Kentmere 100 in Arista Premium Developer

[Nodda Duma]

Kentmere 100 is so inexpensive that I couldn't resist buying some. My 7 year old daughter developed an interest in taking pictures and the Kentmere stuff is less painful to the wallet when she blows through 30-odd exposures of her brother making faces in his car seat or pictures of her knee.

Only issue is that I just have Arista Premium Liquid developer which is probably not fresh, and no data exists for the Kentmere product in that feb (or in the equivalent Clayton D76+ or Kentmere's rebranded versions).

I did a developer test where I soak half a strip of film leader in the developer (1+ 9) and time it until the film develops back to the same shade of gray. The development time in minutes is then deduced by dividing the time in seconds by three. This resulted in a time of 19:30 at 68F.

This gave decent results although maybe a little thick as seen below... I'm just wondering if anyone else has had experience with this combination.

I presoak for 5 minutes, then agitate for 30 seconds and then two inversions every minute

Negative showing the blacks. They're still drying so I haven't had a chance to print anything to scan yet. They seem a little dark and contrasty.



And the whites (overexposed sky)



Thoughts?

Thanks,
Jason

 

[Thomas Bertilsson]

Tonality wise they look perfect for enlarging to about Grade 3, from what I can tell on my monitor. I would not call those negs too high in contrast. I go for even more contrast than that, honestly, and target Grade 2. Highlights do not look blocked up, and shadows look like they got enough exposure. But screens can be deceiving. A contact print would be more telling.

 

[Nodda Duma]

My FB multi-grade paper gave too much contrast for my eye at Grade 3. I then set the enlarger for Grade 2 and it looked really good. I don't have a contact printer but I'll scan a print when it dries and post it. My daughter fell asleep on the floor of the darkroom so I'll have to ask her what she thinks of the prints in the morning

 

[Thomas Bertilsson]

My FB multi-grade paper gave too much contrast for my eye at Grade 3. I then set the enlarger for Grade 2 and it looked really good. I don't have a contact printer but I'll scan a print when it dries and post it. My daughter fell asleep on the floor of the darkroom so I'll have to ask her what she thinks of the prints in the morning

I guess it's all relative. To have negatives that prints well at Grade 2 must be considered a success, because you have as much leeway to lower exposure as you do to increase it. That opens up tons of possibilities with split grade printing if you care to fine tune your prints a lot.
Of course it also depends on your light source. What prints at Grade 2-2.5 on a condenser head enlarger might need Grade 3 on a diffuse light source enlarger.

Anyway, sounds like all is well.

 

[Ricardo Miranda]

Kentmere's rebranded versions

Please, read here: (there was a url link here which no longer exists)

There are no re-branded Kentmere films. There are versions similar to those.

 

[Nodda Duma]

Rollei RPX 100, while maybe not the same, is similar enough that they are considered it the same (for development times at the least).

 

[Ricardo Miranda]

Yes, they are similar, bur different recipes.

It is like Portuguese cod: 100 different ways of cooking the same cod.

 

[Nodda Duma]

I scanned in a print and put it in the gallery. It came off this roll. I think the tones look good but you can go take a look.


Just to recap: I pre-soaked for 5 minutes then developed Kentmere 100 in Arista Premium Liquid Developer for 19 1/2 minutes at standard 1:9 dilution at a temperature of 68F. 30 seconds agitation, then two inversions in 15 seconds on every minute thereafter.