How important are consistent temps with B&W?

Whether there is visual degradation of the print or not due to poor temperature control between processing baths, why compromise and risk it?

It is SO easy to get all processing liquids to exactly the same temperature by using a water bath. Give the liquids time to stabilize.

There is absolutely no reason not to exercise precision in the darkroom.

I personally believe that the harder one tries to eliminate large variations in the process, the better off we are, not only with respect to graininess, but also to achieving our expected outcomes with as little material waste as possible.
All errors are cumulative, and if we skip precision at every stage we end up with a process with pretty wild variations and poor consistency in our output. Yet with black and white darkroom chemistry it is stupidly easy to achieve. All you need is a thermometer and a little bit of patience.

Very important if you want to get good, consistent results. Kodak and other major chemical suppliers provide a lot of information on use of their chemicals to get the best results. If you don't follow it, you'll be all over the place, wondering how to adjust exposure in the camera and your developing process to get good results.

Use of a simple water bath to bring your tank and your chemicals to the right developing temperature is not difficult and will make a big difference in results.

Here's MY question.... (which basically echoes OP's question)

My understanding is, reticulation happens when film encounters a solution (of any stage) LOWER THAN THE PREVIOUS.

As a fellow Floridian, my processing starts with tightly controlled developer temperature, then room temperature stop and fix which are normally around 80F, then whatever comes out of city water supply for washing. During my process, temperature RISE at every step.

I've heard warmer temperature will cause softness in the emulsion. This has not been a problem. I've never seen reticulation either. Is temperature getting WARMER a problem??

How important is correct air pressure in your tires? If you're trying to optimize your gas mileage or even wear on your tires, you might be pretty
nitpicky about this subject. Otherwise you can get away with some variability - up to a certain point. Go too far outside the parameters and
you end up with a flat or even ruined wheel. For most black and white work it is fairly easy to keep temperature well inside recommended tolerances. About all it takes is an oversized tray acting as a water jacket, which you dribble in either warm or cool water for drift-by processing. If the weather is too hot for that, put a block of blue ice in there. But for color processing you have to do better than that or
you'll be outright wasting your time.

I too live in Florida but my darkroom is part of our air-conditioned house so the only difference in chemicals are in film developing and at the most 3 - 4 degrees F. I turn the air a little colder before developing film and never had a problem. I agree that accuracy is important but I wonder how much of a difference is necessary before there is a visual change.

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One of these days, I'll try icy cold developer, stop, fix, then wash it in "Florida cold" water just to see what happens......

tkamiya said:

One of these days, I'll try icy cold developer, stop, fix, then wash it in "Florida cold" water just to see what happens......

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It is not a good idea to try icy cold developer, as the developer temperature/time is quite critical. However, you could then try hot stop and fix at shorter times and then plunge the film into icy cold water and I still doubt you will get it to reticulate.

A point that's entirely missed is most modern films from the major manufacturers are well hardened, but not all. Some have very poor hardening and then there are some developers with high pH particularly those containing Hryrodide which will soften the top coat of the emulsion

Two films which were very prone to micro reticulation were Tmax 400 older version) and Fuji Neopan 400, the latter is prone to full reticulation and frilling in Rodinal.

There's plenty of articles about the subject as well as work done at Kodak from the 1920's onwards when incipient or micro reticulation was first found to be a cause of increased graininess in prints. Trying to deny it can exist is saying that well known photo-chemists are (or were) wrong.

Ian

Ian Grant said:

There's plenty of articles about the subject as well as work done at Kodak from the 1920's onwards when incipient or micro reticulation was first found to be a cause of increased graininess in prints. Trying to deny it can exist is saying that well known photo-chemists are (or were) wrong.
Ian

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Being a well-known chemist doesn't mean you are automatically correct and history is well documented with disproof of work by well-known scientists.

cliveh said:

Being a well-known chemist doesn't mean you are automatically correct and history is well documented with disproof of work by well-known scientists.

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Yes but we are talking about rather a lot of well known chemists from the 1920's onwards including those working quite recently at Kodak & Fuji. Plus a documented evidence that quite mild temperature shocks cause a very mild early form of reticulation that increases graininess.

The onus is on you and MichaelR to prove ithat Micro (Incipient) reticulation doesn't happen with an experiment repeatable by anyone with one of the softer emulsion films, and that doesn't mean cheating by using a tanning developer, but using a standard developer like Rodinal.

More seriously using a tanning developer helps enormously with softer emulsions like Foma and the old EFKE (Adox) films.

Ian

Well one of the first questions I would ask would be - is there any visual evidence in the form of electron photo-micrographs of micro reticulation taken at recorded temperature variations, below that when visual reticulation is seen by the human eye?