Less spotting clean-up

Alan Johnson · Aug 14, 2006

With a few selected 35mm films I would like to reduce print spotting to the minimum and am prepared for extra work.
First question:
Is it possible to eliminate spotting completely on 11x14 from 35mm or are there small defects in the actual film ?
Second question:
I propose to use developer,stop,fix one-off made up with filtered water,wash in filtered water,rinse in distilled water with 10 drops per litre wetting agent,hang diagonally to dry in a dust-free atmosphere,store immediately in print-thru sleeves,brush and air blow all surfaces when loading the enlarger.
Would there be any improvement on this?Thanks.

Thomas Bertilsson · Aug 14, 2006

Print in dust-free environement. Anti-static treatments. Humidity control.

George Collier · Aug 14, 2006

As previous post said, anti static and humidity. The lower the humidity, the greater the invitation to static charge. Too much humidity can result in problems with lenses, paper, etc. I keep my basement (where the darkroom is) at about 50%RH (this from a working experience many years ago with a very sensitive engraving film), and keep the lenses, paper, negs, etc upstairs as a precaution. I don't do anything special (in this regard) with chemistry, but the final rinse is distilled water with 1:200 photo flo, mixed just prior to use and dumped. I store in Printfile pages. I use canned air on each neg (both sides) prior to insertion into the enlarger's neg stage. I rarely have a problem with dust, maybe a very small spec or two in sensitive areas, but many prints have none, until 16x20 from 4x5.
Re film defects - very rare.
Who else has an ideal RH level for a darkroom?

Ole · Aug 14, 2006

I'm in a humid area, and rarely have problems with dust. I give the negatices a quick blast with canned air on both sides just before popping them in the enlarger, and that's really the only precaution I take.

Apart from letting the dust on the darkroom floor stay where it is, and try to avoid disturbing it!

Alan Johnson · Aug 14, 2006

Thanks.Here I do not have the benefit of mountain spring water.My wetting agent is recommended to be used 40 drops/L ,that is about 1ml/L. I believe the best concentration is the minimum so that all the drops run off the film which depends on local water quality.I will try a bit more than I originally proposed.

Bruce Watson · Aug 14, 2006

Alan Johnson said:
With a few selected 35mm films I would like to reduce print spotting to the minimum and am prepared for extra work.
First question:
Is it possible to eliminate spotting completely on 11x14 from 35mm or are there small defects in the actual film ?

That's actually two questions. To the first one, probably not. To the second one, yes there are small defects in every film. I don't know if you'll see them at 12x enlargement or not.

Alan Johnson said:
Second question:
I propose to use developer,stop,fix one-off made up with filtered water,wash in filtered water,rinse in distilled water with 10 drops per litre wetting agent,hang diagonally to dry in a dust-free atmosphere,store immediately in print-thru sleeves,brush and air blow all surfaces when loading the enlarger.
Would there be any improvement on this?Thanks.

You can certainly carry things to more extremes than this. Start with cleaning out the darkroom and wiping down the ceiling, walls, and all selves and cabinet surfaces (including the bottom of shelves). You'll be amazed at how much dust you remove - dust that now won't fall on your drying film.

Then use an electrostatic air cleaner to get rid of as much of the dust that comes through the door with you.

Then, mix all chemicals with distilled water only. That includes when diluting developer stock. Why? Even if you are using 5micron filters, stuff gets through. And typically, the filter isn't on the end of the faucet - and the piping between the filter and the end of the faucet can be full of crud (it's never been cleaned, has it?)

Then, use everything one-shot. That's right, even fixer (dilute it).

When you get done, dry your film with forced warm filtered air. This will minimize the chances of dust drying on your film. There are film dryers made for this.

Then, when you clean up, rinse your equipment with distilled water, and dry it oriented so that dust can't fall on any surfaces that see film and/or chemistry.

Basically, don't let anything not from distilled water touch your film or any surface of your equipment, then dry it do that dust can't settle on it.

You do all this and your spotting time will certainly decrease. But it will not be eliminated. Sorry.

Alan Johnson · Aug 15, 2006

I will add to my original list: darkroom clean out,distilled water for developer , stop , fix, humidity control by central heating radiator already present.
Stores do not appear to sell electrostatic air cleaner by that name, but have "clean air tower with 99% HEPA/Carbon filter (I think that means 99% removal of particles high efficiency particulate air) with ioniser assists in particle removal" so unless advised otherwise I will get one of these of suitable size.
Thanks for all the advice.

Thomas Bertilsson · Aug 15, 2006

An electronic air cleaner will remove some of the particulates from the air, but not all. One thing happens that you can count on, though, they get charged by negative and positive ions. Some of those are caught on the collector plates (which you must have a cleaning regimen for or they will degrade in performance). The additional HEPA filter is a good idea.
Any air cleaning device needs to operate for a while before you can call the area dust free, as air will circulate it will stir up existing dust.

I should add that in the beginning, an electronic air cleaner may 'produce' a layer of dust in the area which looks white. Don't worry, it's the same dust, but cleaner, and it's heavier and falls to the ground or settles on other surfaces.
I work for Honeywell and dealt with electronic air cleaners for over a year. They do a good job of keeping an area cleaner.

- Thom

Christopher Colley · Aug 15, 2006

I would avoid blowing the dust all around the air before starting a session, I think this would not improve the sitatuation..

my enlarger, as well as all of my darkroom is really dusty, and i have a couple cats too.. as well as a beard..

I rarely ever have dust/hair on my negs and prints.. I guess it might be because, as mentioned by ole, I do not disturb it..

I know it isnt much use, but the way I print, I blow off/clean the neg or print again if I see dust, until that point i do nothing special, I load negs straight from the sleeves right into the enlarger without any canned air/dusting off and go right to printing.. If I see dust THEN I worry about it and resolve the issue.

Q17 · Aug 15, 2006

I've always found my negatives and prints to be cleaner when I wait several hours after cleaning the darkroom before starting to develop film or print.

The process of cleaning itself raises any remaining dust, and until it settles, the dust in the air is likely to end up on the prints or negatives.

=michelle=

Lachlan Young · Aug 16, 2006

Clean the condenser glass in your enlarger... you will be amazed at the amount of rubbish you will find!

Lachlan

Neil Miller · Aug 16, 2006

Alan - I used to have terrible problems with dust, which took me some time and money to solve.

Initially I used an antistatic device to zap the film, then blew away the loose debris from the negs with canned air. It was some help, but not the answer (for me) so I bought an air-filter for the darkroom, which helped a bit. I then filtered water coming into the house with a coarse filter, and water in the darkroom with a fine filter, which helped some more. I then changed my condenser enlarger for a cold-light enlarger, which helped immensely. The final step, which has elimated almost all my problems is the use of distilled water as a final rinse for the negatives.

Regards,
Neil.

Ronald Moravec · Aug 16, 2006

I think Bruce Watson copied my paper because we both agree 100%. No need to repeat it. If you follow his advice, you will be home free.

Doug Webb · Aug 19, 2006

One of the reasons I moved from 35mm to larger formats, first 6x7mm, then 4x5 and 5x7 was because of spotting problems on prints, from dust, imperfections in negatives, crud from water, etc. Think about it for a moment, any imperfection on a 35mm strip of film gets mangified immensly by enlargement, think about how much more you are enlarging 35mm film to get an 11x14 print and how much more an imperfection would show up when a 35mm negative is used compared to a 4x5 or larger negative. In my opinion, using a bigger negative reduces spotting immensly, if you are using good technique.

One other big issue with spots on prints is humidity. Increasing humidity to 50% or more with a humidifier dramatically reduces the amount of dust in the air. Most of the so called dust removing or anti-static devices actually end up stirring up lots of dust in so far as how much dust is actually airborne. Although anti-static devices reduce the tendency for film to attract dust like a magnet, dust that is airborne will still fall on a negative, on a blank sheet of paper, or into trays of developer, etc. Don't try to store enlarging lenses, etc. in an environment that is high humidity, however. If you can ever get the airborne dust under control with higher humidity, then cleaning surfaces, provided you don't do it immediately prior to printing, can help a lot

Another big issue, in my opinion, is enlarger light source, I think my negatives from a cold light source show less evidence of dust or other negative imperfections, compared to a condensor light source.

Good luck.
D.W.

Bruce Watson · Aug 19, 2006

Ronald Moravec said:
I think Bruce Watson copied my paper because we both agree 100%. No need to repeat it. If you follow his advice, you will be home free.

I haven't read your paper, but I've read a fair number of your posts! Is this paper published somewhere on the web?

jp80874 · Aug 19, 2006

Alan Johnson said:
,hang diagonally to dry in a dust-free atmosphere,store immediately in print-thru sleeves,...Would there be any improvement on this?Thanks.

Alan,

Define your version of a dust free atmosphere.

For the last three years I have been using what Bed Bath and Beyond calls an extra closet with casters. http://www.bedbathandbeyond.com/product.asp?order_num=-1&SKU=11678653&RN=303
It is a cotton canvas box 30" W x 66" H x 20" D. on casters with a hanger bar inside. Attach Office Max Binder Clips hanging down from wire hangers. Suspend newly developed film in what ever size from the clips, zip up the door and walk away. The moisture goes out through the cotton canvas, but the dust doesn't seem to come in. When the film is dry I put on thin clean cotton gloves sold for film handling by B&H, unzip the door, and put the film in clear plastic holders. I have done this for film sizes from 35mm to 7x17 inches.

I used to sell microfilm systems for Bell & Howell in the 1970s before computer storage was economical. Our developing lab in Cleveland was rated the best in the US. The Service Manager claimed it was because no one touched film without wearing these gloves.

My darkroom is a quarter of our basement. I wheel this thing out into the rest of the basement when not in use and store it with a clean sheet over top to catch any dust.

Good luck. All the ideas so far are tried and true. At some point spotting the print becomes easier than the precautions. You decide where.

John Powers

Alan Johnson · Aug 23, 2006

I'm not going to do this all the time,but I tried out the complete procedure suggested by Bruce Watson and Ronald Moravec, except I left out the heated film drier and replaced an electrostatic air cleaner by an air filter 99%HEPA/Carbon ion assisted particle removal, which seems to be what stores sell in this line.I ran this filter for a couple of hours extra before the film drying and before the printing.Test film was 35mm photographs of clouds printed dark to show up spots,11x14. I used 20 micron filtered wash water, rinsed in distilled water containing 40 drops/L photo flo, hung to dry diagonally with the air filter still running.
In the printing with filter running I at first made an elementary mistake,not brushing the double glass negative carrier enough with the anti-static brush.But by the end of the session I made prints where could only be seen on careful inspection from 10 ins away about 6 spots 0.5mm and no larger spots at all.
Seems like a good method.

Less spotting clean-up

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