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Full-speed compensating developer

2F/2F said:
Come on now.....Why use film with this type of photography? Seriously. Match your medium to your content. Shoot digital and be done with it. There is nothing film will add to this sort of "stuff".
Click to expand...

ugh. don't remind me...

it's a sick world.
 
cbphoto said: My highlights with Rodinal are always very gray, but pulled up easily with a grade 3 or 3.5 filter.


I'm primarily a portraitist, and I build my negatives solely for facial tones. I use incident, mid tone readings to determine the Exposure Index. I use Rodinal when the light is flat, or when I want to show specular highlights in the background. I use Xtol when there are hot lights on the subject's face. I'm obviously not going for 'fashion hot' highlights ! (I carry a little spot meter to read the backgrounds, and use a little digital camera as polaroid)

But for YOUR stuff, Rodinal is probably perfect because you get those long midtones, powerful blacks (and can choose a soft black if you wish) and that long, long range of bright tones.

SO, you're developing Tri X in 1+50 for about 20 minutes with agitation every 5th minute. Good. If you want the highlights to brighten, simply agitate a little more. Every third minute will probably put you right on target. More, or less, agitation will increase or diminish the brighter tones. You have a lot of control with TX and Rodinal, and by changing only the agitation, you can pretty much dial in your highlights like turning a dimmer on a lightboard.

Your Valoy is a fantastic machine, it will run 'hotter' than your 301 because of the condensor.

You have a lot of control, too, with your paper developer (if you are printing fiber). You may find that (assuming you are using Dektol)
that you get more control of your bright tones with a slightly softer developer like Ethol LPD, or scratch mixed D-52.

d
 
I actually do use LPD! Love it.

Highlight control has never been my problem. I'm shooting more available light, so I'm trying to maintain that same level of control, but maximize the shadow detail.
 
I'm shooting more available light, so I'm trying to maintain that same level of control, but maximize the shadow detail.

OK, you can do that with Xtol.

Xtol & Tri-X whether straight or diluted, builds shadow density that you can measure at Zone I or II, all the way up to 3200.

Of course, the rest of the scale rises as well. HOWEVER, you can use it 1+1 or 1+2, and reduce the agitation to every 3rd or 5th minute.

IF it were me, however, I'd venture using XTOL replenished (check the Xtol directions at the Kodak site). Kodak's times for Replenished XTOL in Tri-X 35mm (agitation every minute) are 10 1/2 minutes for 1600 and 12 minutes for 3200.

When the developer is seasoned (do a quick search here for XTOL replenishment and seasoning !) you'll be able to adjust the time and agitation to give you what you are probably dreaming of. No, you won't get 'pushed' looking images, you'll get a proper image !

WARNING: yes, Kodak suggests this. It works for me. Those are two reasons you MUST test it carefully :
 
2F/2F said:
Come on now.....Why use film with this type of photography? Seriously. Match your medium to your content. Shoot digital and be done with it. There is nothing film will add to this sort of "stuff".
Click to expand...

NO film photography for YOU! Come back one year!

;^)
 

DEFINITELY going to try both of these methods. Thank you so much for the information. What kind of qualitative difference do you (or anyone) think I'll see between diluted one-shot and replenished? I did some reading, and the replenished developer is reputed to give better highlight separation without the modern harsh look that fresh developer can give. Would the diluted Xtol with subdued agitation match that quality? How is the "look" most obviously different?

Thanks for enduring all of these questions. I want to have as much information as possible going into this. I've really been using nothing but Rodinal since I started developing 10 years or so ago.
 
Tri X @800 in Acufine will give you very similar results to Rodinal - I would actually recommend to use ACU-1 or dilute Acufine and use it as a one shot developer, this way you get more compensating effects. However, THE compensating developer par excellence is Diafine - due to the 2 bath action. It will give you mushy grain and a bit compressed tonality, but you can expose it easily at EI 1250.
 
What kind of qualitative difference do you (or anyone) think I'll see between diluted one-shot and replenished?

I'm not to answer that ! Try it out --- follow the method Kodak describes in the Xtol publication:
http://www.kodak.com:80/global/en/professional/support/techPubs/j109/j109.pdf

The fastest way to start a spitting contest is to say something good and wonderful about it !
If you see a difference, there's a difference. It's subtle, and for a lot of folks it is more trouble than it's worth. For others, it's just the thing.
 

That's my fear about Diafine: I'm really hooked on the super-sharp grain I get from Rodinal. I do want to try the Acufine one of these days.
 
How About a Compensating Developer?

Classic compensating developers such as Crawley's
FX-1, Beutler's, and Mason's were formulated for the
purpose of compensation. They are all metol - sulfite
- carbonate blends. Comparatively they are all used
very dilute.

Because of the carbonate contained they may be
expected to act more quickly than the very dilute
D-23 I suggested earlier this thread. Dan
 

I keep reading that, but I have to say that Tri-X in Diafine at 800-1250 is as close to a miracle as you'll see in photoland.... ;-)

Is it possible to properly develop Tri-X @ 400 in Diafine? Would you have to mix a batch with a higher dilution or simply cut development time?

I once accidentally developed a roll of Tri-X that I had shot at 400 in Diafine. the results were interesting. The shadows were incredibly open yet the highlights were not totally blown. Overall it wasn't a totally failure.
 
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Harry,

Why not test Tri X in plain ol' Diafine at 400 ?
 
That formula (AB 55) also came up in a Darkroom and Creative Camera article from about 15 years ago. Is it still made, and if so, by whom? Can you mix this yourself?
Thanks
 
takef586 said:
However, THE compensating developer par excellence is Diafine - due to the 2 bath action. It will give you mushy grain and a bit compressed tonality, but you can expose it easily at EI 1250.
Click to expand...

I find my Diafine negatives to have quite sharp and fine grain, as mentioned earlier, on par with Rodinal where I used reduced agitation techniques like df cardwell describes.
 
OK, anybody want to define the term, "Compensation" ?

See you later.

BONUS QUESTION: What does it mean to say that a "Highlight is blown out" ?

Alt. Bonus Question: How many words can you find in "Christmas" ?
 
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Alterations in standard development materials, parameters, and/or procedures that are made in order to compensate for the excessive contrast that would arise with standard development when an excessive brightness range has exposed the latent image.
 
df cardwell said:
OK, anybody want to define the term, "Compensation" ?

See you later.
Click to expand...

Compensation - what you'd have to provide to get me to completely read through a random set of definitions of what compensation means with respect to film development.

Lee
 
df cardwell said:
OK, anybody want to define the term, "Compensation" ?

See you later.

BONUS QUESTION: What does it mean to say that a "Highlight is blown out" ?

Alt. Bonus Question: How many words can you find in "Christmas" ?
Click to expand...

My idea of those things:

Compensation = exhaustion of developer activity on the highlights while the shadows continue to develop.

Blown out = lacking detail due to overexposure or overdevelopment

Christmas = scrim, stash, sh*i, shat, scram, cram, chat, mat, mast, mist, cast....i could go on...
 
Compensation doesn't really exist. When we achieve 'compensation',
we are managing to capture information in the 'headroom' of the negative,
without overflowing the Dmax.

Rodinal, Beutlers, and other developers tend toward high Dmax, normal contrast negatives.
They support high dilution, and low agitation, and let us make negatives with generous shadow densities ,
fine local contrast, and as much highlight information we can figure out how to print.

That is really the key to compensation. We can choose paper developers to help this.
Dektol is the default developer today, primarily because it was the standard commercial developer for the past 50 years.
It is as contrasty a developer you can make up without getting into Lith Printing. In my darkroom, with no filtration,
my threshold white on Ilford MG IV WT is about 1.5 (contact printing a Kodak Step Tablet).

Ethol LPD (a fine developer having a nice comeback) places the white threshold close to 1.8. It is a longer scale than Dektol,
because it better expresses the toe of the paper, and tends to fit my negatives better than Dektol.

You can use a pure metol developer (Agfa 120, or Selectol Soft, or some variation) and record a higher threshold,
but you need a small amount of dilute Dektol to make a strong black.

And THEN you can use your MG filters. There are all kinds of ways to reach the information stored in the highlights of a Rodinal/Beutler negative.

The other way to 'compensate' is to use a film like Tri-X, which has a very high Dmax, and records far more highlight information than we normally need. All the funny business we go through to 'compensate' Tri-X is unnecessary because it is holding the data anyhow. The best thing we can do is expose generously, give gentle development, and use agitation to control the local contrast so the negative prints easily.

If you combine Tri-X and Rodinal, you will get a straight line approaching 16 stops. In other words, before you hit the point of the curve where highlights begin to shoulder, you can capture a brightness range of 32,000 :1.

ON THE OTHER HAND, you can use a film like Neopan 400, which has a strong shoulder and is very resistant to building a long straight line. Used with Xtol, the combination gives a great shadow details while compressing the bright, bright highlights. Many would feel that the combination is perfect for compensation, because it makes an easy to print negative which magically controls bright highlights.

Depending on the photographer, and the circumstance, the Neopan/Xtol negative, which fits it’s full 1.8 density on a sheet of paper, may be seen as the perfect, compensating film & developer.

The same may be said for Tri-X and Rodinal, whose nature is quite the opposite.

A “blown highlight” describes whichever case you don’t want !

The thing we must each do is to test our materials and see what is going on. There is no need of a densitometer, just contacting printing will tell us all we need to know.

Most of what is written down, that is true or useful, is limited in its scope. We can describe our results, but we seldom are able to predict accurately what our results will be if we apply our principles to a new condition. Too many variables exist to build a system that can function without testing and examination. Ansel Adams may have done it one way, but it’s my problem now, and his way might not fit the picture I need to make today. But Adam’s advice was always to test. And so it is with notions like COMPENSATION. Decide what you need to happen, and test your normal procedure. Decide what needs to change.

There is no magic, photography doesn’t require it !
 
df cardwell said:
Harry,

Why not test Tri X in plain ol' Diafine at 400 ?
Click to expand...

I did. By accident (see second half of my post).

THe result was interesting. Enormous amount of shadow detail and miraculously the highlights weren't fried. A very low contrast image, that was not a total disaster, but not really useable
.
I was curious if it would work if I made a batch of diluted Diafine or perhaps cut the development time (in half?). Has anyone experimented with this?
 
Harry, we just overlapped posts. I was being helpful:rolleyes:while you were editing !

I only asked because most of the guys I've known shooting Diafine and TX just rated it at box speed. It call comes down to metering and how one build the image, I guess.

I wouldn't dare shorten the development time, but diluting the A would surely do the trick.
 
Hey cardwell, no offense taken. I probably should have put a ;-) at the end of that.

Now that I think about it I see why you wouldn't shorten the development time, but diluting bath A should have
the desired effect. The big question of course is by how much and that can probably only be answered by experimentation.

I've been using Barry Thronton's 2-bath for the past 2 years with Tri-X. I tend to meter a little on the conservative side, probably rating the film around 320asa. BT 2-bath has worked brilliantly during the daytime, but I do notice a little speed loss, when the light levels drop.

I really would like to find a 2-bath developer that gave me a full 400asa out of Tri-X 400. Maybe a version of divided D76 is the answer.
 
H. James Wolf said:
That formula (AB 55) also came up in a Darkroom and Creative Camera article from about 15 years ago. Is it still made, and if so, by whom? Can you mix this yourself?
Thanks
Click to expand...
Last I checked the manufacturer was Cachet. However it could have hit the dustbin like so many other B/W developer kits. A fine panthermic 2-part compensating developer. In my experience it showed slightly more film speed than diafine and greater acutance. Changing the stock dilution of the "A" part enabled some contrast control.
 
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