ECN-2 Development Troubleshooting

Flares · Sunday at 10:17 PM

This's from a roll of reflx lab's respooled AHU 250D, and my ECN-2 developer was a half batch based on Kodak's recipe. So 1g sodium sulfite, 0.6g sodium bromide, 2g CD-3, 12.8g sodium carbonate, and 1.35g of sodium bicarb mixed in 500mL of water. Developer was mixed a few minutes before use, developed for 3 minutes at 106F, then discarded. Then just ran through some ferricyanide bleach and color fix.

I'm at a loss as to what's causing those color bands on the sides of the frame. I ran this roll in a patterson tank rotary processing with a Pira Darkroom Helper, so it shouldn't be an uneven agitation or temperature issue. I mix all the chemistry to 0.01g of precision on a scale, so I don't believe it's a mixing issue. Anyone here have any clue what I might've borked?

Spektrum · Monday at 2:34 AM

Have you ever before developed ECN-2 films using your own homemade chemicals?
You didn't mention a stop bath.
In my experience, when developing colors at home using Ferri Bleach (both C-41 and ECN-2) a stop bath is necessary.
This prevents stains resulting from Ferri Bleach interacting with developer residues on the film. This has been discussed many times here on the forum.
For example, see this link: https://www.photrio.com/forum/threads/color-cast-problem-with-diy-color-negative-chemistry.212253/

You don't have to use sulfuric acid. Glacial acetic acid or even white vinegar from the grocery store will work. Of course, you need to use the right concentration.
To this, add 10g-20g of sodium sulfite (I also add sodium acetate). After this bath, rinse the negative thoroughly with water before using Ferri Bleach.

koraks · Monday at 3:29 AM

Spektrum said:
You didn't mention a stop bath.
In my experience, when developing colors at home using Ferri Bleach (both C-41 and ECN-2) a stop bath is necessary.

Yeah, good advice. Most likely this is the issue.

@Flares, in addition to the above, you could try adding a pre-soak to your process to promote even wetting of the film with developer. But the stop bath & sulfite clearing are essential if you use a ferricyanide bleach.

loccdor · Monday at 6:46 AM

Is that Phoenix II? Looks like its signature orange.

Spektrum · Monday at 6:48 AM

Flares said:
This's from a roll of reflx lab's respooled AHU 250D

No it is not Phoenix II. It is Kodak Vision3 without remjet.

thinkbrown · Monday at 6:53 AM

Well that's a pretty wild result, never seen that before.

I mix my developer based on Kodak module 7 (I sub the sodium bromide for potassium because I've got loads of it), use grocery store white vinegar diluted to 1% as a stop bath, and then use c41 bleach and fixer. Never seen anything like that.

loccdor · Monday at 6:53 AM

Spektrum said:
No it is not Phoenix II. It is Kodak Vision3 without remjet.

Thank you. My coffee hasn't kicked in yet.

Spektrum · Monday at 7:00 AM

thinkbrown said:
I mix my developer based on Kodak module 7 (I sub the sodium bromide for potassium because I've got loads of it), use grocery store white vinegar diluted to 1% as a stop bath, and then use c41 bleach and fixer. Never seen anything like that.

You're using C41 bleach and fixer, so it's probably EDTA or PDTA-based. These results in the OP's case are due to the use of ferricyanide bleach and probably not using a cleani-stop bath after the developer and before the bleach.

thinkbrown · Monday at 7:03 AM

Spektrum said:
You're using C41 bleach and fixer, so it's probably EDTA or PDTA-based. These results in the OP's case are due to the use of ferricyanide bleach and probably not using a cleani-stop bath after the developer and before the bleach.

Yeah, that seems plausible based on the thread thus far. I haven't every dealt with ferrocyanide bleach afaik.

Spektrum · Monday at 7:18 AM

The author of the thread I linked to in post #2 had the same problem.

Even if you're using EDTA/PDTA-based bleach/blix, also use the STOP bath (adding sodium sulfite wouldn't hurt).

After the STOP bath, rinse with water before applying bleach. This is mandatory for ferri bleach

The basic rule is to rinse thoroughly before each subsequent bath.

Samu · Monday at 10:12 AM

Spektrum said:
Have you ever before developed ECN-2 films using your own homemade chemicals?
You didn't mention a stop bath.
In my experience, when developing colors at home using Ferri Bleach (both C-41 and ECN-2) a stop bath is necessary.
This prevents stains resulting from Ferri Bleach interacting with developer residues on the film. This has been discussed many times here on the forum.
For example, see this link: https://www.photrio.com/forum/threads/color-cast-problem-with-diy-color-negative-chemistry.212253/

You don't have to use sulfuric acid. Glacial acetic acid or even white vinegar from the grocery store will work. Of course, you need to use the right concentration.
To this, add 10g-20g of sodium sulfite (I also add sodium acetate). After this bath, rinse the negative thoroughly with water before using Ferri Bleach.

You can't buy glacial acetic acid anymore freely in the EU. It is classified as a drug precursor. 60% is the maximum strength, but as a stop bath. this is of course not an issue. The ban on sulfuric acid, and restrictions for selling potassium permanganate cause more problems (bleach for black & white reversal process).

Spektrum · Monday at 4:59 PM

I don't know if this is banned across the EU.
You probably know better, but I order glacial acetic acid on the popular Polish marketplace Allegro, even 5 liters, and they ship it to me.
Perhaps this is up to individual EU member states..

I am attaching a screenshot of the Allegro offer in the original Polish language and the same image translated.

Spektrum · Monday at 5:11 PM

Samu said:
The ban on sulfuric acid, and restrictions for selling potassium permanganate cause more problems (bleach for black & white reversal process).

In Poland I can buy as much potassium permanganate as I want.

koraks · Monday at 5:34 PM

There may/will be local restrictions for the purchase of some chemistry, such as obligatory end use declarations. In those cases, shopping abroad may be a practical solution, but it's technically illegal if you're using it to circumvent restrictive legislation. YMMV.

As to acetic acid, I always just purchase unscented cleaning vinegar. It's more expensive per liter of pure acid than glacial acetic acid, but (1) it can be bought in every supermarket here, so it's easy to obtain and (2) if you spill some on your clothes, it doesn't burn a hole straight through the textile and the skin underneath, and (3) the smell when opening the bottle is decidedly less obnoxious. Cleaning vinegar works OK as an ECN2 stop bath in my experience; I use it all the time.

Rudeofus · Monday at 5:40 PM

There is no need to buy Glacial Acetic Acid, and I can (here in Central Europe) easily buy Acetic Acid 80% in 5 liter quantities with no questions asked. Sulfuric Acid is even easier, since it's an essential ingredient in car batteries.

Permanganate is (or has been) used as desinfectant, so it may be available, at least in small quantities, in pharmacies. And in Poland, of course, where chemicals are somehow legally on sale when they are already quite difficult to obtain everywhere else I was once told "I can only sell you the whole 1kg. I don't even want to open the can, because this stuff is sooo corrosive!".

NortheastPhotographic · Monday at 5:40 PM

I would definitely just run that new stuff C41. ECN2 is only going to give you a lower contrast negative.

Spektrum · Monday at 7:30 PM

Gentlemen, I don't know if you've noticed, but we've completely strayed from the topic.

In fact, we should wait to see what the OP will answer us.

koraks · Tuesday at 2:33 AM

NortheastPhotographic said:
I would definitely just run that new stuff C41. ECN2 is only going to give you a lower contrast negative.

C41 will give crossed-over color curves. It's still an ECN2 film. Best results will be had with ECN2 development. If higher gamma is desired, e.g. for optical printing, extend development by 30-45 seconds.

NortheastPhotographic · Tuesday at 1:43 PM

koraks said:
C41 will give crossed-over color curves. It's still an ECN2 film. Best results will be had with ECN2 development. If higher gamma is desired, e.g. for optical printing, extend development by 30-45 seconds.

I've scanned a lot of rolls developed ECN2 and C41. It's not a significant difference save the ECN2 rolls need yet more boosted contrast in the scanner. People think they're getting this big unlock by using ECN2, they're not. IMHO all the movie film color negative stuff looks like crap compared to normal print films.

koraks · Tuesday at 1:48 PM

NortheastPhotographic said:
I've scanned a lot of rolls developed ECN2 and C41.

I've scanned it to, and optically printed as well.
It's a 'big unlock' for sure if you print your negatives.

As far as scanning is concerned - digital post is very flexible. It almost doesn't matter what you throw at it; you can make it come out OK either way.

NortheastPhotographic said:
IMHO all the movie film color negative stuff looks like crap compared to normal print films.

Okay. I'll go burn stack of 'crap' prints now. Just a sec.

Flares · Tuesday at 5:24 PM

Spektrum said:
Have you ever before developed ECN-2 films using your own homemade chemicals?
You didn't mention a stop bath.
In my experience, when developing colors at home using Ferri Bleach (both C-41 and ECN-2) a stop bath is necessary.
This prevents stains resulting from Ferri Bleach interacting with developer residues on the film. This has been discussed many times here on the forum.
For example, see this link: https://www.photrio.com/forum/threads/color-cast-problem-with-diy-color-negative-chemistry.212253/

You don't have to use sulfuric acid. Glacial acetic acid or even white vinegar from the grocery store will work. Of course, you need to use the right concentration.
To this, add 10g-20g of sodium sulfite (I also add sodium acetate). After this bath, rinse the negative thoroughly with water before using Ferri Bleach.

This was most likely it. I normally wash my film rather aggressively between dev & bleach but probably didn't do a good enough job this time and had some prussian blue forming because of it.

Should be easy enough to mix up some stop bath with household vinegar for future rolls. What's the point of adding sodium sulfite to the stop bath though?

Spektrum · Tuesday at 6:17 PM

Let me paste a link to a post written by the unfortunately deceased PE, who was an expert on photographic chemistry on this forum.

C41 Bleach: Pot.Ferricyanide Vs. Ammonium Ferric EDTA

Hallo everybody, there are many advantages by working with c41 chemicals when you not use bleach and fixer as one solution. Also named as "Bix" - just like, for example, the tetenal c41 home-kits contains. This is offen discused here on APUG. One can find so many tread as one would like to...

www.photrio.com

koraks · Wednesday at 2:11 AM

Flares said:
What's the point of adding sodium sulfite to the stop bath though?

It's there to avoid instantaneous oxidation of the color developer in the bleach bath by means of the ferricyanide, which is quite aggressive. This oxidation can/will result in fogging of the film. It would be a perfect explanation for the problem shown in #1.

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