Developer volume according to Anchell

Dani

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I'm sure this has been covered before but I couldn't find a thread. Anyway, reading The Darkroom Cookbook I came across to this...

"According to the Kodak Research Lab it only takes 150.0ml of developer to cover the surface of 80 square inches of film and to develop that film. What is missed by some is that the research that led to this finding was carried out to determine the bare minimum of developer that could be used in a Kodak Versamat machine processor in order to maximize profits to the last penny. What is also missed is that there is a difference between minimal development and full development of a negative or roll of film. What is further missed is that Kodak’s final conclusion was that while 150.0 ml could develop 80 square inches of film, far better results would be obtained by using a minimum of 250.0 ml of undiluted developer.

The one thing all photographers can do to instantly improve the quality of their negatives and guarantee full and complete development of every negative on a roll of film or batch of sheet film is to increase the volume of developer that they routinely use. The bare-bones minimum that should be used to develop 80 square inches of film is 250.0ml of undiluted devel- oper. This means that if you are developing a single roll of 120 in a two-reel metal tank and using 500.0 ml of D-76 straight (undiluted), you are in good shape as you are using double the minimum. However, if you are developing two rolls of 35 mm 36-exposure film in the same two-reel metal tank you are back down to 250.0ml per 80 square inches.You will obtain consist- ently better results were you to remove one roll of film, replace it with an empty reel as a spacer and use 500.0 ml of developer—it is not possible to use too much developer, and more is always better."

I've been developing film for years now, first with Paterson tanks, then a Jobo with both kinds of reels. Years ago I settled on XTOL 1:1, so always using a little more than 100ml of active developer per roll.

Has anybody experimented with using more developer than the minimum and seen a difference? I've never heard about minimal development and full development or a negative. Nobody really talks about that.

Now for the highlighted part... this is just commentary... why would Kodak recommend that amount (100ml minimum per 80 square inch) if it was going to be used as well for home use, then Kodak would not be maximizing profit, if anything people would be saving money and not buying more Kodak developers.
 

Donald Qualls

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Uh oh. Hear that siren? That's the signal to take shelter...
 
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Dani

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LOL that's probably why I couldn't find a thread about that!
 

bluechromis

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Anchell and Troop also elaborate on this in "The Film Developing Cookbook." This has been discussed before here. As I recall someone (Adrian B.?) posted the results of an experiment they did that showed that development activity did indeed go down when the volume of working solution was reduced below the amount recommended by Anchell and Troop
 

Donald Qualls

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For whatever it's worth, I'm very confident that this differs for different developers.

Kodak has recommended dilution at 1+1 for D-76 and Xtol since flashbulbs were the standard for supplemental light (or since Xtol was introduced). This goes for 35 mm in a single reel tank as much as for 120. Hundreds of thousands of photographers have gotten good results from this dilution, and my swear by D-76 1+2 or Xtol 1+3, despite that (in 35mm minimum volume) giving significantly less than Kodak's recommended minimum "active developer" volume. For other developers, you'll normally dilute much more than that -- Rodinal, for instance, is typically used at 1:25 or 1:50, sometimes 1:100. So, given Anchell didn't specify which developer he meant, we can only take what was quoted above as more of a rant than a recommendation.
 
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Dani

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I'll have to dig for that thread. I have the "The Film Developing Cookbook" but not the second edition, which I imagine there's a bit more information. I'll have to get that book.


He mentioned some developers...

"All developers require a minimum amount of developing agent in solution per roll of film to prevent oxidation and underdevelopment. While some developers are meant to be diluted in order to make a working solution, others can be used undiluted or with a variety of dilutions. An example of the former would be Ilford DD-X® which is meant to be used 1:4. Though developers such as DD-X diluted 1:4 can be used at 250.0ml per 80 square inches of film 350.0 ml would be better. An example of the latter would be D-76, which is able to be used at various dilutions. Undiluted D-76 can be used at 250.0 ml per 80 square inches of film (though I recommend a minimum of 350.0 ml). However, if you dilute D-76 you should increase the volume of developer to maintain the quantity of developing agent in solution. A good rule to follow would be to increase the amount of developer by the amount of dilution. In the case of D-76 11, use 500.0ml instead of 250.0ml to adjust for the reduced amount of developing agent in solution and the longer development time. If you were to use D-76 13 then use three times the amount of the undiluted developer for a total of 750.0 ml per 802 inches.

There are two reasons photographers might wish to use a lesser volume of developer. The first is they believe they will save money, and the second is that they are afraid of burning out the motor on their rotary processor. In the first case, the extra twenty-five cents spent on developer will be well worth the expense. As far as the motor on the rotary processor, the film you are developing does not care whether you are using a rotary processor, tray, tank, brush, or Versamat. If you insist on using a rotary processor then develop only as many rolls of 25 film as will allow you to use 250.0 ml of developer per 80 inches at a time.

My personal recommendation is to use a Paterson System 4® tank and fill it with 500.0 ml of developer for one 120 roll and 700.0 ml of developer for two rolls of 35 mm film. You will find your negatives are of consistently higher quality."

I have developed hundreds of rolls by now and always gotten good results, never thought I was missing something or that I'd get more. I'm just curious now what others think of those ideas.
 

bluechromis

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With developers that come in a concentrated syrup, the minimum amount of developer is often specified in terms of the amount of the concentrate. For example in the thread at the link they cited this information from Agfa: "'That means that you need 10 ml of concentrate to process 1 film [80 sq. inches]. It does not matter what the dilution is.'" https://www.photo.net/discuss/threads/minimum-amount-of-rodinal.21978/
 

Donald Qualls

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If you're getting the contrast index you want/need to print at around Grade 2 to 2 1/2 at close to the recommended time/temp for your film and developer concentration, and your results are consistent from roll to roll over time, then you're doing fine.

If your contrast is too low, and you're having to extend recommended times more than about 10%, there may be an issue -- but since those times were arrived at by manufacturer (of the film, or of the developer) testing, they ought to generally be pretty close unless you're looking for different results than the tested contrast index.
 

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What especially troubles me is that you see novices first get it in their head that there only needs to be enough developer to barely cover the film. Then they get it in their head that they can save money by using dilute developers. Then they get it in their head that they can save even more money by reusing a developer solution 15 times. Then they ask "Why are my negatives looking crummy?" Anchell and Troop are emphatic that using an inadequate amount of developer is a terrible way to try save money.
 
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bluechromis

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Kino

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When I read the "Darkroom Cookbook" or "Film Cookbook", many times I think, "They just contradicted themselves" or that's not what they said on page (whatever).

But I have come to realize that it is practically impossible to cover all possible variables in any one process with a simple declarative statement. Everything must be analyzed under the particular variables in play AND those variables may yet have been implemented or tested.
 

Sal Santamaura

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The class of developer that requires a minimum of 250ml stock solution includes D-76/ID-11, D-23, Perceptol, etc. Scene brightness distribution will determine whether full development can take place with less. If it's a low-key scene, i.e. less negative density to develop, one might squeak by with less solution. If it's high-key, i.e. a fully developed negative would have lots of density throughout, less than 250ml will result in less than full development. Player's choice: confidence or crap shoot.

XTOL is a different kind of developer. The same situation I just described applies to XTOL too, but that minimum stock solution number is 100ml, not 250ml.

Any other questions?
 

pentaxuser

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The Anchell and Troop write-up seems to leave certain things unsaid: Where did they obtain this allegedly Kodak source of 150ml as the minimum? Are they referring to stock solution? I take it they are but they don't appear to say. I take it that this 150ml is for machine processing in that 150ml might be fine for a machine processor, including a rotary Jobo but spells disaster if it's inversion as the film not is even covered by 150mls

Yes they do mean all of the above and it should be obvious you may say but possibly not so to newcomers. It all seems a little "slack" in the way it has been said or is all that I have mentioned included in the larger context of the book?

What is the evidence of a clear and appreciable difference between a film developed with 150ml and one done with 250ml? Presumably somewhere clarification is given for the likes of the highly concentrated developer like HC110 and indeed also given for the conclusion only applying to Kodak's own developer( HC110 excepted) and not to other maker's developers and films?

pentaxuser
 
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Doremus Scudder

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I would imagine that the amount of developing agents in a particular amount of solution (at whatever dilution) needed to "fully develop" 80 sq inches of film depends a lot on developer formulation (pH, superadditivity, etc.) as well as the particular developing agents used (Metol, hydroquinone, ascorbic acid, glycin, pyrogallol, catechin, etc.)

It would also depend on the "standard" for "fully developed" (whatever that is supposed to mean).

And, it would almost necessarily eliminate compensating development techniques, in which the developer is planned to exhaust before highlights are "fully developed."

If developer activity stops before you get the film speed, shadow density and highlight density you need, then, yes, you likely need more developer. If not, then...

Doremus
 

bluechromis

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Doremus your supposition that,"And [large developer volume], it would almost necessarily eliminate compensating development techniques, in which the developer is planned to exhaust before highlights are "fully developed." is something I have wondered about. For example, if one is using 1 + 100 dilutions of Rodinal and long development times to try to achieve a lot compensation by causing the developer to be locally exhausted in highlight areas, wouldn't it be good to have a weak working solution and by that logic actually minimum volumes of developer would be best? But I have never heard an exception to the rules about the recommendations about minimum developer required in the case of high dilutions and long development times. According to the logic of what you are saying one should be carefully scaling the volume of developer to kind of effect wanted. But I have not heard a reputable source say that would be a good idea. Nor have I heard that large developer volume is an impediment to compensating effects. Anchell and Troop say it is impossible to have too great a volume of developer. But I don't know why. So I wonder if the idea of using a weak solution in order to promote local exhaustion is somehow independent of the need of having an adequate volume of developer. Perhaps it is about a difference between local exhaustion and the overall exhaustion of developer. Perhaps the assumption that a greater volume of developer must be "stronger" and acts more like a less diluted solution is not valid.
 
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Sirius Glass

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When I develop film I fill the tank. If the Jobo tank or drum takes 500mm that is what it takes. If it is a steel tank I fill it up. The developer goes back in its bottle to get mixed around with what was left in the bottle and everything gets mixed and diluted. The developers always seem to be happy with that so there is no need to change that practice.
 

Doremus Scudder

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The variable in the discussion seems to be "fully developed," which doesn't get defined well. For a normal scene and normal development, you need enough developer to deliver the film speed and contrast index/gamma/scale (along with tonal separation) to give you a negative from which you can make an excellent print on medium-contrast grade paper.

The actual amount of development time needed varies with scene contrast, materials, etc. Extreme contractions and expansions are outside of "normal" and are not considered in the ISO standards at all. Development for those situations is often altered to control the overall contrast range on the negative in order to get it to print well.

Certainly, if you are not using enough developer and it exhausts and becomes inactive before development goals are reached, then you need to use more developer. If your development goals are different than "normal," then using less developer than is needed for "normal" might be alright.

Compensation development is often a combination of having the developer exhaust or gradually lose activity toward the end of the development time to rein in the highlights and reduced agitation, which allows even active developer to exhaust in the highlight areas while staying active in the mid-tones and shadows before the next agitation cycle provides fresh, active developer to those areas.

However, most development schemes that deviate from "normal" aren't as useful nowadays with modern materials and their possibilities as the seemed to be in the past.

Best,

Doremus
 

bluechromis

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I am not sure what you are referring to about "The Darkroom Cookbook" having bad information. But in these cases, it is better to go beyond personal opinion to some kind of empirical facts. You said that we should use manufacturer recommendations but Anchell (and Troop) claims that there has been confusion about what Kodak actually recommended about developer volume. He said Kodak's empirical research showed was 150 ml/roll was just a bare minimum that skinflint commercial processors could use to obtain marginally acceptable results. But he said that very same research proved that 250 ml/roll would yield "much better" results. So Anchel could say he was citing manufacturing recommendations but that historically the recommendation that the larger volume was better got lost in the shuffle and 150 ml became accepted as plenty good in popular lore. Anchel and Troop make a strong assertion based upon reputed Kodak science. But to my knowledge, they do not offer not a citation for the Kodak research. I would agree that is not ideal and would be much better if we could access the primary source he refers to. But there are other sources of objective information. I was persuaded when an APUG member, maybe Adrian, did an experiment that showed that developer activity did deteriorate at lower volumes.
 

pentaxuser

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I just couldn't help wondering if there wasn't something reminiscent of a kind of "sales presentation" that you give when you wish to give the impression of wanting excite a warm feeling of admiration in your audience of your earnestness and desire for the very best.

At first hearing or reading you are meant to be left with a good feeling about the presenters' desire for the best which overrides the desire to analyse what has been said or in this case written

pentaxuser
 

Kino

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It makes you wonder if those multi sheet film tanks are not an invitation to disaster. Seems there is no way there could be enough room for the minimum developer volume with something like the 4x5 Yankee tank.
 

MattKing

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Any reference to a Versamat film processor would probably be rooted in the developers recommended for that.
Polydol was probably big with the Versamat crowd.
 

bluechromis

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As usual, there are a lot of opinions, but I hope there could be could some things that could be agreed upon. There may be debate on what is minimum developer required, is 150 ml/roll, 250ml/roll, or something else. But we see that Agfa had recommendations for minimum amount of Rodinal. And far as I know, all major manufacturers say there is some minimum amount of developer needed to obtain the best results. For example, I never heard a manufacturer say one could use 130 ml at a 1 + 1000 dilution for one roll of film. If we at least agree there is SOME minimum, whether 150 ml or 250 ml, that itself has implications that many, especially beginners, don't grasp. There are a lot of people that assume that only thing that matters is that there is enough solution to cover the film. It is like boiling cabbage, as long as there is enough water to cover the cabbage it's good. But if we assume there is some minimum amount of developer needed it means, for one, that one should not try to save money by diluting developer because one ought to use same amount of chemistry and just add more water when diluting. It also has implications for tank size. When deciding about what sort of tank to purchase beginners often think about buying a tank that is just big enough to contain the number of reels that they plan to develop. But that may not be the best way to think about it. If they ever want to use diluted solutions, especially highly diluted solutions, they would be better getting a bigger tank. I recommend that if someone plans to develop one 35 mm roll at a time to get at least a double tank.
 
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Doremus Scudder

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150ml/l of what? 250ml/l of what? Etc. The "what" seems to me to be important. "Developer" does not equal "developer." Any given developer formulation will likely have a minimum needed to give a specified result. That may be similar for certain similar types of developers, but likely different for different types. Apples vs. oranges...

Doremus
 

MattKing

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There will always be a minimum necessary amount of developer necessary, but the amount will vary with:
1) the amount of film being developed;
3) to a small extent, the film being used;
3) the developer being used; and
4) the amount of exposure recorded on the negative - a high key image of a polar bear in snow will demand more developer than a dark scene with more shadows than anything else.
However, recommendations for minimum amounts of developer aren't keyed to individual negatives. They are keyed to:
a) what the average density (and developer required) is of normally encountered negatives on normally encountered film stocks; and
b) how much developer do you need more than the average minimum, in order to develop properly most of the negatives that actually require more.
Kodak's referenced recommendations would have been keyed to the realities of commercial labs, and would have been directed toward criteria b) above.
However, if you spend all your days photographing Caucasian babies with white bonnets on white shag rugs (some people used to do that) and you use film that likes a lot of developer (Tri-X 320?) your minimum developer numbers are likely to be higher.
 

john_s

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The way I see it, there isn't a minimum, there is a continuum. Less developer could mean a smaller amount in rotary processing, or more dilute larger volume to cover the film for inversion processing. They will probably give different results. Less will work, even less will work giving a different result, and even less than that will work giving a different result and so forth. At some point the negs will be pretty flat. And maybe a bit more variability due to differing degrees of exposure and developer freshness etc.

Fwiw, I use a generous amount of very cheap very dilute developer (Pyrocat-HD) in a big tank.
 
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