Help diagnose a development problem, please

Unless Fuji has deliberately decided to make its edge markings this faint and that seems unlikely then as long the developer is good and the time is as per that recommended then the state of the exposed frames are irrelevant, aren't they. The edge markings will be unaffected.

The faintness of the edge markings can surely be cleared up if enough of our richer members who can afford Acros II were to comment on what their edge markings look like

Calling all Acros II users who develop in Xtol? Are any in the house able to help ?

pentaxuser

bluechromis said:

With respect to the question about what film to use for testing, I think all the films you mentioned except slide film would work. I think the more important thing is to consistently use one of them, at least for now, so you can get a feel for how it responds to development. The thing is there are too many variables, exposure, agitation, duration of development, temperature etc. The goal is to control things as much a possible so that we can change only ONE variable at time to see the effect that has. If we are changing multiple variables then we have no idea what caused what.

Click to expand...

Thanks for your reply. So true about multiple variables. If I had not decided to develop my first-ever roll of Acros in a new-to-me developer, I would have better experience to guide me.

Now I am trying to investigate two different issues:
1. Metering. Are my hand-held meters reading correctly? Am I using them wrong? And,
2. Is the XTOL performing as expected?

Obviously, shooting a roll of slide film will not help with #2, but I was thinking it might help with #1. For me, it is hard to see the difference between a slightly underexposed negative and a correctly exposed one - but I can easily see when a slide is not exposed correctly.

I am planning to limit the test roll to one scene, all shots of the same subject with the same lighting. My plan is to take an incident reading as a base exposure, and then -1, -2, -3, and -4 stops, followed by +1, +2, +3, and +4 stops. And then repeat that sequence on the second half of the test roll. After I cut the roll in half for developing in the two different developers, then:
- Looking at either half of the test roll, the only variable will be exposure, possibly showing me something about my meter reading(?)
- And comparing a given exposure on the first half of the roll to the same exposure on the second half, the only variable will be the developer.

From post #24, "With developers in general and especially Xtol it is good to do a clip test..." Why "especially Xtol"?

runswithsizzers said:

From post #24, "With developers in general and especially Xtol it is good to do a clip test..." Why "especially Xtol"?

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Because unlike some other developers, when X-Tol dies from contamination or exhaustion, it doesn't change appearance.

runswithsizzers said:

Thanks for your reply. So true about multiple variables. If I had not decided to develop my first-ever roll of Acros in a new-to-me developer, I would have better experience to guide me.

Now I am trying to investigate two different issues:
1. Metering. Are my hand-held meters reading correctly? Am I using them wrong? And,
2. Is the XTOL performing as expected?

Obviously, shooting a roll of slide film will not help with #2, but I was thinking it might help with #1. For me, it is hard to see the difference between a slightly underexposed negative and a correctly exposed one - but I can easily see when a slide is not exposed correctly.

I am planning to limit the test roll to one scene, all shots of the same subject with the same lighting. My plan is to take an incident reading as a base exposure, and then -1, -2, -3, and -4 stops, followed by +1, +2, +3, and +4 stops. And then repeat that sequence on the second half of the test roll. After I cut the roll in half for developing in the two different developers, then:
- Looking at either half of the test roll, the only variable will be exposure, possibly showing me something about my meter reading(?)
- And comparing a given exposure on the first half of the roll to the same exposure on the second half, the only variable will be the developer.

From post #24, "With developers in general and especially Xtol it is good to do a clip test..." Why "especially Xtol"?

Click to expand...

Good for you to have the patience to do tests. You could learn a lot. If both the meters are reading the same thing and they are at least roughly in with Sunny 16 rule it less likely is the meters. There are so many things that could go wrong. Speaking for myself, it possible that the meter is correct but I didn't read the recommend settings correctly from it, or failed to adjust camera settings appropriately. Some cameras have an exposure compensation adjustment that could cause problems. I think there is good chance it just some little process glitch like that. It will help a lot to take careful notes. Many light meters will give a reading in EV units which is the magnitude of the light itself. If you record that and the f/stop and shutter speed you use to take a shot people on forum would be able to tell you if your camera settings were in line for the light level. If the metering and camera settings were all ok and you still had problems with the image it might be something else--possible a mechanical problem with camera. If you continue to have problems it would also be helpful to shoot some film with another camera, maybe borrow one, to know if it is limited you your camera.

Re: why especially do clip tests with Xtol. Xtol is by many accounts one the best general purpose developers. It's biggest challenge as Matt said has been that it has a history of unexpectedly deteriorating in storage without much warning.. I don't hear much about the sudden failure nowadays that we have learned we need to be really careful about storing Xtol in airtight containers. The clip test isn't super precise but at least would let you know if there were major problems with the developer before you wasted some real film. But it is not just Xtol, I have had other developers go bad with little warning as well, so the test is a good precaution generally unless you are using Rodinal which never seems to go bad.

Following up, information posted on Photrio <here> suggests Kodak Alaris has announced some kind of problem with several lots of XTOL, including Cat 105 8338, Date 2109/10/07, which is the lot number I used.

Without knowing more about the exact nature of the Xtol problem, it is hard to say if the Xtol was a significant contributor to my thin negatives, or not.