Historical Interneg Films

[Michael Talbert]

I have a couple of queries about two different types of internegative films used for still photography.
The first query concerns Ektacolor Internegative film 6110. The film was processed in C-22 chemicals except for the developer which was Internegative Replenisher + internegative Starting solution - 5 mins. dev time. The replenisher was used on it's own as - replenisher. I beleive the film was first marketed in 1961. My query is : Was the film always processed in Interneg Replenisher + Starting Solution, or to begin with, in 1961, was the film processed in ordinary C-22 developer. I have evidence dating from 1964 that the film required a "special developer" but nothing before that date.
I have to say that Ektacolor Interneg film gave excellent results printed on Agfacolor MCNIII type 7 and 4 paper. I made a great deal of internegs on it during the 1970s and correctly filtered with the right exposure the film was capable of giving extremely good reproductions from transparencies.
The other query is: Does anyone know anything about "Agfacolor ZN "film with regards of how it was used - filtration wise, exposure wise?
This film was used as an Internegative, it was unmasked, like Agfa CN17, and I beleive it was marketed as from the mid-fifties.
Heinz Berger mentions the film in three editions of his "Agfacolor" books, two English and one German. He says nothing about how to use the film apart from "...even better results are obtained by using masks for the ZN film..."
I take this to be either for colour correction or , more likely, for lowering the contrast. I know I'm going back a bit but there might be someone out there who knows something about the film. Any information gratefully received. Thank you. MDT

 

[Photo Engineer]

When I worked at Cape Canaveral, we made internegatives on sheet film in 4x5 size using Kodak internegative film and the C-22 process. There was also a 120 film for duping 35mm slides. They were printed in the center o the 120 strip. Both were masked.

The Christmas picture in my gallery here was reproduced on a sheet of 8x10 masked Interneg from a 4x5 Ektachrome transparency. Since this was made during the transition from C22 to C41, IDK which film was used, as the code notches were cut off.

When C41 was introduced a comparable internegative product was introduced.

Print films were available for both.

So, I am not sure what you are referring to.

PE

 

[Photo Engineer]

On further research, I find that in the time period you mention up until about 1965, Kodak produced prints from slides by means of a throw away internegative. This material was never sold on the market and the customer never saw the negative. If you specified a "keep internegative" you got a masked negative and the print.

This service, AFAIK, was discontinued when the C41 product came out.

PE

 

[Michael Talbert]

PE. I think the internegs you made at Cape Canaveral were likely to have been made on the Ektacolor Interneg sheet film, 6110. I don't think I made it very clear that it was the sheet film I was asking about, - sorry! There was a 35mm bulk interneg film, called 6008. It may have been a different emulsion, anyway it had a different dev time. I've never heard of a 120 interneg film, there cetainly was'nt a 120 material marketed as interneg in the U.K.

The change over to the C-41 type interneg film happened in 1978. The new film was called "Vericolor Interneg film 4112" sheet, and the 35mm was "vericolor interneg film 6011". They used the same dev times as C-41 camera films. At around the same time Kodak also introduced a "Density Difference" interneg set-up technique which was quicker and easier than the old "curve matching" set-up. I never used the "curve matching" method, I just made a few test internegs, and filtered the internegs from the test prints! It always worked!
Yet another interneg film was marketed in 1984- "kodak Vericolor Interneg film 4114 type 2"

You can tell the difference between the two films, the Ektacolor inter neg film will be slightly thicker and the mask will be yellower.

It is interesting you mention the Kodacolor prints from transparencies. Eastman kodak first made prints from transparencies using an interneg as long ago as 1951. I reckon they made an interneg on roll film Kodacolor Type A with a diffuse light source to cut the contrast. Kodacolor film had the orange mask by this time (1949) and had less contrast than the previous two unmasked Kodacolor films. To be honest , I don't know how they made the internegs but that's my theory! They could have even made them on the "daylight type Kodacolor" with electronic flash! I think printing them on Type A kodacolor is much more likely. By the nineteen sixties I suppose they used the proper interneg film.

Print Films to me mean "Vericolor Print film" and "Ektacolor Print film" used for making transparencies from negatives. In the fifties, before Kodak made any Duplicating sheet film, printing a negative onto "Print Film" was the only quick way of making duplicate transparencies. MDT

 

[Photo Engineer]

Michael;

I cannot give you as detailed infomation as you seem to want but I can say that the product is entirely different in structure, balance and curve shape than a camera material. The upper scale is curved upwards, so that when the positive image is properly mated to this upsweep on the internegative, a straight line is achieved. The toe of the positive is being printed onto the upsweep of the shoulder in the negative.

So, the film was special, but whether any required a different developer, IDK. In my experience we used a seasoned standard line either C22 or C41.

I have used all of the above films at work and here at home and always used the curve shape matching method, as each batch of interneg film varied a bit in speed. It was roughly tungsten balance but was less controlled than camera films. I had good luck with it and with the print films, but found that once the box was opened, the films kept rather poorly.

I never used the 35mm versions. Instead, I copied onto regular 35mm film.

Kodak's current recommendation is to use Kodak Portra VC film, overexpose a tad and underdevelop by 15" to make an internegative. I have done this with reasonably good results. With my enlarger, I have to use daylight filtration, but it works. All of the interneg and print films have been discontinued.

PE

 

[analogsnob]

I never used the Ektacolor interneg films although I have printed some but I used cases of the 4114 and lesser quantities of the 4112 and its 35mm version. We started with the density difference system and wound up with a computer program that made the balance more accurate. The more accurate balance made matching PMS colors much easier. The 4112 we used mainly for copies from reflection art. We also used some of the ID variant which had an extra kick to keep the white paper white.

We also used tungsten balance neg film for picky work from transparencies that had both a contrast and a highlight mask.(mask in this reference means a low density b&w neg registered with the transparency)

After Duratrans and Duraclear came out we only used Vericolor print film for color correction masks or 35mm slides.

 

[Terrence Brennan]

I never used the Ektacolor interneg films although I have printed some but I used cases of the 4114 and lesser quantities of the 4112 and its 35mm version. We started with the density difference system and wound up with a computer program that made the balance more accurate. The more accurate balance made matching PMS colors much easier. The 4112 we used mainly for copies from reflection art. We also used some of the ID variant which had an extra kick to keep the white paper white.

We also used tungsten balance neg film for picky work from transparencies that had both a contrast and a highlight mask.(mask in this reference means a low density b&w neg registered with the transparency)

After Duratrans and Duraclear came out we only used Vericolor print film for color correction masks or 35mm slides.

I have used the Ektacolor internegative film, albeit very briefly, in 1977, when Vericolor internegative had not yet made it to market. I was a student at Ryerson Polytechnic University (then known as Ryerson Polytechnic Institute), and it was part of our Third year program to produce a correctly balanced Ektacolour internegative. It was one of the few times I actually made internegs on that film, and my results were only so-so. I had problems with, AFAIR, a red-cyan crosscurve, and the colour saturation and contrast were high. This, I found out later, hinted at an imbalance in the magenta and yellow filtration, and my exposure was too great. We balanced the film using the curve plotting method, although I included a special Kodak three-point gray scale, designated Q6C, which was supposed to be a shortcut method for assessing the interneg.

We used a Meteoriette processor, for a modified C-22 process, which also included special Internegative control strips, designed especially for the modified process C-22. I remember my lab instructor, a photographer with many years experience in the industry, telling the class that he had worked in operations where the C-22 processing line had three different developer tanks: one for regular C-22, one modified for Internegative film, and a third modified for Ektacolor Print Film, which was a method of making large format transparancies directly from negatives.

We used to make a sort-of "quick and dirty" interneg using Vericolor Professional film, Type S (VPS). The procedure was to enlarge a transparency onto it, and then to flash the film before development. The exposure was something like 1 second @ f/16, for 35mm to 4x5, using a Chromega enlarger, equipped with a colorhead. We would dial in filtration to simulate a Wratten 80A filter, about 100 cyan plus 60 magenta, or you could use an actual filter. After all of your transparencies were exposed, you would flash them through a 2.0 ND filter, plus (I think) a CC20G filter, using the same exposure and filtration used for the image making. The prints which resulted from this procedure were okay, but they weren't as good as prints made using Ektacolor Internegative film.

So it was no surprise that when the Vericolor inteneg films were available about 1978, their arrival was greeted with cries of joy (and I'm not kidding about that; I distinctly remember one of my fellow students holding a 50-sheet box of this film in his hand, and wildly gesticulating with both arms, and saying that he could now make Type C prints from his FAVOURITE 'chromes!). They required unmodified C-41 processing, which was a blessing. AFAIR, there were two types, 4112, for internegs from other than Kodachrome originals and for flat copy work, and 4114, which was for internegs from Kodachromes. We balanced the film using the curve plotting method.

When I entered the full-time workforce, after graduation in 1979, I made rather a lot of internegatives (rather...) on those two films. I also used the 35mm vesion, in modified duplicating equipment, to make internegs from 35mm slides, especially for Christmas Card production. The one thing I never did do was to use it for copy work, as it was just too slow, and it was not a viable option to expose it using electronic flash; I had a chance when on a training course at Eastman Kodak's Marketing Education Center in 1987 to speak to one of the company's experts, and I was warned off that idea.

In the 1990's, a new internegative film was available from Kodak, Commercial Internegative, and worked quite well. I used to balance that using the density difference method, based on contact exposures of a 21-step silver step tablet, with feedback provided from the printers, on the balance. I used to change the red-cyan balance for Kodachromes, as we experienced a crosscurve when they were given the same exposure and filtration as Ektachrome originals.

Fuji also marketed a nice internegative film, too; I had a chance to "test drive" it, about 1993. Management of the lab in which I worked decided to stick with the Kodak product.

Any of the dedicated internegative products I used over the years, when properly filtered, exposed and developed, would make beautiful prints. Sometimes, filtration and exposure would have to be modified, to suit a particular need. I remember making internegs from slightly faded, blue transparencies; the interneg filter pack required a change in the yellow filtration, and slightly more exposure. The final prints were better than the originals! And I made many, many internegs from underexposed transparancies.

 

[Michael Talbert]

P.E. Thanks for the info. I used the ordinary C-22 dev when I first started to make internegs but it did'nt give enough shadow detail on the negative. Camera films can't "see" the shadows of a trans. and increasing the exposure just makes the highlights block up. That was the beauty of interneg film, you could control the contrast by the exposure.
There was such a large turnover of interneg film at the lab I worked at that the film would not have had time to "go off".They used 10 x 8 sheet film, which was cut down to 5 x 4 to save money. All internegs were made as 5 x 4 except for mural prints printed on De Vere Mark X horizontal enlargers which took a 10 x 8 negative if the print was very large. I seem to remember that the enlargers were filtered by square glass Agfa filters in those days. 1972. Very old-fashioned! A few years later you could get a De Vere colour head to fit horizontal enlargers. Later on, while working at a lab in London, I nearly got the chance to print the murals on a horizontal enlarger when the regular printer was on holiday. But the lab wanted me to do the , guess what, internegs instead, because the regular interneg guy was on holiday as well.

Thanks Terence, and Analogsnob, for your posts. That's a lot of work, plotting those graphs. I can remember only one guy who ever did that. The printer who did the Cibas, Cibachromes, plotted the graphs and managed to get a filtration for the internegs at the lab I worked at around 1972. I think they had a filtration for each transparency film.
I once knew of a lab who made internegs on Vericolor Type S. They made a few negs for me but they all lacked shadow detail. I agree, the proper interneg film was much better.
I've never used any C-41 interneg films, Ive had a few transparencies made on the C-41 print film which were very good. In the 70s, I occassionally printed on Ektacolor Print film and Slide film. The Slide film came in sheets and wide rolls.
Another interneg film is "Gevacolor Interneg film" dating from over 40 years ago.It's mentioned in Jack Coote's book "Colour Prints". He does'nt say much about it except it was for tungsten light and it also could be exposed by electronic flash with a CTO12 filter. MDT

 

[Terrence Brennan]

De Vere Mark X

All internegs were made as 5 x 4 except for mural prints printed on De Vere Mark X horizontal enlargers which took a 10 x 8 negative if the print was very large. I seem to remember that the enlargers were filtered by square glass Agfa filters in those days. 1972. Very old-fashioned!

A De Vere Mark X horizontal enlarger! We had one of those, in mothballs, for about four of the six years I worked in local pro lab. We ended up stripping it if all the stuff we wanted, namely the lamphouses (we had two; one condenser and one diffusion), the fans, and of course, the lenses. We then pushed it, for all the world like a giant choo-choo train, off the loading dock and into a large recycling bin, to be picked up by one of the local recycling companies. Probably got melted down and now has new life as a throwaway digital camera body. No wait, aren't those mostly made of plastic?

 

[Michael Talbert]

Terence.
There's a lot of scrap metal in a De Vere Mk. X maybe enough to make a small car! They were massive enlargers! I think they had square condensers and the filter draw was between the lamphousing and the condensers. They definitely took Agfacolor glass filters coded from 0 - 99, probably 6 inches square.The "99" was Agfa's abreviation for 100 to keep a six figure coding to the filtration.
Many of the enlargers I used in the early seventies were De Vere black and white enlargers fitted with Agfacolor heads.Another make I used (and liked) was the Chromega enlargers with the colour mixing spheres and a lamp each side of the spheres. I think they were called "D4" . The spheres could be interchanged as according to the film format being printed. The Chomegas had the strongest filters I have ever used on a colour enlarger.

Being of an inquisitive nature, I once asked the printer who made the mural prints on the Mark X enlargers why the Mark Xs took individual glass filters instead of a colour head. As far as I can remember he told me that the colour heads did not give enough light output compared with the glass filters. The extra light output, or speed of the enlarger, was necessary when printing onto Cibachrome material, CCP-D182, which was about one to two stops slower than Agfacolor paper. MDT

 

[Michael Talbert]

Terence.
The Agfacolor glass filters were coded "05" (lowest density) to "99" (highest density). They were a set of filters which came in steps of 10 , 10, 20 ,30 etc. to 99. The Agfa method of filtering was : 85 70 - which meant in Kodak terms: 85Y 70M (The - meant , no cyan filters being used) The disadvantage of using individual glass filters was of course that you could only filter down to 05, whereas on a colour head you can filter down to 1 or even 1/2 on some heads. MDT

 

[Terrence Brennan]

De Vere Mark X

Terence.
There's a lot of scrap metal in a De Vere Mk. X maybe enough to make a small car! They were massive enlargers! I think they had square condensers and the filter draw was between the lamphousing and the condensers. They definitely took Agfacolor glass filters coded from 0 - 99, probably 6 inches square.The "99" was Agfa's abreviation for 100 to keep a six figure coding to the filtration.
Many of the enlargers I used in the early seventies were De Vere black and white enlargers fitted with Agfacolor heads.Another make I used (and liked) was the Chromega enlargers with the colour mixing spheres and a lamp each side of the spheres. I think they were called "D4" . The spheres could be interchanged as according to the film format being printed. The Chomegas had the strongest filters I have ever used on a colour enlarger.

Being of an inquisitive nature, I once asked the printer who made the mural prints on the Mark X enlargers why the Mark Xs took individual glass filters instead of a colour head. As far as I can remember he told me that the colour heads did not give enough light output compared with the glass filters. The extra light output, or speed of the enlarger, was necessary when printing onto Cibachrome material, CCP-D182, which was about one to two stops slower than Agfacolor paper. MDT

I have one of those Omega heads, and two--count 'em, two!--sets of replacement filters, as well as the power supply, and the integrating sphere for 4x5 negatives. I took it out of service ten years ago, and it now graces my spare parts collection, often referred to by Mrs. Brennan, as "...that pile of camera junk in the corner of the basement..."

I recall that the condenser assembly on the Mark X was just huge; the lenses appeared to be 12-inches square. Fortunately, I never had to lift it or to mount it on the enlarger!