Developing AgfaPhoto APX 400 in Adonal

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cromatt

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Hi all!

I’m after a bit of help, I’ve just developed a roll of AgfaPhoto APX 400 in Adonal Developer and the negs have come out a bit darker than expected (not too dark to print but still pretty dark compared to my usual results.

I did this:

Developed at 11.5 mins (as the dev chart stated), agitating 4 x every 30 secs

Then 30 secs Stop, 5 mins Fix, 5 mins Wash

Is there something I’m doing wrong?

Could it just be that it wasn’t done at the right temp?
 

TomR55

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I will assume that your exposure (and processing temperature) was correct. I’ve used this film—it’s another iteration of Kentmere 400 (I mention this in case you’re using the Massive Development Chart on the Digital Truth website, … you might check developing specs for that film too).

I know nothing about Adonal, but I found that agitating this film constantly for the first minute (gentle inversions with alternating twists), and then agitating 5 seconds every 30 seconds helped with the contrast and overall ‘flat’ response. I am certain that others on this forum have experience with this film and may be more helpful.
 

koraks

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Developed at 11.5 mins (as the dev chart stated), agitating 4 x every 30 secs

Dilution...1+50?

the negs have come out a bit darker than expected

Can we see some pictures of the negatives? Just a phone snapshot of the film itself held against a backlight would be nice. No scans or anything; just the negatives as they appear in real life.
Overall dense can also be due to liberal exposure.

it’s another iteration of Kentmere 400

Good point; it always helps to know what material you're really working with. Didn't this newfangled 'AgfaPhoto' film already go through several incarnations based on quite different films?
 
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Could it just be that it wasn’t done at the right temp?

Absolutely! Temperature is just as important as duration and dilution. As a rule of thumb, reactions go twice as fast for a temperature increase of 10 K, if I remember my 10th-ish grade chemistry and biology right.
 
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From my experience Kentmere 400/APX 400 needs a longer development time and/or less dilution. Rodinal is quite linear: if you double the dilution you have to double development time. I've had good results with Rodinal 1+25 at 20 degrees C for 7 1/2 minutes. That would be 15 minutes at 1+50. Your agitation scheme seems allright. So maybe try a longer time in the developer.
 
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Now you write it, the initial post seems unclear for me. I automatically assumed dark prints/negatives with not enough density because of the 11 1/2 minutes. But if thats for 1+25, it would most certainly lead to very dense negatives.
 
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Here’s an attachment - I diluted 1+25
 

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koraks

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Ah. There's something totally wrong there. This is not a regular developing problem, but some kind of massive fogging. Fog is commonly caused by the following things:
1. Light; i.e. light leaks in the camera or development tank, forgetting to load the center column in the development tank, or trying to handle unprocessed film under 'safelight' conditions as if it were photo paper.
2. Radiation; xrays especially as emitted by CT scanners exposes film.
3. Age; this is really a combination of (2) and normal chemical deterioration of an emulsion.
4. Chemical fogging; e.g. by bringing certain sulfur compounds (sodium sulfide, thiourea) in contact with the film before it is processed.

Applying the above to your film:
(1) usually gives more uneven fogging patterns; your film looks to be fogged very severely and evenly across the entire surface, assuming the rest of the film looks like the bit you've posted. The exception is safelight fogging, which tends to be complete and can very much look like this. Did you load this film from its cassette into the developing tank under safelight conditions?
(2) I've yet to see xray fogging anywhere near this strong. It would take many passes through even a modern CT scanner to build this kind of density.
(3) Only film that's very old (>10 years) and stored under very bad conditions (high heat) would be fogged this badly.
(4) It's generally uncommon for fogging compounds to come into contact with a development tank, unless you happen to have processed E6 slide film - but even then, the fogging agent would have washed out with subsequent processing steps. So this kind of fogging is really only likely if some kind of major mistake happened during processing and frankly I can't think of anything that is likely to happen. Contamination of the developer with a fogging compound is unlikely to the point of impossible, especially with store-bought Adonal.

Can you tell us please what happened with this film before you developed it?

PS a few things we can rule out: this is not the result of developing at a few degrees warmer than prescribed or a few minutes longer than optimal, so you don't have to worry if you looked up the right temperature, time & dilution for this film. The outcome wouldn't have been the kind of catastrophic failure we're seeing here.
 
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cromatt

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Thanks so much for your response, I really appreciate it.

So I loaded the film into the dev tank in a bag that I’d purchased and used multiple times before.

And that was it, then I started developing
 

koraks

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Thanks for clarifying; that's odd.

How old was the film? How was it stored since you received it? Have you traveled with this particular roll of film, and/or has it gone through any kind of luggage inspection system at any point?

These changing bags sometimes give problems with light leaks along the sleeves, although this generally doesn't fog the film so evenly all over its surface.
While you were using the changing bag, did direct sunlight shine directly onto the bag?
 
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cromatt

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I know! I got it recently, have done no traveling and it was in a drawer which doesn't get particularly hot/cold
 

lamerko

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Maybe it was loaded in the tank at "safe" light? If it isn't, maybe it was fried with heat or something went terribly wrong in the processing.
Incident lighting usually results in uneven exposures, not as uniform as base fog...
 
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A stab in the dark but as in the picture of the film, its colour isnt very visible, could it be massively underfixed?
OP, was the fixer fresh? Can you show us another picture ofth negatives, this time not against the light, looking at the emulsion (matte) side?
 

foc

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could it be massively underfixed?

That was my first impression when I viewed the posted image.

Could the OP try and re-fix the negative strip and see if it helps? (put the negative strip into a tray or beaker of fresh fixer for say 5 minutes, then wash and dry as normal. It won't damage the negative strip)
 

john_s

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When you invert the image, there is a patch that does look like uneven and inadequate fixing.
 
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cromatt

cromatt

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That was my first impression when I viewed the posted image.

Could the OP try and re-fix the negative strip and see if it helps? (put the negative strip into a tray or beaker of fresh fixer for say 5 minutes, then wash and dry as normal. It won't damage the negative strip)

Thanks, I’ll give that a go - I hadn’t used fresh fixer so that may be the problem…
 

DeletedAcct1

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Here’s an attachment - I diluted 1+25

Too much base fog. Probably the film is outdated and/or stored improperly...
Is it the original Agfa Apx 400 made in Leverkusen or the newish Apx400?
 

DeletedAcct1

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it’s the new one but maybe a bad batch?

When it comes to Agfa it's often difficult to assess the real origin of the film. It can really be that your Apx 400 film is the results of old master roll coated by Agfa in Leverkusen and sold to Lupus Imaging or the new Agfa incarnation.
 
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