Is Tetenal E-6 chemistry a C-41 + First Developer?

[przemur]

Hi Folks,

Recently, my Colortec E-6 3-bath (4, really) kit died (almost a year after opening). I was using the 5l one, which provides the best value. At the same time, I develop C-41 (currently in Rollei Digibase chemistry) films and I presume that my other kit will die within few months too...

To my best knowledge, the Color Developer as well as bleach and fix (or blix in case of 3-step chemistry) are pretty much the same across E-6 and C-41 (or maybe I'm terribly wrong here?)

So, I was curious if I could make a kind of an optimization, and consider following scenarios (note that I don't mean to cross-process films):

- using Tetenal E-6 kit for both E-6 and C-41 processses (in the latter case sans the First Developer),
- buy Tetenal First Developer for E-6 and make a "mix" of Tetenal and Rollei Digibase processes by using Tetenal First Developer first, and then Rollei Digibase C-41 chemistry

The E-6 stabilizer is not really a problem, as I have plenty of formaldehyd-one from the Tetenal E-6 kit.

Would love to hear opinion on that.

Thanks!

 

[hrst]

No, the color developer is totally different. Color developing agent is different (CD-3 versus CD-4 in C-41), pH is different, it is very fogging and there are chemistry that fine-tune color balance and Dmax.

You WILL get positive images with any BW developer as a first developer, then light or chemical fogging, and then any color negative process (such as C-41) (dev, bleach, fix), so what you ask is possible, but the resulting image quality is far from E6. It is interesting experimentation though!

But, if you want "normal", high-quality slides with neutral color, deep blacks and bright whites and long-term dye stability, you need E6 first developer AND E6 color developer (and formalin somewhere in process). Bleaches and fixes can be changed as long as they are potent enough to remove all silver and silver halides.

 

[przemur]

Thank you very much! You have probably saved me from wasting some color slides.