Ilford Delta & DDX

[martinsmith99]

Has anyone used this combination?

I've just bought a couple of rolls of 135 Delta and (probably) intend pushing it a stop with DDX for a badly lit gig at the weekend.

Any tips appreciated.

 

[mcgrattan]

I presume you mean Delta 3200? If so, yes. It's an excellent combination. I've taken some gig photos with that pairing. I followed someone else's advice to use Ilford's times for a one-stop push above the speed you are exposing it at. So I used the 6400 times for a film metered at 3200. However, in most of those cases I was already shooting wide-open at the slowest speed I could hand-hold, so I was probably underexposing anyway.

 

[2F/2F]

It is a great combination.

Be careful about making it your S.O.P. to push film shot at gigs. It can make negs hard to print if the spot lighting is bright and contrasty. In more dimly and/or evenly lit clubs, pushing helps printing, rather than hindering it. It is important to learn to judge the intensity and contrast of the lighting in clubs, so you know when to push and when not to. You only learn this through trial and error.

Also, be aware that the EI "3200" film is actually ISO/DIN 1000/31, per Ilford's data sheet. Therefore, rating it at 3200 is already underexposing it quite a bit.

 

[martinsmith99]

Many thanks.

I ended up rating it at 12800iso as this gave me F2.8 @ 1/125. Lighting was flat to it shouldn't be too much of a problem.

The info says 17mins at 1+4 dilution (20 degrees). Any other advice before I attempt to develop?

 

[martinsmith99]

Well I bit the bullet and developed them. They are thin to the point of being useless.

I guess the development time needs to be increased.

 

[Tom Kershaw]

Many thanks.

I ended up rating it at 12800iso as this gave me F2.8 @ 1/125. Lighting was flat to it shouldn't be too much of a problem.

The info says 17mins at 1+4 dilution (20 degrees). Any other advice before I attempt to develop?

- just a quick warning that you will get very grainy negatives; try and agitate normally.

Tom

 

[2F/2F]

Sounds like the 2.8 lens was a deal killer in this situation. Rating at 12,800 (not an actual speed rating, because the highest one specified is 10,000, but we know what you mean when you say it, i.e. twice as fast as 6400), underexposed the ASA 1000 film by nearly four stops. That places the high values at middle grey or below, and middle tones at almost black.

Do you have a faster lens, and a chance to reshoot? How about a monopod?

In the future, you can use a more concentrated developer so that your developing time does not need to be so long. For instance, try 2:3 (A.K.A. 1:1.5) instead of 1:4, and extrapolate a time based on a developing chart in which times are shown for one dilution and another dilution twice as powerful. Ilfotec HC has such a chart, with 1:31 and 1:15 times listed for some films.

 

[martinsmith99]

I tried some Delta 3200 with DDX developer and using the Ilford times along with the Massive Development Chart, pushing to 12500iso (1+4 for 17mins @ 20 degrees) and apart from producing terribly under-develpoed negs I had the weird lines as seen below in about a third of the negs.

An ideas what caused this?


The only thing I can think of is light somehow got into the changing bag.

 

[martinsmith99]

Sounds like the 2.8 lens was a deal killer in this situation. Rating at 12,800 (not an actual speed rating, because the highest one specified is 10,000, but we know what you mean when you say it, i.e. twice as fast as 6400), underexposed the ASA 1000 film by nearly four stops. That places the high values at middle grey or below, and middle tones at almost black.

Do you have a faster lens, and a chance to reshoot? How about a monopod?

In the future, you can use a more concentrated developer so that your developing time does not need to be so long. For instance, try 2:3 (A.K.A. 1:1.5) instead of 1:4, and extrapolate a time based on a developing chart in which times are shown for one dilution and another dilution twice as powerful. Ilfotec HC has such a chart, with 1:31 and 1:15 times listed for some films.

Well this was just a test and not critical so no need to reshoot. The lens was a 1.8 so fine for the task. I was shooting in Tv mode with 1/125 and my speeds were ranging from F2-F4 so this was just an average figure.

 

[Tom Kershaw]

I tried some Delta 3200 with DDX developer and using the Ilford times along with the Massive Development Chart, pushing to 12500iso (1+4 for 17mins @ 20 degrees) and apart from producing terribly under-develpoed negs I had the weird lines as seen below in about a third of the negs.

An ideas what caused this?


The only thing I can think of is light somehow got into the changing bag.

This is light fogging and happened once when I accidentally turned the safelight on while loading a 35mm roll of TMY-2.

Tom

 

[pentaxuser]

If you apply the DDX/D3200 rules which is to develop for the time of the next speed up then as each speed quoted in Ilford chart increases by roughly 12% but the percentage climbs as the speed goes up then if 12500 needs 13% more than 6800, I'd go for say at least 14-15% more for the time quoted for 12500 so 17 mins plus 14% which is about 19.5 mins. My experience is that even the next time up still gives quite thin negs so I'd be tempted to go to at least 20 mins and maybe 21 mins, especially if the negs are so thin as to be unuseable.

pentaxuser