Certainly if bath A changes with time it is not ripening in the traditional sense as would occur with replenished developers. Since bath A is acidic no development should occur in it. So just what would explain any ripening. This is the first mention of this phenomenon and runs against Diafine's claims that development remains uniform throughout the developers life.
When Baumann owned Diafine it published very specific instructions concerning agitation for their developers Diafine, Acufine, and Acu-1. While two bath developers are convenient their use should not be taken as an opportunity for sloppy technique.
Sounds to me like more of a pain, I already dislike multiple steps without adding a 4th... Lol
The mfg. instructions say that a stop bath is not necessary and, in fact, recommend against it.
Therefore, instead of Dev. > Stop > Fix > Wash, it becomes Dev.-A > Dev.-B > Fix > Wash. The same number of steps. You just trade Dev.-B for the Stop.
They also recommend a rinse between Stop and Fix but I do that already. It prolongs the life of the fixer. Right?
Bottom line: No more work than other workflows.
Yup, it's been done. I can't remember who did this, but a longtime APUGer posted this trick here. I think he go EI 6400 from TX by doing this. If you search the archives, you may find it.
How sensitive is the agitation scheme? Can it be used in a jobo processor?
Stefan
Verstuurd van mijn GT-P7510 met Tapatalk
So it ripens huh? Interesting, is that the B developer that ripens or the A?
Also does this mean IN THEORY that if you took it and soaked in A... The. Developed in B till completion... Then soaked in A again and back to B, you could push it beyond the normal point as more developer could soak in?
Sounds to me like more of a pain, I already dislike multiple steps without adding a 4th... Lol
With Tri-X you get very good classic looking results....
...Once it has 'ripened' a little your negatives will become noticeably smoother and take on a pearly appearance.
The mfg. instructions say that a stop bath is not necessary and, in fact, recommend against it.
Therefore, instead of Dev. > Stop > Fix > Wash, it becomes Dev.-A > Dev.-B > Fix > Wash. The same number of steps. You just trade Dev.-B for the Stop.
They also recommend a rinse between Stop and Fix but I do that already. It prolongs the life of the fixer. Right?
Bottom line: No more work than other workflows.
I've always used it with plastic reels and never had a problem.
Why are you inverting only once half way through? Instructions say to agitate gently for 10 seconds (three inversions or so if done slowly) initially followed by 5 seconds each minute - which is what I do, two gentle inversions and tap the tank each minute including the last one, then pour. Never any problems with unevenness.
(using Diafine twice for more speed)
I think it was Donald Qualls, who also cooked up a developer that gets a very respectable 6400 and an arguably-usable 12800 from HP5+ or TX400. He seems to have wandered away from APUG in the last few years, which is a shame as he contributed some very good mad-scientist darkroom ideas.
I never tried this particular trick myself, but clearly you'd have to rinse the holy hell out of it after the first B bath to avoid any contamination of the A bath. If you only needed to do it once in a blue moon, I suppose you could throw away the second A bath rather than putting it back in the stock bottle. Even then, it seems like the emulsion wouldn't absorb too much of the A bath due to being already wet---might it work even better to let it *dry* in the tank, at least partially, before doing the second round?
The approach makes sense, but of course you'd lose a certain amount of the compensating effect in the highlights. Reduced agitation might bring back some of that compensation, I guess, but maybe at the cost of unevenness. IMHO, some experiments are justified to find out what does and doesn't work well in practice.
-NT
Diafine works best with strong, directional lighting, or even some crazy, unpredictable indoor lighting like Harry showed. If you like to shoot in flatter lighting, you will have trouble getting enough contrast for a good silver print. (The negs do scan beautifully - if you see the Rodeo project on my website, those were all Diafine and either HP5 or TMAX 400, scanned and then printed with Eboni-6 inks).
Most of the time for silver you will be in the Grade 4 range with a diffusion enlarger. The negs don't look thin, there's lots of detail there, they just have a very low gradient/contrast. That, in fact, may be the biggest knock against Diafine. So again, make sure you have some strong or interesting lighting. I have another series of beach portraits (not ready to show, alas) that are all done in that early morning Equatorial light where it's so bright you can barely keep your eyes open. Diafine worked wonders on those Acros negs.
It was indeed Donald Qualls. You have a good memory and he is missed. I happended to print out the page from this thread. Here's what it says:
Give the film a thorough water rinse after the B bath, you can then put the film back in A for another 3 min, followed by another 3 in B. Fix and wash as normal.
Shadow detail will surley be compromised--that's already a given, based on how you shot the film, and the results will be fairly grainy, but you'll get good midtones and quite printable negs if you didn't cheat on the metering even at 3200.
He goes on to get EI 5000 from a mixture of HC-110 and Dektol. WOW!
In my experience Selenium can give you up to about a grade, but it really depends on how much density there is to begin with. If the negative is thin, or if it doesn't have much contrast to begin with, you might not get much expansion with Selenium. Sometimes even a slight boost can help, though.
Although I'm not a Diafine user, if anyone has tried it with Acros and has some characteristic curve data I'd be interested in seeing it. I've always thought for those who like Diafine Acros might be a good candidate for general use with it (and other two-baths or compensating developers) since Acros inherently has very high highlight contrast.
Since I haven't had a problem with getting enough contrast I've never tried it, but I wonder if you could intensify flat Diafine negatives in selenium toner to get more contrast and print more easily on diffusion enlargers?
...I have always printed on a condenser enlarger. With a condenser enlarger I still end up printing negs from flat lighting on grade 3.5 or sometimes 4, but I've always been able to get good prints.
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