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Extreme stand developing

mrred

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While talking to a friend of mine, I was explaining how I tried stand developing in a fridge because of a (seemingly) tall tale from some assistant professing that it is what her employer did. I tried a 1:100 Rodinal mix and put a can and appropriate amount of wash water in the fridge for several days. I got developed negs, all be thin ones.

So being board, I just mixed up 1:1000 of Kalogen (about twice the strength of Rodinal, but not Rodinal). That was at 11pm and I will check on it sometime in the morning....room temp this time.

Any tales to add?
 
I tried this a while back. 1:200 in rodinal for 3:30. When I pulled it the emulsion was so soaked it just wiped off at the slightest touch. I wonder if it would have started sloughing off if I left it in a little longer.
 
Several years ago, I shot a roll of tri-x with a Kodak Duaflex. There are two shutter modes, one for "instantaneous" and one that keeps the shutter open as long as you hold the shutter button down. I later realized that I'd had it in this "bulb" mode, so my exposures were all over the place -- holding my breath and pressing the shutter release carefully and gently probably made for some long exposures

I developed it in HC-110 about 1:250 ( 2ml syrup in the tank which holds about 480ml ). Agitated for 30 seconds and then set it on a shelf for an hour. The negatives were all perfectly printable and many of them were surprisingly sharp. There were also no "bromide drag" marks or other problems. I was surprised and thought that was pretty neat, but I never tried it again.

Here's a print from that roll:

At Fort Ross, a former Russian colony on the Sonoma Coast in California
 
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Nice compression with the light from the window.
 
hallo
i tried acros 100 wich rodinal 1:100 for one or two hours stand development. worked fine.

regards

thomas
 
I read a Mortensen article, or maybe it's in one of his books, in which he described developing that way. I tried it with Efke PL-100 and IIRC a glycin only developer. It may have been glycin/metal. Mortensen used glycin, thus my choice. I think I developed four or five hours. The negative has a full contrast range and is rather dense and requires a bit longer to print. I never experimented further because I get such good results with minimal agitation and Pyrocat.
 
Sorry to ask the question but what is the advantage of stand development compared to "normal" development?
 
Dali said:
Sorry to ask the question but what is the advantage of stand development compared to "normal" development?
Click to expand...
you can go to sleep or shopping

regards
thomas
 
Dali said:
Sorry to ask the question but what is the advantage of stand development compared to "normal" development?
Click to expand...

The theory is that it helps keep detail in highlights, because the developer exhausts itself in the highlight areas while remaining active in the parts of the negative that received less light. Without agitation to mix things around, the shadows get full development, but the highlights are held back some.

And you can go shopping
 

You explain the theory but does it work?
 
I have never seen a family of film curves from this technique. Maybe they will show up in this thread.
 
while i have read the threads and heard about the problems
i think if someone wants to try these things and enjoy themselves
they can see what works and doesn't work for them ... i've never stand-developed for longer than maybe 40 mins
( i fell asleep and woke up 10 mins after i was supposed to rinse/fix )
i developed film like this ( c-41, e6, b/w, chromo b/w ) in the same tank, all different iso's, all different ages
( some expired, some way expired some fresh all shelf stored ) for a few years ... and
i didn't have any issues at all, and when i have enough film to process and i don't feel like standing around shuffling them in the dark for 8-15-mins or inverting a tank ...
i'd do it again in a heartbeat.

its not for everyone ... a lot of people love perfection and enjoy that sort of thing. i gave up on perfection a long time ago, set the bar really low and
have a good time. after all, that is why most of us are making photographs anyways ... and if i get a difficult negative or 2 while
i am having a good time, i'll learn how to print it better ... its a win-win ... but like everything

YMMV
 
Mortensen used a technique which he termed developing to gamma infinity. The joke at the time is that he would fill the bathtub with water and add one drop of developer. The film was left for several days.
 
I used semi-stand quite often for a couple of years. I really liked that I could make dinner or a batch of muffins and develop film at the same time. Most of my results were great but I DID get bromide drag on occasion. Never found a way to predict or prevent it, so went back to the usual.
 


I don't think a step wedge would adequately show tonal compression, unless this is what you are referring to uniformity. Personally I either do a very quick pre-soak with some photoflo or just add some to the working solution (just a micro drop). This reduces the associated bromide drag and uneven development issues. If I do the latter I do not pre-soak at all.
 
Why can't you do both the presoak and the micro-drop?
 
Surely "extreme" activities (e.g. Extreme Knitting, Extreme Ironing etc.) need to take place whilst doing some other risky activity - like skydiving or skiing down the Eiger.

Though I suppose that would lead to unwanted agitation in this case.
 
I sometimes give semi-stand in Pyrocat-HD (diluted a lot more than normal) with HP5 sheet film when I want edge effects. I've done semi-stand in other developers including Rodinal, and it does not compare or come close to what Pyrocat-HD can do.
 

Thanks for this Michael. Very interesting.
 
Gerald C Koch said:
Mortensen used a technique which he termed developing to gamma infinity. The joke at the time is that he would fill the bathtub with water and add one drop of developer. The film was left for several days.
Click to expand...

I fixed the film at noon today. That gave it 13 hrs at 1:1000. The leaders (35mm) were mud grey, but not enough development to see any images. In the spirit of what you have said, Gerry, the next (same dilution) one I will leave in the tank until Friday.


edit: I think I will give it a shake once a day
 
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