Making a fine grain developer less fine grain.

I'm looking to hand process some 8mm reversal. Now, I'd rather use off the shelf chemicals rather than mix them from scratch. I intend to use Fomadon LQR as it looks like an affordable alternative to D19.

However, these are both fine grain developers. Because of 8mm's small frame, I feel the fine grain developer results in a 'mushy' image and I would rather have a harder grain to achieve a perceived increase in definition. (Tell me if I'm being bonkers.) Plus, I prefer a gritty image.

If I recall it's sodium sulfite that does the business of softening the grain. So, my question. If I bought D19 or LQR is there something I could add that would negate the effects of the sodium sulfite? Would using the developer at a higher dilution help?

You would be much farther ahead by testing first, as opposed to assuming you will have problems that may not be a problem.

Use any of these for more grain/sharper looking images:

Bromophen
Rodinal
HC110

Bests,

David.
www.dsallen.de

But those developers are far from ideal for reversal development

Reversal processing is relatively complex (compared with negative processing). Messing with first developer could result (a.o.) in blown highlights or excess base density. Make sure you have good results with the as-documented process before attempting changes.

pdeeh said:

But those developers are far from ideal for reversal development

Click to expand...

Really?

Bromophen - Paper developer so will give more grain and is what Ilford recommend for reversal development:

http://www.ilfordphoto.com/Webfiles/20114271220441194.pdf

Rodinal - known for it's grain and successfully used by a photographer acquaintance of mine for B&W slides.

HC110 - also not a truly fine grain developer, highly active and what I successfully used to use (albeit some 20 years ago now) when I dabbled in B&W slides..

Bests,

David.
www.dsallen.de

I use dektol diluted either 1:1 or 1:2 depending on the film. I actually projected some 35mm B&W white slides last night done in dektol. shown at 70x70 inches and still no grain and really sharp, especially rollei retro 80s!

David Allen said:

Really?

Bromophen - Paper developer so will give more grain and is what Ilford recommend for reversal development:

http://www.ilfordphoto.com/Webfiles/20114271220441194.pdf

Rodinal - known for it's grain and successfully used by a photographer acquaintance of mine for B&W slides.

HC110 - also not a truly fine grain developer, highly active and what I successfully used to use (albeit some 20 years ago now) when I dabbled in B&W slides..

Bests,

David.
www.dsallen.de

Click to expand...

With normal negative developing Rodinal gives excellent fine grain particularly with films like APX100, Tmax100 & Delta 100.

I don't think any of those developers will give increased grain with reversal processing which tends to give much finer grain than negative processing.

Ian

With normal negative developing Rodinal gives excellent fine grain particularly with films like APX100, Tmax100 & Delta 100.

Click to expand...

One person's 'fine grain' is another person's 'grain like golf balls'.

Yes Rodinal can give fine grain with lower iso films and high dilutions but, in general, it tends to be more grainy than many other developers and the OPs question was specifically about using something without a formulation for particularly fine grain.

When people attend one of my courses and they state that they like 'really gritty prominent sharp grain' then I simply do some tests with them using Foma 400 and Rodinal at a relatively low dilution (1 + 15). When they see the results they are either horrified or love it!

Given the addition of Hypo to the first developer, my friend tells me he uses Rodinal at pretty low dilutions and longer development times than for negatives. All of which indicates that Rodinal will give a more grainy result than a fine grain developer.

Bests,

David.
www.dsallen.de

Many people have difficulty with the reversal process. Therefore I would use the developers recommended by the film manufacturer and not compound the difficulty by using something else.

Gerry rings true with great advice. Without solid experience with this process, you would easily compound your difficulties for success.

I think it's safe to say I got there after sifting through a ton of miss-information, bad procedures ad poor advice from people that really had no expertise what so ever. I decided early to be very cautious and try to figure out why things worked. Lots of film got harmed in the process.

Sooooo..... One of the things to get straitened out was the first developer. I thought the "grain" was determined by the second developer. I was wrong. I preceded to try to make an ultra simple developer to minimise development time and reduce the need for a solvent. What I found was developers with high amounts of developing-agents compounded with superlatively yielded the shortest times and the finest grains. However shifting ph higher also shortened developing time and created the most ugly grain.

This explains why normal neg developers have a hard time building up usable amounts of silver. There just is not enough agents in there. It also explains why paper developer works so well.

The good thing is paper developer is good and cheap and if you stick with older film formulations, you can likely get away without using any solvent.

Back to the original question: After you have refined your process, you may add some alkali to your fist developer. I would take baby steps here because it will be like falling off a cliff when it starts to "grain-out".

My personal opinion is that if you thing the grain from well developed reversals are "muddy", look at your camera setup. Garbage in = Garbage out. Better lens / lighting may be in order.