Instant Mytol Recipe

[BHuij]

I'll throw my recipe into the mix - I can't remember where I sourced mine, but it was definitely an "Instant Mytol" recipe rather than just "Mytol". I adjusted the recipe down to make 250ml of stock strength solution (which I guess is supposed to be essentially equivalent to XTOL stock). Just enough for a single roll of 35mm in my Nikor steel tank. I can just open a "capsule", toss it into 250ml of water, and stir for a minute or so, and then use one shot.

I absolutely love this stuff for Delta 100 and HP5+ in 35mm and 120. Extremely fine grain and full film speed or better. Tons of resolution.

Recipe is found on this page for a 3D printed "capsule" I made to store premeasured ingredients prior to use.

 

[Don_ih]

I'll throw my recipe into the mix

Seems to be the same as the one Koraks posted.

Yours, for 250ml

or Koraks' for 1 litre:

looks like 4x yours. (Easy for me to recognize, since I always mix 250ml of 1:1 calculated from that second recipe, and it is pretty much 1/2 of every bit of your recipe.)

 

[BHuij]

It's entirely possible that I got my recipe from Koraks originally. Been a couple of years since I started playing with Instant Mytol, and IIRC he was there helping me answer a lot of questions up front.

 

[aconbere]

I'll throw my recipe into the mix - I can't remember where I sourced mine, but it was definitely an "Instant Mytol" recipe rather than just "Mytol". I adjusted the recipe down to make 250ml of stock strength solution (which I guess is supposed to be essentially equivalent to XTOL stock). Just enough for a single roll of 35mm in my Nikor steel tank. I can just open a "capsule", toss it into 250ml of water, and stir for a minute or so, and then use one shot.

I absolutely love this stuff for Delta 100 and HP5+ in 35mm and 120. Extremely fine grain and full film speed or better. Tons of resolution.

Recipe is found on this page for a 3D printed "capsule" I made to store premeasured ingredients prior to use.

Thanks for chiming in. I’ve seen your recipe and was one of the ones I’d been planning to try (and another fellow in the club I’m in uses your recipe and canisters). Nice job!

 

[bluechromis]

In case you didn't know already, @relistan's PC-512 Borax uses fewer ingredients than Instant Mytol and is gaining a solid reputation as a XTol-like developer. Merits consideration.

I like PC-512 very much. To be clear, it is not an exact clone of Xtol, in the way that Mytol and Instant Mytol are meant to be. It is more like a cousin. I see it as a brilliant evolution of Pat Gainer's approach to sulfite-free ascorbate developers. Relistan has been able to mitigate the fog and graininess of Gainer's formulas while retaining the high acutance and long shelf life.

 

[BHuij]

I like PC-512 very much. To be clear, it is not an exact clone of Xtol, in the way that Mytol and Instant Mytol are meant to be. It is more like a cousin. I see it as a brilliant evolution of Pat Gainer's approach to sulfite-free ascorbate developers. Relistan has been able to mitigate the fog and graininess of Gainer's formulas while retaining the high acutance and long shelf life.

Out of curiosity, how does PC-512 combat grain without having the sulfite?

 

[BHuij]

Thanks for chiming in. I’ve seen your recipe and was one of the ones I’d been planning to try (and another fellow in the club I’m in uses your recipe and canisters). Nice job!

Hope you like it as much as I do. Glad to hear someone out there is using the capsules haha.

 

[bluechromis]

Out of curiosity, how does PC-512 combat grain without having the sulfite?

Many of Pat Gainer's ascorbate developers had fairly high pH. One of Relistan's innovations was to formulate that style of developer but with a lower pH. In his article linked below under the heading "What does it look like", he explains the effect of PC-512 on grain.

It's open to debate, but there may be advantages to using a developer that avoids sulfate, such as enhanced acutance.

https://imager.ie/a-simple-phenidone-ascorbic-acid-concentrate-developer/

 

[BHuij]

Yeah my (layman's) understanding is the sulfite is a solvent, so it rounds out the grains and makes them a bit smaller. This results in smoother and less visible grain, but by the same token reduces acutance.

I went down this rabbit hole a bit after reading Edge of Darkness by Barry Thornton. He made some compelling arguments for high-acutance developers. I messed around with BTTB, found I didn't care for it, and ultimately settled on Pyrocat HD for my acutance developer. In medium format and up, particularly with FP4+, I love it. For 35mm I find it... too grainy. Haha. With Delta 100 in Instant Mytol Stock, I find I can get great 11x14 prints from 35mm (assuming good technique, sharp lens near its sweet spot, etc). I haven't found the lower acutance to detract from the viewing experience on the final image too much, but we're well into subjective quality here.

Guess I'm on the "solvent is good for small format film" bandwagon, but maybe one of these days I'll try out PC-512 for 35mm and see how I like it.

 

[Raghu Kuvempunagar]

Working solution:
For use, dilute 1+19 with water containing 60 g/L of sodium sulfate. The resulting solution matches the activity of stock Xtol. To create something like Xtol 1+!, dilute 1+39 with water containing 30 g/L of sodium sulfate.

To be clear, it should be Sodium Sulphite.

It's open to debate, but there may be advantages to using a developer that avoids sulfate, such as enhanced acutance.

 

[albada]

I see, would you then mix the phenidone with something like IPA to aid in measurement?

I've had good results by mixing phenidone into propylene glycol (PG), creating a 1% or 2% solution. It lasts 6 months or longer at room temperature.
The quantity of PG in the resulting developer should be low enough to not produce fog.

Mark