Ilford warmtone devoper at 1:4 instead of 1:9

mexipike · Feb 20, 2019

I made about 25 4x5 contact prints today and when cleaning up I realized that I mixed my developer at 1:4 instead of 1:9. I developed all prints for 2 minutes and toned in selenium 1:5 for 45 seconds. The developer and paper were ilford warmtone.

The tone seems nice enough but I’ll have to see tomorrow after they drive. What does this change? Tomorrow I’m making the rest of the set and don’t want them to stray too far! If I go back to 1:9 (which I would prefer to do) will my prints vary widely?

Ian Grant · Feb 20, 2019

The only difference is the prints may be fractionally less Warm toned. Shorter development times or greater dilution along with a slight increase in exposure gives warmer tines, over development will gove colder tones.

Ian

pentaxuser · Feb 20, 2019

There is another adverse effect that Ian hasn't mentioned and that's to your bank account

pentaxuser

mexipike · Feb 20, 2019

pentaxuser said:
There is another adverse effect that Ian hasn't mentioned and that's to your bank account

pentaxuser

That’s why I want to go back to 1:9!

I should also mention that the negatives I’m printing are all about the same density and I’ve been able to print all of them around the same time contrast. Will contrast/exposure time change much? (Obviously, I’ll be printing soon and will find out)

mexipike · Feb 20, 2019

Ian Grant said:
The only difference is the prints may be fractionally less Warm toned. Shorter development times or greater dilution along with a slight increase in exposure gives warmer tines, over development will gove colder tones.

Ian

Thanks! They actually seemed fairly warm to me after the selenium, I’ll see in a minute how they look after drying down.

Tom Kershaw · Feb 20, 2019

Going by UK prices the Harman Warmtone product seems to be one of the more economical choices for a warmtone commercial liquid concentrate (at 1+9).

Tom

mexipike · Feb 20, 2019

Thanks everyone. I just printed the second batch today and they look very similar. Maybe just a little warmer.

Tom Kershaw said:
Going by UK prices the Harman Warmtone product seems to be one of the more economical choices for a warmtone commercial liquid concentrate (at 1+9).

Tom

It is fairly economical and convenient as a liquid. I’m quite happy with the tone produced by it with ilford warmtone and selenium 1:5. Not super warm at all but nicely warm. If I wanted real warm I’d use sepia. I wanted to use ansco 130 but my kit was old and they were out at Freestyle(which is luckily my neighborhood store.) I’ve been trying to mostly standardize all of my printing and developing to ilford products- it stresses me too much to have to worry about a product I like becoming unavailable.

Ilford warmtone devoper at 1:4 instead of 1:9

mexipike

Ian Grant

pentaxuser

mexipike

mexipike

Tom Kershaw

mexipike

Privacy & Transparency

Privacy & Transparency