Delta 100 shot at 800, best chance to salvage anything

I have just realised that over the last week or two I've shot a couple of rolls of HP5 and a roll of Delta 100, three stops under exposed. I was using a new light meter app on my phone (light meter tools for android) and using the filter compensation feature to add 1.5 stops of neutral density to account for the yellow 12 filter that I way using. For some reason the app also allows positive nd values and indeed these are the values which are visible when you open the filter section, whilst negative nd values are hidden off screen. I thought I was adding additional exposure, in fact I was taking it away. All in all the films were 3 stops under exposed.

I admit that it should have been obvious that something was wrong but I find reading winter sunlight difficult and unpredictable.

That's the sob story, now for the solution.

I know I am not going to get back shadow detail that was never exposed but I would like to be able to salvage something, if at all possible. I'm sure I will have better luck with the HP5 as this is generally considered a good film for pushing so my main focus is on the Delta 100.

I have HC110, Rodinal, Xtol and Acu-1 (long life version of acufine) available to me. I will be looking to print these on mult-grade paper rather than scan.

My thought is either a straight push with Xtol or Acu-1 or a 2 hour stand in Rodinal.

I've never bothered with stand development and I'm aware that it cannot perform miracles but I have seen examples of two stop pushes using this method with impressive results. I would like to keep the contrast manageable whilst salvaging any mid-tones that I can and I'm worried that a straight push would end up with extreme contrast.

I've never used the Acu-1 developer (or Acufine) they are meant to be speed increasing developers but I rarely see them mentioned around here. What do people think about the claimed speed increases? Are they genuine?

I'm also aware that this may be a write-off which I will have to chalk up as a learning experience but I'd like to give it my best shot.

soup

Personally, I would soup the stuff in Diafine.

+1 for Diafine!

snapguy said:

Personally, I would soup the stuff in Diafine.

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Please forgive my ignorance but could ya clarify the term soup for me?

Thanks.

Based on what you have on hand I would recommend HC-110 Dilution B for about 2.5X the time you would use for the film at 100. If you can get something else then I would recommend undiluted Ilford Microphen for about 2.5X the time for the film at 100.

MartinCrabtree said:

Please forgive my ignorance but could ya clarify the term soup for me?

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As a noun: developer
As a verb: to develop

OK so it's not a method. Thanks.

MartinCrabtree said:

OK so it's not a method. Thanks.

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Only in the most general sense.

Go with Xtol or Acu-1

But since I have zero expereince with Acu-1, but some with Accufine....I say Xtol

snapguy said:

Personally, I would soup the stuff in Diafine.

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I use the term 'souping film' all the time.

If it was a dark cloudy day and you took reflected readings you will be ok, just.

You might want to develop for 10-15 % longer to try and get more contrast for a easier print.

Id recommend Microphen stock per Ilfords times for normal exposure or +15%.

But Id normally use Rodinal 1:100 @ 20C 60 minutes stand.

Either of there will give good toe detail. The Delta toe will be horrible. I find PanF easier to deal with.

I recommend spending some time without a camera but with a borrowed incident meter calibrating your head for sunny side /16. If you understand rules you should be within a 1/3 of a stop.

It is simpler getting a Weston II, invercone, and filter, and reading up on the zone system. Mine has been down an escalator, but not recommended, for a smart phone either.

Thank you all for the advice. Having done a bit more research I've decided to treat this as a genuine experiment. I'm going to try one roll of HP5 in Xtol with a conventional push and one roll on Rodinal 1:100 semi stand for 2.5 hours.

Based on the results of these I will soup the Delta 100 in whichever performs best.

Xmas, unfortunately I've taken advantage of some rare sunny days so the light was already fairly contrasty. Added to this I was using a heavy yellow filter to really darken skies so I'm expecting some pretty full on contrast whatever happens.

I actually have a Weston Euromaster light meter with invercone but the needle sticks and I'm not confident using it for critical situations.

I genuinely rate the light meter app but need to make sure I don't mess up the filter factor again. The app actually has an incident mode as well, although as I largely shoot landscape, I find reflective more useful.

Anyway, I'll post results when I have them, which might be a while before they are printed and scanned.

Simonh82 said:

Thank you all for the advice. Having done a bit more research I've decided to treat this as a genuine experiment. I'm going to try one roll of HP5 in Xtol with a conventional push and one roll on Rodinal 1:100 semi stand for 2.5 hours.

Based on the results of these I will soup the Delta 100 in whichever performs best.

Xmas, unfortunately I've taken advantage of some rare sunny days so the light was already fairly contrasty. Added to this I was using a heavy yellow filter to really darken skies so I'm expecting some pretty full on contrast whatever happens.

I actually have a Weston Euromaster light meter with invercone but the needle sticks and I'm not confident using it for critical situations.

I genuinely rate the light meter app but need to make sure I don't mess up the filter factor again. The app actually has an incident mode as well, although as I largely shoot landscape, I find reflective more useful.

Anyway, I'll post results when I have them, which might be a while before they are printed and scanned.

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You then need to use the app in incident mode to calibrate your f/16 rules without a camera. Sunny side is incident.

You need to be able to know what zone snow is in in bright sun.
an avery label if you need...

Here maintenance on a Weston is more £ than an operating II.

Ansells book is in the library.

Also, remember that when pushing a film using one developer, besides extending the duration of the development you can also use a higher development temperature.

Results are in, very pleased with what I managed to salvage!

I thought I should update this thread now that I have got some results to report. I did as I proposed and developed one roll of HP5 in Rodinal 1:100 semi stand for 2.5 hours. One minute initial agitation, then a couple of gentle inversions at 1 hour, 1.5 hours and 2 hours. The second roll of HP5 I developed in Xtol stock for 17.5 min, with 30 seconds initial agitation, then 3 gentle inversions mostly every minute (I did do a few every other minute to try to rein in contrast). Both development methods produce excellent results, far exceeding my expectation. You can see the results here:

HP5 @3200 in Rodinal 1:100 semi stand
HP5 @3200 in Xtol stock

Please bear in mind that these are scans from the negative so far, as I've not had a chance to set up my temporary darkroom for a printing session. The image names indicate whether I have carried out any editing on them which I have done for many, although only to compensate for the fact that I scanned them with very low contrast to try to get all the detail that was there. Also for the roll I developed in Rodinal I seem to have suffered a fairly large light leak down the left edge of the images, so I did adjust for this in some images. The first image from the Rodinal roll has been fairly heavily edited. I was just playing around to see what would be possible. I haven't uploaded every shot from the rolls as some where really just duplicates with slightly different composition etc. Please believe me when I say I've not selected the best results, these are genuinely representative of what I got. I'm also not discounting the fact that the light leak may have acted as a significant pre/post flash for the film, raising the shadows beyond where they would have been.

I was most surprised by the excellent results I got from the Rodinal, although due to the potentially skewed results from the light leak, I decided to go with Xtol as my developer for the Delta 100 shot at 800. The Xtol performed very well for the HP5 but I really like the tonality of the portrait shots developed in Rodinal. With both developers they did an excellent job of bringing out what shadow detail there was and also keeping the highlights in check.

You can see the results of the Delta 100 roll here:

Ilford Delta 100 @800 in Xtol stock

Again, it is better than I could ever have hoped for. There is far more shadow detail than I expected to get. Based on this, I would actually be quite happy to shoot Delta 100 at 400 if needed. It performed much better than expected.

Next job is to actually try to print these and see what I can do in the darkroom. The negatives are pretty dense but look printable to my inexperience eye.

I have to say: Simon, this is bad. That's Simon Galley I am addressing as if this can be replicated on a darkroom print, Simonh82, then its bad news for D3200

These are excellent and if anything the D100 underexposed by 3 stops looks better than HP5+ underexposed by the same three stops.

Well done

pentaxuser

If the films were under exposed by three stops, I wouldn't have expected the negatives to be pretty dense. At 3 stops under, I would expect reasonable results from the HP5, but not the Delta. I would be inclined to go back over your procedure for using the light meter app, just to make sure you have arrived at the right conclusion. Perhaps check the readings against a meter of known accuracy before continuing with it. Ilford give Delta 100 a latitude of 50-200 ASA.
Alex

Delta 100 to 800 is a 3 speed push, which is still within the usual "push" range. Delta 100 is a true ISO 100 speed film, so there shouldn't be no problem.

EDIT: I see you did it...

In any case, i found MICROPHEN to be really really good soup for souped-up film souping.

Alex Muir said:

If the films were under exposed by three stops, I wouldn't have expected the negatives to be pretty dense. At 3 stops under, I would expect reasonable results from the HP5, but not the Delta. I would be inclined to go back over your procedure for using the light meter app, just to make sure you have arrived at the right conclusion. Perhaps check the readings against a meter of known accuracy before continuing with it. Ilford give Delta 100 a latitude of 50-200 ASA.
Alex

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Alex this may just be my inexperience using Xtol. It is a new developer to me and my negatives with HC-110 are usually a little thinner. I've noticed the same effect with normally exposed films too, with a couple of cameras and lenses so I don't think it is a shutter speed issue.

I am sure that I was exposing 3 stops below where I was expecting to but as I normally aim to expose for the shadows somewhat, this may have helped to compensate.

My normal metering procedure is to use the lightmeter app to view a black and white image of the scene with the preview function. If I am shooting landscapes then I will expose more or less of the sky until I get the shadow areas for the land to the right place. This often leaves the sky blown out on my phone, if it is a hight contrast scene but I figure that film will handle highlights much better than a poxy phone sensor can. Generally this works well for me but my guess following this little experiment is that by exposing for the shadows I'm rating the film at at least a stop below box speed. I've never bothered to do a proper zone system type calibration of film speeds etc. It usually takes me a few goes to get though a roll, often with such varying light conditions that it makes it fairly pointless to alter film development to match the conditions.

For reference here is one of the two shots on a roll of Delta 100 that I exposed @800 (by my calculation) but developed normally in Xtol stock. This was the roll where I realised my mistake after two shots and shot the rest of the film at 100. i think this confirms that I probably over expose my film slightly to begin with.



Anyway I'm very happy I managed to get reasonable negs out of it. Proper printing will be the real test though.

Simonh82 said:

Anyway I'm very happy I managed to get reasonable negs out of it. Proper printing will be the real test though.

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Absolutely. I look forward to seeing a scan of a darkroom print

pentaxuser