Help: Diagnose exposure problem 35mm negative

I think you have it Polyglot. I have seen the streaks from the sprocket holes and knew I was overdoing it so I guess I went too far the other way, plus I did fill the tank till I was over the light baffle.

Again, thanks, that makes the most sense to me so far...I will try these tips next time! I will post results and I an glad it is most likely not the camera.

trythis said:

I just scanned the last roll from the same tank and it looks like I have more of this but it seems isolated to the middle of the tank or the end of the roll that gets loaded first.

I am using stainless steel.

It appears equally frequent with the reels in the bottom and the top of the tank but maybe top reel was slightly worse on the innermost image. There was a double exposure like the roll had been removed and reinserted in the camera on that first shot though, so don't read too much into that.


Wouldn't light leaks effect the rebate?

I am starting to think developing.

Would slightly old developer do this? My D76 stock is December 20 dated but was clear and worked fine with a clip test.

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A leak through the shutter or into the mirror box won't affect the rebates. A back door leak can.

A shutter leak could bleed out of frame into rebate boundaries as could overexposure.

local over development would also over develope rebate text as well - especially in steel tank.

Over development wont be correlated with pictures shutter leaks will.

A light box is useful for looking at negatives or even a table lamp.

Try a cheap C41 film if you need confirmation.


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Xmas said:

A light box is useful for looking at negatives or even a table lamp.

Try a cheap C41 film if you need confirmation.


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I do have a light table from a while back...finally a use for it.
I plan on using some of that wallmart Fuji for my camera test roll. I still have a couple rolls of b&w from the FG to do the developer technique tests.

trythis said:

I think you have it Polyglot. I have seen the streaks from the sprocket holes and knew I was overdoing it so I guess I went too far the other way, plus I did fill the tank till I was over the light baffle.

Again, thanks, that makes the most sense to me so far...I will try these tips next time! I will post results and I an glad it is most likely not the camera.

Click to expand...

When a nice big chunk of air passes through the spiral, all of the developer gets shoved right out of the way and you don't get flow marks even if you're agitating quite roughly. You also don't need to be super-vigorous in the agitation because it's the motion of the air that's doing your work for you. If the tank is overfull and the air can't displace the developer away from the film, then you get flow marks near the sprocket holes. In that case, it's not the bubble shoving all the developer aside, it's just a trickle of developer coming through the holes, which is why you can see the effect.

If there's not enough air in the tank, you're either going to get streaking from flow marks or uneven development across the frame depending on how you agitate; you might even get lucky and have both.

The need for air in the tank is of course a problem if you want to use high dilutions (large volume of working solution in order to meet the minimum-concentrate requirement) in small tanks. If you're using D76 1+3 in order to reduce the solvent effect, then you probably should choose a different developer with less solvent effect, e.g. Rodinal (no solvent, all the sharpness and grain) or Xtol (has solvent but doesn't soften the image as much as D76). Perhaps HC-110 but I'm not really familiar with it.

polyglot said:

The need for air in the tank is of course a problem if you want to use high dilutions (large volume of working solution in order to meet the minimum-concentrate requirement) in small tanks. If you're using D76 1+3 in order to reduce the solvent effect, then you probably should choose a different developer with less solvent effect, e.g. Rodinal (no solvent, all the sharpness and grain) or Xtol (has solvent but doesn't soften the image as much as D76). Perhaps HC-110 but I'm not really familiar with it.

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I dont even know what solvent effect is... I just dilute to conserve materials. I am not asking you to explain, I can look it up.

I have read about minimum concentration and when I use a single roll tank I use stock D76 or a high concentration of HC110 but for the 4 reel tank, its the lower concentration.
Hc110 I typically use on some 50 year old Tri-X in dilution D (and some fog reducer) with very cold water. I plan to stop using D76 after I run out and stick with HC110 because I have nearly 400 feet of the old film to use. My Hc110 bottle will last quite a while. Anyway, that gives you some idea of my lack of experience.

I am probably going about this a bit carelessly; I see s many Apugers' more scientific approaches. I am getting there, but I seem to only look for more instruction when I run into issues. I will take lots of notes next time around.

If you get sprocket hole effects it can be fixer exhaustion as well as development problems.

I never bother agitating. I have read the Kodak technique, thought that risible.

For stop, hypo clear and wash I inversion agitate with a 90% full tank.

1+3 will give subtle differences but 16x20 side by side maybe just detectably.

Yeah, what would Kodak know about developing film? Bunch of clueless n00bs, the lot of them.

I take your point but they were about to pull out of film yesterday and if you care to read their last procedure and are not able to laugh you are way too credible.

I developed another set of negatives and the problem persists. No way its an agitation problem from this roll, and the inconsistent issues continue. I developed in a 4 reel tank with three rolls and left plenty of air space for complete wash down of the developer. I dont think any indoor shots have the problem and not all outdoor shots. It looks like bright sunny conditions are required.

Could it be a slow or bouncing shutter over exposing the bottom more often than the top?

If it overexposes more often on the bottom of the camera when in landscape and equally over exposed on both long sides when in portrait position, would that also fit the possible shutter issue?


I am trying to work with the seller for a warranty claim. I have a roll of C41 to take to the lab to completely rule out developing issues, but I have never had this problem with any other camera.

One last thought. Is there any possibility this could be caused by sticky aperture blades in a lens? I dont see that problem on other cameras, but thought I would bring it up.

trythis said:

I developed another set of negatives and the problem persists. No way its an agitation problem from this roll, and the inconsistent issues continue. I developed in a 4 reel tank with three rolls and left plenty of air space for complete wash down of the developer. I dont think any indoor shots have the problem and not all outdoor shots. It looks like bright sunny conditions are required.

Could it be a slow or bouncing shutter over exposing the bottom more often than the top?

If it overexposes more often on the bottom of the camera when in landscape and equally over exposed on both long sides when in portrait position, would that also fit the possible shutter issue?
View attachment 93050

I am trying to work with the seller for a warranty claim. I have a roll of C41 to take to the lab to completely rule out developing issues, but I have never had this problem with any other camera.

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I took a look at my FG and judging from your negs, I'm going with a sticky shutter. Possibly someone poked a finger into the shutter blades while loading film and bent them ever so slightly or the CLA person used some cleaner/solvent/lubricant that migrated to the shutter blades. Looks like a slow start and a slow finish when the shutter blades open/close.

If it happens with high shutter speeds and not with low shutter speeds, that would indicate that one of the shutter blades isn't moving properly. As Fred says.