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Help me before I give up on Photography

Jimi and Jim and Janis

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Oct 12, 2009
Messages
58
Location
Puerto Rico
Format
35mm
I mixed all of my chemicals with distilled water. I did the stop bath with distilled water and the final wash too with photo-flo. Im still getting stains on my negatives! Please help me because I feel hopless. Im gonna post some shots from a test roll of Tmax 400 developed in Tmax dev. After the roll dried off, I did notice some spots or stains. I used rubbing alcohol(70%) on the base side with a q tip, then i wiped it with a lint-free cloth like the ones that come with sunglasses. Please help!

The pics are over exposed because I havent edited them yet so you can see what im dealing with.
 

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Good Evening,

It's a little difficult to tell, even with the photos. On my screen there seems to be a tinge of pink on the photos (I assume you've made negative scans); that may suggest inadequate washing. The second photo seems to show residue or stain from a water spot left over from the drying process. Are you sure that your fixing time was adequate? The T-Max films require a longer time than traditional films. Five or six minutes in Kodak Rapid Fix or about double that in a standard fixer is usually recommended. That's about all which occurs to me now; perhaps others with better eyes (or screen) will pick up on something else.

Konical
 
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Your problem might easily be solved by switching from photo flo to Edwals LFN. Your marks look like wetting agent problems to me.
Dennis
 
actually, I forgot something

when i used photo-flo i used like like 6-8 drops in the final wash of 350cc of distilled water, could that be it?
 
A ggod soak in distilled water for ,ummm, 15 min or so with a fair bit of agitation and let them dry, no photoflo, and see what you get. If that pink tinge in the scans is on the negs, refix them first and then a good wash and then distilled water rinse with maybe two drops of photoflo.
 
"when i used photo-flo i used like like 6-8 drops in the final wash of 350cc of distilled water, could that be it?"

Good Evening,

Maybe. The amount of Photo-flo needed seems to vary somewhat depending on the characteristics of the water used. For me, just a couple of drops in 16-20 oz. of water is adequate, and that's much more diluted than Kodak calls for. It's probably better to start with too little rather than too much.

Konical
 
Thank you everbody for helping me

polyglot said:
Kodafix for 6 minutes is not enough for tmax; what you're seeing is I think underfixing. put it back in the fixer for another 10 mins and the stains should go.

Edit: obviously you must re-wash after re-fixing.
Click to expand...

I think I just screwed the pooch. I got impatient and used the rubbing alcohol method. I didnt really let it dry(no more then 15mins), then i tried to re-wash with much less photo-flo and now the negative looks like it has raised spots on some parts. This negative doesnt worry me, but I have 8 rolls to develop of important things AND I really dont wanna mess that one up
 
Jimi said:
actually, I forgot something

when i used photo-flo i used like like 6-8 drops in the final wash of 350cc of distilled water, could that be it?
Click to expand...

15 Oct 2009

Jimi, Jim, and Janis:

Your process seems quite sound, except that you are not very close to the recommended 1:200 to 1:300 dilution of Photo-Flo. If you are adding stock Photo-Flo to your last wash of 350cc you will need 1.5cc of Photo-Flo stock solution. If I recall my home laboratory days that translated into about 25 drops.

Hope this helps.

Regards,
Darwin
 
Jimi said:
actually, I forgot something

when i used photo-flo i used like like 6-8 drops in the final wash of 350cc of distilled water, could that be it?
Click to expand...

why not follow the mfgr's mixing instructions? Why skimp on something so cheap and so important?

Photoflo200 is supposed to be mixed 200:1 - that's 5ml per liter...2-1/2 ml per half liter. 6~8 drops in 350ml is way short of the mfgr's specification.

I also agree with the others..6 minutes is not long enough for Tmax in Kodak fixer. Kodak themselves state clearly that ten minutes is required. Read the Kodak data sheets. They're loaded with information. Do you believe the advice from folks on the internet is better than that given by the engineers at Kodak? Do you think they just spew shit and that all the friendly folks on internet fora are smarter than all those PhD's at Kodak?

You shot kodak film and used kodak chems but failed to follow the kodak instructions.
 
Are you aware that rubbing alcohol is only about 70% alcohol and the rest is water and 'denaturing' agent? If you try to clean your eye glasses with this stuff and look carefully, you will often see some film and mark. Denaturing agent can be anything to make it non-drinkable. Personally, I would not use it on any negatives.

I think you need to slow down a bit and approach this calmly.... if rest of your rolls are important to you, you might shoot some more and practice on non-important stuff.

I recently came back to film photography so I really shouldn't be giving advise but from my fading memory, I recall having water marks when I didn't wash it long enough. I would suggest read over the instructions for the chemicals carefully, watch your temperature, watch the timing, watch the agitation procedures, wash it well and long, then see if there are any problems to be addressed. It seems you rushed the process, based on your last post.

Good luck.
 
So for my next roll I will

1) Fix for longer, 10min
2)use 1.6cc of photo-flo in the final wash (1:200 dilution)
3)not use Alcohol

Anything else? thank you everyone
 
Jimi said:
After the roll dried off, I did notice some spots or stains.
Click to expand...

Distilled prior to adding some chemical then no longer
distilled. Because of the geometry of the 'spots' I believe
you've chemistry showing; making the spots. How was
the film washed? Was the surface water removed
prior to drying? Dan
 

I strongly agree. Rubbing alcohol is 70% isopropyl alcohol and 30% nasty water. It leaves residues.
 
dancqu said:
Distilled prior to adding some chemical then no longer
distilled. Because of the geometry of the 'spots' I believe
you've chemistry showing; making the spots. How was
the film washed? Was the surface water removed
prior to drying? Dan
Click to expand...

I didnt understand the first thing you said. I used distill water in the Ilford Method, then I did a final wash with photo-flo. With latex gloves I slid my fingers down the negative, then I hung the negative horizontally.
 
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that looks like a fixer issue,, i fix for 10 min. when i first started dev my own film, i was getting stains like that. it wsa the fixer
 
THAT's the problem! You hung the negatives horizontally! Is it possible that as you hang the negatives horizontally, some part of negatives had water collecting on its surface and dried in place? A common practice is to hang it VERTICALLY with clip on top to hold it in place and clip at the bottom to weigh it down. That way, all the surface water will drip down and not pool on the surface.
 
You are using wayyyy too much photo flo... use 1 drop.
 
I'm very grateful for all the advice I have recieved, but its becoming confusing now. I have contradicting comments, use 25 drops of photo-flo or one? Also, many people claim that having your negative horizontal or even diagonal greatly reduces water marks because the drops have to travel less.
"tell me what am I supposed to do?" -Flock of Seagulls
 
polyglot said:
Kodafix for 6 minutes is not enough for tmax; what you're seeing is I think underfixing. put it back in the fixer for another 10 mins and the stains should go.
Click to expand...

This sounds completely contrary to the way I was taught (with TMax) and have been practicing for 2 years now. Kodafix for 5 min. More than 8 minutes and it can cause long-term damage to the negative.
 
Jimi, Jim, and Janis...

The only real advise I can really give you (and it won't be a quick one) is for you to go to a local library, check out a book on traditional b&w processing and follow it to the letter. The only change you'd make will be the timing as today's chemicals are little different from old days. Don't rush the process. Then, re-evaluate your results. I *think* you are trying to do this by piecing together other people's practices and ideas and it is greatly confusing you.

This is hobby. You are supposed to enjoy the process, not rush through and get frustrated. Also, you would want to learn from the process by starting with known and established procedure and then make changes to make it better. Start from a good old book on the subject.

I came back to film photography after 30+ years. I had to check out few books to re-learn the process.
 
Hi there
Yes, ten different people will give you ten slightly different answers. So here is number eleven!
The stains I am seeing look like drying marks. There was another lengthy thread on this issue a while back. I would repeat the various comments I made throughout that thread (see link below):

(there was a url link here which no longer exists)

Good luck!
Ian
 
Drying Marks

iandavid said:
The stains I am seeing look like drying marks.
Click to expand...

Yes drying marks and I said as much in an earlier post.

Vertical or Horizontal, it makes no difference if all the
surface water has been removed. For the complete
removal of surface water I use an eight blade
FILM squeegee. It follows the film in use
of a half strength Photo-Flo. Dan
 
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