Developing Tech Pan - Practical Developer Options

mawz

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I'm back shooting film after a 5 year break and I've got 2-3 rolls of Tech Pan in the fridge, long expired now, but it's been refrigerated since new, or practically so.

I'd like to shoot it, but given Tech Pan Developer is long gone, what are my options for developing?

Constraints:

1. I don't mix my own developer.
2. I stock Blazinal (Rodinal R09), D-76 and Cawenol (professionally packaged Caffenol-C), but have access locally to pretty much all the common options from Kodak, Ilford & Cinestill, plus a few others.
3. I don't mind ordering as long as I'm not stuck with large quantities of something extremely specialized.
4. If it's compatible with ADOX CMS20 as well, I'll be willing to buy larger quantities even if it's only good for TP + CMS20
5. Excessively high contrast negs are a challenge for my workflow after developing
 

Nicholas Lindan

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Technidol is still available on ebay, though the prices are a bit idiotic.

I never found anything else that worked as well, including POTA (that I had high hopes for). There are lots of things that will give you an image, but getting that 4x5 look from a 35mm negative and getting pretty grainless 20x24 prints, not so much.

The one I haven't tried though, and that Kodak says will work for pictorial negatives, is C41 developer. I should get some and try it - I still have some 'end-of-life' purchase Technidol left, but I have several 100ft spools and a brick of Tech Pan left so I am going to have to find something I am happy with.

* * *​

Technical pan is not a microfilm - it is a continuous tone film developed from films made for solar flare observation and electron microscopy. When developed in 'normal' developers it produces a very high contrast continuous tone negative suitable for these 'technical' applications. Developers that are designed in an attempt to get a continuous tone negative from microfilm aren't a good fit for this film.
 
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Donald Qualls

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The recipe for POTA is public. There's also a public recipe (whether genuine or not, it works like the original) for H&W Control. And I've processed microfilms (including CMS20) in a version of Caffenol (the low contrast version might be possible to make from the commercial one you have) and in Rodinal 1:100.

C-41 (don't bleach or blix!) is a very good option if you already have it; otherwise, I'd probably try a clip test with your Cawenol mixed at half strength -- that's close to what I used to use as Caffenol LC+C.
 
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mawz

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Thanks folks.

I don't want to put too much effort in, it's only a couple rolls.

The results shown from Rodinal 1:150 look really good overall, and I have that already. I'll probably do one roll that way.
 

Donald Qualls

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mawz said:
The results shown from Rodinal 1:150 look really good overall, and I have that already. I'll probably do one roll that way.
Click to expand...

Notice also the three minutes between agitation cycles -- that helps control contrast while letting the development time bring up the shadows.
 

Arvee

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I'm working my way through a 20 roll brick (exp. '86 but refrigerated) and picked this up from Prof Lynn Jones (photo.net): TP, ISO 64, Rodinal 1+100 7' @ 20 C. It's been working very well for me.
 

Andrew O'Neill

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If I still had any of that film, I would develop it in Adotech IV, since I've got a couple of bottles on hand. If not, I'd mix up POTA.
 

destroya

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I have tried a lot of developers (didnt want to pay the crazy prices for the official developer) and found the best was straight c41 developer. 70 degrees 7.75 min, with an ISO of 32
john
 
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