Kodak BWC - B&W for C-41...???

So I was given a 24 exp roll of Kodak B&W film in the box to use, and stuck it in the fridge when I got it. I went to load it yesterday, and read the box. It's B&W meant to be developed in C-41. Now I'm sure you guys were aware of this stuff, but it was news to me.

But it got me thinking. I just developed some old color film in B&W chemicals, and it came out decently enough. Could I still develop this B&W/C-41 in B&W chemicals? Or is there something about this film that doesn't allow doing it. I was thinking just develop it like I would a roll of color.

Has anyone shot this stuff? How was it? This stuff really has piqued my curiosity.

BW400CN can be developed in a normal black & white process, but you will probably get rather dense low contrast images, and it'll have the same orange mask as colour c41 (I think I remember reading that it was intended by Kodak mostly to be printed in minilabs on RA4 paper).

Remember C41 films all use silver to create the latent image - all that happens when you develop them in black & white developers is that latent image is developed without triggering the dye production that the colour developer does, and you don't go on to bleach & fix the silver out.

You'll be able to get a scan out of it. Less easy to print in the darkroom on ordinary black & white papers than film without a mask, but perfectly do-able.

There are a couple of other C41 black & white films - Ilford XP2 Super, and Fuji Neopan 400CN - which don't have the orange mask; I think the Fuji version is made for them by Ilford, but that may be internet gossip & without foundation.

Or of course you could get it developed in the process for which it was designed and get almost grainless creamy negatives that scan beautifully

pdeeh said:

BW400CN can be developed in a normal black & white process, but you will probably get rather dense low contrast images, and it'll have the same orange mask as colour c41 (I think I remember reading that it was intended by Kodak mostly to be printed in minilabs on RA4 paper).

Remember C41 films all use silver to create the latent image - all that happens when you develop them in black & white developers is that latent image is developed without triggering the dye production that the colour developer does, and you don't go on to bleach & fix the silver out.

You'll be able to get a scan out of it. Less easy to print in the darkroom on ordinary black & white papers than film without a mask, but perfectly do-able.

There are a couple of other C41 black & white films - Ilford XP2 Super, and Fuji Neopan 400CN - which don't have the orange mask; I think the Fuji version is made for them by Ilford, but that may be internet gossip & without foundation.

Or of course you could get it developed in the process for which it was designed and get almost grainless creamy negatives that scan beautifully

Click to expand...

That's what I'll do.

I enjoy using this film because it gives almost a sepia tone when processed/printed. I really like it for certain things.