Fixer before developer

[Old_Dick]

The closest thing I've done is, develop Kodachrome in Microdol-X

 

[GarageBoy]

I feel your pain. 50 years ago, after shooting photos that needed to go to the printer that evening to make the press run of our high school newspaper, I put fixer in first, realizing that 'ohshit' moment just as I finished filling the tank with fixer. I had to drive back and reshoot, and go back to the darkroom, with 1.5 hours lost before the deadline!
I made the deadline, by printing wet negatives.

Many a newspaper lab rat have done the same thing, regularly - many nice aluminum negative holders have been sacrificed so that images got onto newsprint faster

 

[cliveh]

Instead of just labelling, try colour coding - blue for dev - yellow for stop - red for fix.

 

[dE fENDER]

This is new to me. I always thought that if the fixer is reasonably fresh then 30 secs of immersion and agitation was enough to make rescue impossible. Can you tell us more about your process?

When you expose film to light, some AgHal molecules converts to metal silver. When you put this film to fixer, all AgHal will be washed out, but these metal particles will not. They are not visible to naked eye, but can became centers of silver crystal forming, which will take place, if you process your film in physical developing solution, which contains silver nitrate and a developing agent. This technique is used when you need an extremely low grain, but sensitivity will fall in several times. Besides, it works badly with modern emulsions and if your developer or fixer contained strong silver solvent, these little metal silver particles possibly are already destroyed.

 

[Sirius Glass]

So sorry ...

 

[Europan]

Moscow knows it all, perfectly correct. It still might be worth a try but one shouldn’t expect miracles.

 

[DWThomas]

I follow Bdial's approach, and have so far done well, but readily admit "brain farts happen."

We have to be philosophical and accept these moments as proof of our humanity!

 

[Vaughn]

Should have some nice deep blacks there...

 

[Nodda Duma]

Should have some nice deep blacks there...

Haha, Indeed!

 

[Luckless]

Thank you for sharing your pain and loss.

Posts like these help me be paranoid of screwing up for my own work, and keep me triple checking everything is in order before the first pour.

 

[pentaxuser]

When you expose film to light, some AgHal molecules converts to metal silver. When you put this film to fixer, all AgHal will be washed out, but these metal particles will not. They are not visible to naked eye, but can became centers of silver crystal forming, which will take place, if you process your film in physical developing solution, which contains silver nitrate and a developing agent. This technique is used when you need an extremely low grain, but sensitivity will fall in several times. Besides, it works badly with modern emulsions and if your developer or fixer contained strong silver solvent, these little metal silver particles possibly are already destroyed.

Thanks for the explanation.

pentaxuser