hp5, hc110 dilution h problem

And therein lies the problem.

You underexposed.
A lot.

If you had your meter set at EI 640, and you metered incorrectly away from the camera lens toward the main light in the background, you probably shot the film at EI 3200, or 3 stops underexposed.

I will bet you that if you do the Sunny 16 test that I recommended, you will find that your film will process just fine at Dilution H, at the processing time you gave it.

If you can't hand hold it, you have to use a tripod.
Or accept blurry pictures.
But you have to get enough light onto the film.

cjbecker said:

The reason I had to meter for the dark side is because I was handholding a 500cm with a 80 2.8 at 1/30, If I was going to meter the other side I would have been at 1/8 or 1/15 and its just a little slow.

Click to expand...

Thomas Bertilsson said:

And therein lies the problem.

You underexposed.
A lot.

If you had your meter set at EI 640, and you metered incorrectly away from the camera lens toward the main light in the background, you probably shot the film at EI 3200, or 3 stops underexposed.

I will bet you that if you do the Sunny 16 test that I recommended, you will find that your film will process just fine at Dilution H, at the processing time you gave it.

If you can't hand hold it, you have to use a tripod.
Or accept blurry pictures.
But you have to get enough light onto the film.

Click to expand...

I have a roll that I am doing to develop later today that I shot sunny 16 on.

So are you saying to shoot at 400 iso with the new test film and develop the same as before? Develop for 800 or develop for 400.

cjbecker said:

I have a roll that I am doing to develop later today that I shot sunny 16 on.

So are you saying to shoot at 400 iso with the new test film and develop the same as before? Develop for 800 or develop for 400.

Click to expand...

If you want to use HP5 at 640/800 you should expose it as such. That's the speed you were intending to use the film at when you stated your problem. You should shoot it at the same speed where you had the problem, just to prove (or disprove) that the exposure is the problem.

If you shoot it at 400, you're not addressing any of the issues you had to begin with. Troubleshooting is about taking one variable out of the scenario at a time, and otherwise do everything else exactly the same. No cheating on this. If you try to adjust more than one parameter, you will never be able to tell with certainty what went wrong to begin with, in case your actions fix the problem.
And then you end up not learning anything.

So, shoot the film at the speed where it didn't work out for you, but using Sunny 16 in broad daylight. Develop the film exactly as you did last time without changing a single thing.

holmburgers said:

Well when a scale is chosen arbitrarily (letters), and that scale usually follows a sequence (alphabetical order), one should be able to reasonably assume that there is some logical order to it. Only 2 dilutions don't follow the pattern; C & H.

Plus given Kodak's reputation for mistakes in their literature...

Click to expand...

I thought long and hard about what reply I could make on the danger of making assumptions. I decided that I would let the expert logician make it for me, "My dear Watson - assume nothing."

Well, surely you know what happens when assumptions are made?

It makes an ass out of u and me.

Well I developed another roll using the sunny 16 and it looked good. Now I am getting ready to develop a roll at 1600.

cjbecker said:

Well I developed another roll using the sunny 16 and it looked good. Now I am getting ready to develop a roll at 1600.

Click to expand...

That's great! We know what's wrong - metering.