometer and/or a Stouffer step wedge that will give readings that show whether 250ml gives different readings from 100 or 150ml ?
This then establishes that more is or is not different. The it's a question of whether the prints from 100ml or 150 ml negs give prints that are visually different and inferior to those from 250ml negs. Is there a test for this?

Otherwise the thread reaches no meaningful answer to the OP's question, surely? Currently the only meaningful answer I can see from the thread is that some may believe 100ml is fine and some may believe that 250ml is fine.

pentaxuser

RedSun said:

Yes, but Kodak somehow and somewhere stated the minimum of 100ml. So it makes some people excited to same half a dollar.

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Different Kodak developers have different capacities, so I wouldn't be surprised if some people might confuse the capacity numbers for another developer with the capacity numbers for D-76.

MattKing said:

Different Kodak developers have different capacities, so I wouldn't be surprised if some people might confuse the capacity numbers for another developer with the capacity numbers for D-76.

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No, this is specific for D-76....

pentaxuser said:

Is there not a scientific test with say a densitometer and/or a Stouffer step wedge that will give readings that show whether 250ml gives different readings from 100 or 150ml ?...

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Sure.

Expose two entire rolls to a high value, say Zone VII or above. Develop one using 100ml of stock. Develop the other (at the same time and temperature / following the same agitation routine) using 250ml of stock. Compare densities. Note that the roll developed using 100ml yields noticeably lower densities than the one developed using 250ml.

Easy peasy.

pentaxuser said:

...The it's a question of whether the prints from 100ml or 150 ml negs give prints that are visually different and inferior to those from 250ml negs. Is there a test for this?...

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As I've posted many times, the "confidence or crap shoot" situation refers to how dependent developer capacity is on scene content. The more "high key" a scene is, the more difference one will see when photographing it and developing with insufficient stock solution. Pictures of a black cat in a coal mine will likely be "just fine" using only 100ml. Just make sure you use enough fresh fixer for those.

pentaxuser said:

If you recall, Sal, I started a thread sometime ago on what Ilford told me in reply to a specific question of what was the minimum quantity of Perceptol needed for a 35mm film if I wanted to dilute at 1+3 and its answer was 70ml. This was its actual answer and not my interpretation of Ilford's instructions or having to deduce an answer from an Ilford reply that did not directly answer the question.

It is clear that on this issue we have our own beliefs in terms of what is right. I can only say what Ilford said

pentaxuser

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I think that if you were to reframe your question to Ilford in a certain way you would get a different answer. Try asking them the original question, but specify that you want to know not only the "minimum quantity," but the recommended quantity to maintain the "best quality" of development. Further, mention that you are interested in doing hi-key portrait work, and perhaps increasing exposure by a stop or two (this will exhaust the developer faster).

I would be very surprised if the answer doesn't change to a higher quantity of developer. I would guess the answer will include something on the order of "perform your own test" for maximum quality.

Asking only "what is a minimum quantity" without further qualification can set a very low bar. Something I've found over the years is that Kodak tends to be very conservative in its recommendations, such that the user seldom suffers a failure. Whereas at least some other manufacturers (I can't say specifically about Ilford; my expertise is primarily in color) may give recommendations that are more subject to occasional failure, but give overall better economy.

The thing is, exhaustion of developer is more complicated than most users care to become knowledgeable about; as a consequence the manufacturers tend to give a simple, one size fits all, answer. So the answer depends mostly on whether they want you to be happy about getting maximum use out of the developer, or protecting you from "harm" in extreme cases. Harm, in b&w, mostly just means not enough contrast.

Kodak's datasheet for D-76 at https://imaging.kodakalaris.com/sites/uat/files/wysiwyg/pro/chemistry/j78.pdf says that you can use D-76 1:1 in a small tank to develop a 35mm roll, with 8 oz of 1:1 working solution (240 ml, or 120 ml of stock solution), with a 10% increase in developing time over using 16 oz of 1:1 working solution. The working solution is one-shot and not reused. It's at the bottom of page 2 of the datasheet.

This was mentioned in post 2 of the thread, but for some reason the OP wasn't satisfied. Kodak are usually pretty conservative about their recommendations, as mentioned above. It is important, not to save money, but because otherwise you couldn't use D-76 1:1 in a filled steel tank, which only holds about 16 oz for the typical 2-reel steel tank.

Exceeding developer capacity with small amounts of highly dilute developers seems like a false economy.

pentaxuser said:

Is there not a scientific test with say a densitometer and/or a Stouffer step wedge that will give readings that show whether 250ml gives different readings from 100 or 150ml ?
This then establishes that more is or is not different. The it's a question of whether the prints from 100ml or 150 ml negs give prints that are visually different and inferior to those from 250ml negs. Is there a test for this?

Otherwise the thread reaches no meaningful answer to the OP's question, surely? Currently the only meaningful answer I can see from the thread is that some may believe 100ml is fine and some may believe that 250ml is fine.

pentaxuser

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Sal's post #33 is (probably) a good answer for testing without instruments. And I would expect that you'd see the results he predicts. I say "expect" on the basis that I'm guessing that Ilford has stretched the limit, although this is not necessarily the case. But if they have not pushed the limit (for the somewhat extended amount of silver developed, per Sal's zone VII exposure) then you don't expect to see much difference.

If you wanted to put numbers on the things then printing some step wedges and reading the results with a densitometer would do the job.

You said, "The it's a question of whether the prints from 100ml or 150 ml negs give prints that are visually different and inferior to those from 250ml negs." Well sure, see if the prints are different. But the part about " inferior," no, that doesn't come into play here. You would ideally set up a "system" to give you the prints you want. Then the goal is to keep your system consistent. If the system CHANGES, then that is the problem, regardless of whether the print quality got better or worse.

As a general note, if someone wanted to make some hypothetical guesses as to how finicky things would be, this is probably possible with publicly available data. (But it would be quicker and more reliable to just do Sal's test.) The general method could be to estimate how much silver is being developed, and how much that would deplete the developing agent and increase bromide level. Then look at the proportional change in both. As a general rule in photofinishing you tend to change replenishment rates in increments of about 10%; anything less than that is generally considered not worth the trouble. So you might use the 10% figure as a guideline for changes in developing agent and bromide; anything less than that would likely not be noticeable.

Dear Sal Santamaura,
Just a minute to send you a brief but huge thank you...
Until yesterday I belonged to the vast group using less than the amount recommended by Kodak. Never below 150ml, though...
When I checked this subject long ago, before this thread, as you explain, I thought Ilford's ID-11 lower minimum meant Kodak's was conservative... And yes, as it seemed to work normally, I used to say "it worked out fine"...
Before reading your comments, I had never read about too high byproducts increasing during the last part of the process, and it made a lot of sense to me...
Yesterday, for a soft light scene, I used D-76 I mixed two days ago. Looking for sharp grain, and wanting to stay away from any compensating (and compressing) effect, instead of trying 1+2 I went for 1+1.5 to anyway really cut solvency: 240ml D-76 + 360ml water... TMY-2...
Amazing. Grain is totally sharp, and tight, beautiful. Kind of miniature Rodinal grain, but without any midtone compression... The look I always looked for... I used 22C instead of 20C by the way, and yet grain is a dream, so stable, distinct and good looking through different tones... Possibly the cleanest tone I've ever got.
Thank you very much!

Interesting discussion. But it just shows that people are wasting wayyyyyyy too much energy in saving 0.25$ instead of putting the same energy in making 1$.
1$ is still four times 0.25$, and four times 0.25$ is still next to nothing. So I don’t get it.

And if saving time is the major issue, then wtf are you even using D76?

Developing film is not the moment to get creative. If there is one step of the photography process where you need to be RIGID, it’s during the development stage.

Stand development, stand developing paper, stand fixing, water stop, pre-washing film, squeegeeing film (even if it’s “only with fingers”)... why? Useless Obsessive compulsive behaviour is my only answer.

I can't speak for others, but I'd say we don't use a little less developer for saving money, at all... In my case I did that after reading 150ml was more than necessary, and mostly trying to use "not too much" to be close to highlights' local exhaustion to promote shadow enhancement... As I said, it all started years before I learnt it was not the best idea for all types of scene contrast...
It's about wrong information available here, there and everywhere... And Ilford's recommendation was or is misleading too, as many forums' members posting was and is...
This is society: some people imagine I wanted to save money, and some other people imagine I should have saved the money I spent in a six year career in Photography in Europe, and they all imagine they're right!
Truth is, even during six years and with good teachers, time is not enough to test every option related to all subjects... I've learnt more during the last 13 years than during my career, but there are these small details... I studied with ID-11 stock and 1+1 exclusively, and only later, after reading mixed web opinions I tried 1+2 after being unhappy with trying 1+3... But, I never did it using 240ml... Anyway life's sweet: sometimes we enjoy it and reach the right place, with help of the right people.

I have had consistent results using 100ml of D76 stock in a roller drum loaded with four 5x4 TMX-100. Just lucky I guess.

Juan Valdenebro said:

Dear Sal Santamaura,
Just a minute to send you a brief but huge thank you...Thank you very much!

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Juan, you are most welcome. I'm happy to have been of assistance.