Massive Dev Times

[sergio caetano]

D76 1:1 TM100 EI 100 = 9.5min / EI 64 = 12min. With EI 64 time cannot be longer than with 100. Something wrong on that table or on me. Some explanation ? Tks.

 

[runswithsizzers]

Why would you be using times from the Massive Dev chart for Kodak developer and film?

Can you not find the times in the D76 or T-Max 100 data sheets?

 

[sergio caetano]

¨runs,
I don't use D76, I am Beutler and D23 user. But independently of that I suppose there is something wrong on that table.

 

[John Wiegerink]

Most every time and temp on the MDC for a developer and film combo is submitted by ordinary everyday people. Everyone has a different way of doing things like agitation or different and not so accurate thermometers, etc.. The MDC is just a starting place. Of course the best place to start is with the manufacture and hone your technique from there.

 

[runswithsizzers]

I suppose there is something wrong on that table.

There is always "something" wrong with that table. ;-)

I use the MDC only if I cannot get more reliable information from some other source.

Any time you see illogical data, you can bring it to the attention of Jon Mided at sales@digitaltruth.com, and he will correct it, if he thinks a correction is indicated.

 

[Sirius Glass]

Use Kodak's website to find development information for Kodak's films such as D76. Massive Development is open to anyone is able to add information regardless of their lack of knowledge and therefore is susceptible to data base contamination. MD while usually correct, should an information source of last resort.

 

[PicklesFrog]

¨runs,
I don't use D76, I am Beutler and D23 user. But independently of that I suppose there is something wrong on that table.

for d23 i use 10% extra time of d76, idk if my math is correct but i calculate 10% of the d76 time and add that to the top. so for kentmere 400 its at 9.5 minutes d76 stock, 10% of 9.5 is 0.95 (i rounded up to 1) so my d23 time for d23 stock is 10:30 min. i found when printing this gives me roughly the same amount of density and detail from d76 (at least to my eye, i dont have those densimeters or whatever its called)

 

[cliveh]

Do not believe anything you read on that site.

 

[DREW WILEY]

I've found the Massive Dev Chart quite similar to my own tested and confirmed results numerous times. It's sorta like Wikipedia in that respect - depends on whom the input came from, and it's generally suitable as a starting point at least, but certainly not infallible. Many of us might have slightly different expectations than factory tech sheets provide, or with different developers in mind, so having more resources available is a good thing. I don't know the statistical frequency of simple typos on that site - have better things to do.

D76 is a cagey animal because the result varies between freshly mixed and after the brew has allowed itself to ph stabilize and plateau in active strength several days or a week later.
You need to standardize on one mode or the other. Then some people replenish it (more often than less popular developers), so there's that potential factor too.

 

[otto.f]

Besides, these days there are better developers, also far better for your health and for the environment than D76, which was never my choice, certainly not for T-Max.

 

[250swb]

Some people are happy if they get anything on their film and treat it as a success that needs sharing. And some people know what a good negative looks like and will print like, and fortunately these are in the vast majority with the information they give to Massive Dev Chart. But it's only a starting point as are the data sheets from the film manufacturers, nothing anybody says is to be believed implicitly other than going by what your own eyes tell you, and that doesn't just cover the MDC. It's the reason everybody who has used the Zone System has to do their own tests and not just read from a book, and the same applies to every individual exposure, film, and developer regime.

 

[koraks]

there are better developers, also far better for your health and for the environment than D76

The use of D76 in a home darkroom setting is not associated with any particular or significant health or environmental problems, as long as basic precautions are taken (i.e. don't breathe or ingest the developer). What concerns there may be, trace down to three ingredients in particular; hydroquinone, metol and the borate buffer used in classic D76 to maintain desired pH. The hydroquinone is in itself toxic, but you'd have to eat an entire bag of D76 powder to die from it. Metol has been associated with skin sensitization; the epidemiology is rather unclear, but as always with photochemicals (also the 'eco' ones!) skin contact is to be avoided in principle. Acute toxicity of metol is even lower than hydroquinone. The borate buffer has become a concern more recently due to suspicions of risk to the human reproductive system. Again, avoiding ingestion of the developer suffices to make this risk manageable. Note that the concentration of all these materials in a working strength photographic developer is fairly low.

Environmental risks are likewise marginal for a home setting in which maybe a few liters of D76 are used on an annual basis. In case the developer is dumped down the drain, the developing agents oxidize in the sewage system and further break down downstream. They're unlikely to end up in the environment in a recognizable or harmful form and concentration. The boron remains boron (although how it's organically bound may change), but here, the effect of dilution renders it virtually harmless. Does that make it good practice to chuck the developer down the drain? That's debatable; arguably, only zero emission is permissible. But then again, if you take your spent developer in a jug to a waste disposal facility, you'd at least have to go by bike and not by car to also hit the (almost) zero emission point. It then remains to be seen how the disposal facility deals with your waste and what kind of impact results from it.

For eco-developers (generally based on a phenidone/ascorbate system with something like a carbonate buffer), the environmental impact of discharge into sewage may be less (tiny compared to very very small for a private user). What we don't know, however, is the complete LCA (life cycle analysis) for the product and since the difference in effects downstream are likely small, upstream differences (in manufacturing, packaging, logistics etc.) may easily tilt the balance.

The long & short of it is that it's really, really difficult to say anything reliable about H&S impacts of a developer in a typical home use setting. As always, this is under the assumption that the user takes reasonable precautions to not ingest the chemistry, not get it into contact with mucous membranes (eyes etc) and to clean up spills & splashes.

The story may be different if you're running a commercial lab or community lab that sees intensive use. Both the usage and waste disposal patterns involved are different from a home use setting and more easily bring into view a somewhat thorough analysis of the products used and waste management practices.

The best solution from a H&S perspective is of course to avoid any darkroom work altogether. Since I think we can agree that this is not necessarily preferable within our community, I think the conclusion will always be that we have to strike a sensible compromise, taking the factors into account that we can oversee reasonably well. I personally would want to caution against dogmatically focusing on one or two factors, or crass generalizations based on vague assumptions.

 

[ezphotolessons]

Besides, these days there are better developers, also far better for your health and for the environment than D76, which was never my choice, certainly not for T-Max.

the ingredients list is me-tol, h-q, sulf-ite bo-rax and water. me-tol, h-q and usual photographer-callous-drain-use are not very helpful to nature. what developer better for one's health and environment do you use? is it really better? I use pine needles from my suburban-home and beer from my local-packy, 9% works best. the pine needles are for the film, the beer makes it better but I have-to-admit sometimes if I have more than a roll or two of-film to process I don't recognize where I am when I wake-up the next-day.

 

[otto.f]

what developer better for one's health and environment do you use?

XT-3 is what I use, a variant of X-tol. The two don't differ in result, but I like XT-3 because there's no dust coming up when preparing the stock solution.

is it really better?

That is not only personal, although X-tol has many followers, but has also to do with your own equipment and habits of processing, as @250swb pointed out above. My aversion against D76 is personal too and based on own experience and work from fellows.

 

[Samu]

The use of D76 in a home darkroom setting is not associated with any particular or significant health or environmental problems, as long as basic precautions are taken (i.e. don't breathe or ingest the developer). What concerns there may be, trace down to three ingredients in particular; hydroquinone, metol and the borate buffer used in classic D76 to maintain desired pH. The hydroquinone is in itself toxic, but you'd have to eat an entire bag of D76 powder to die from it. Metol has been associated with skin sensitization; the epidemiology is rather unclear, but as always with photochemicals (also the 'eco' ones!) skin contact is to be avoided in principle. Acute toxicity of metol is even lower than hydroquinone. The borate buffer has become a concern more recently due to suspicions of risk to the human reproductive system. Again, avoiding ingestion of the developer suffices to make this risk manageable. Note that the concentration of all these materials in a working strength photographic developer is fairly low.

Environmental risks are likewise marginal for a home setting in which maybe a few liters of D76 are used on an annual basis. In case the developer is dumped down the drain, the developing agents oxidize in the sewage system and further break down downstream. They're unlikely to end up in the environment in a recognizable or harmful form and concentration. The boron remains boron (although how it's organically bound may change), but here, the effect of dilution renders it virtually harmless. Does that make it good practice to chuck the developer down the drain? That's debatable; arguably, only zero emission is permissible. But then again, if you take your spent developer in a jug to a waste disposal facility, you'd at least have to go by bike and not by car to also hit the (almost) zero emission point. It then remains to be seen how the disposal facility deals with your waste and what kind of impact results from it.

For eco-developers (generally based on a phenidone/ascorbate system with something like a carbonate buffer), the environmental impact of discharge into sewage may be less (tiny compared to very very small for a private user). What we don't know, however, is the complete LCA (life cycle analysis) for the product and since the difference in effects downstream are likely small, upstream differences (in manufacturing, packaging, logistics etc.) may easily tilt the balance.

The long & short of it is that it's really, really difficult to say anything reliable about H&S impacts of a developer in a typical home use setting. As always, this is under the assumption that the user takes reasonable precautions to not ingest the chemistry, not get it into contact with mucous membranes (eyes etc) and to clean up spills & splashes.

The story may be different if you're running a commercial lab or community lab that sees intensive use. Both the usage and waste disposal patterns involved are different from a home use setting and more easily bring into view a somewhat thorough analysis of the products used and waste management practices.

The best solution from a H&S perspective is of course to avoid any darkroom work altogether. Since I think we can agree that this is not necessarily preferable within our community, I think the conclusion will always be that we have to strike a sensible compromise, taking the factors into account that we can oversee reasonably well. I personally would want to caution against dogmatically focusing on one or two factors, or crass generalizations based on vague assumptions.

Long story short. The official requirements for disposal of photographic chemistry are mostly made with commercil users in mind. In most cases, the environmental impact of even pouring yout used fixer down the drain is negligible. It is often illegal though, but frankly, driving to the hazmat collection point pollutes the environment more, and it is probably not even treated any way in many cases.

 

[DREW WILEY]

Our hazmat site is just ten minutes away; and yes, it is mandatory here to use that in relation to leftover chemicals. There is no restriction on pouring into the official drain small amounts of amateur darkroom effluent. Not into street gutters - which run untreated into waterways. In terms of enviro risk, common household products like Simple Green are far worse - it takes very little of that kind of popular surfactant to coat the gills of aquatic life and kill it. Defoliants like Roundup are also terrible, but still recklessly used. We also have free annual household hazmat drives, right into the neighborhood.

 

[Randy Stewart]

The MDC is an unedited database. Every Tom, Dick and Harry can upload whatever they want to the MDC. That "information" goes into the charts without any verification, which is why you find the stupidity first reported in this thread. A lot of folks in social media refer to the MDC as gospel, when it is more like a data garbage pail. If you want process times for a film and developer combo for which you can find no other resource, the MDC is better than nothing, but it is definitely a last resort. In fairness to the MDC publisher, if you drill down through their website, you will eventually find their acknowledgement that their process is a classic "garbage in, garbage out" operation where they do not check or verify anything. I observed this situation years ago after noting that the MDC data for processing HP-5+ in a common developer at box speed was actually a full one-stop push compared to the data from both film (Ilford) and developer (Kodak) manufacturers.

 

[DREW WILEY]

It's like hiring a contractor. Throw out the highest and lowest bids (equivalent to recommended dev times), and then look at the rest of them. And again, each photographer is their own ultimate arbiter of this, depending on the look and predictability we each might want. Factory recommended times are no substitute for that either, just themselves potential starting points. And we all know that their rated film speeds tend to be overoptimistic in terms of real world expectations. You've gotta do your own testing with YOUR OWN specific development methodology if you expect the best outcome - no way around that.

 

[ezphotolessons]

XT-3 is what I use, a variant of X-tol. The two don't differ in result, but I like XT-3 because there's no dust coming up when preparing the stock solution.

That is not only personal, although X-tol has many followers, but has also to do with your own equipment and habits of processing, as @250swb pointed out above. My aversion against D76 is personal too and based on own experience and work from fellows.

Sounds good. I don't use D76 XTol or XT3 (I have never heard of XT3). From expressions from others I trust and have seen their works, I will not use ascorbic acid developers. IIRRC they sometimes develops flat negatives, and without Seagul Grade 5 Paper I do not want flat negatives. if you like it that is all that counts.

Long story short. The official requirements for disposal of photographic chemistry are mostly made with commercil users in mind. In most cases, the environmental impact of even pouring yout used fixer down the drain is negligible. It is often illegal though, but frankly, driving to the hazmat collection point pollutes the environment more, and it is probably not even treated any way in many cases.

Are you sure pouring fixer down the drain does no harm? This is exactly the opposite what experts [cousins and best friends are environmental and water scientists] and other best friends who destroyed their septic system told me.
To each their own.

 

[koraks]

Are you sure pouring fixer down the drain does no harm? This is exactly the opposite what experts [cousins and best friends are environmental and water scientists] and other best friends who destroyed their septic system told me.

Fixer is relatively easy to desilver for the most part. It also makes a difference whether you're a high-volume printer doing multiple sessions a week, or occasionally print a couple of 8x10's. And it does indeed make a difference whether you're on a septic tank or a municipal sewage system.
Environmental scientists will generally adhere to the principle that the only permissible discharge is zero discharge. The water will remain clean as we drive our SUV's and F150's to the local disposal station where our used fixer can be incinerated by chucking hydorcarbons onto it and setting it alight - or simply dumping it in a 'designated place'.

 

[ezphotolessons]

Fixer is relatively easy to desilver for the most part. It also makes a difference whether you're a high-volume printer doing multiple sessions a week, or occasionally print a couple of 8x10's. And it does indeed make a difference whether you're on a septic tank or a municipal sewage system.
Environmental scientists will generally adhere to the principle that the only permissible discharge is zero discharge. The water will remain clean as we drive our SUV's and F150's to the local disposal station where our used fixer can be incinerated by chucking hydorcarbons onto it and setting it alight - or simply dumping it in a 'designated place'.

Thank you for the explanation.

My cousin-and-friend are not bandwagon "zero discharge influencers" theyre quite aware that silver and photo agents harm-systems (septic and food chain) and do not bother with magical thinking. reading old threads on this wastesubject has been enlightening.

 

[Bill Burk]

I did this study on TMX in D-76 stock and 1:1

8 minutes for EI 64

13:30 minutes for 100

https://beefalobill.com/images/tmxfamily.jpg

I feel strongly that MDC should show time /contrast

Sometimes their notes do give clues

But I decided against setting up a competing website because I didn’t want to do testing to fill out the data

 

[ezphotolessons]

D76 1:1 TM100 EI 100 = 9.5min / EI 64 = 12min. With EI 64 time cannot be longer than with 100. Something wrong on that table or on me. Some explanation ? Tks.

@sergio caetano
please forgive my environmental desecration confusion I had no idea
if you are able to find a dark green safelight you can do a very-wellknown-and-oft-used-super-top-secret-technique called "developing by inspection"(DBI) there are also children's toy night vision goggles from the toy store that the internet says works well.

IIRCC there are published essays on the late Michael Smith's website about Edwardo Weston and DBI and there are also details floating around the internet about what a "inspired-exposer" Hank Bresson was and how his lab tech used this technique for every roll. the goggles IDKWTFTS the internet might be wrong or maybe somebody who borrowed the glasses from their 6 year old mercenary is experienced with this technique and give you some pointers. sorry for no direct answer have never used D-76 and do not know what EI means.
Happy St Saturninus Day!

 

[runswithsizzers]

It is pretty funny that someone who uses "IDKWTFTS" in a post on a photography forum would admit not knowing what "EI" means.

Personally, I have a low tolerance for TLAs (three letter acronyms) which are used far too often without definition.

In more formal writing, best practice is to always spell out what every abbreviation or acronym stands for with the first use, just as @ezphotolessons has done for "DBI" in his first paragraph. But in any field with specialized vocabulary, I think it is practical to assume all-but-novice practitioners will be familiar with the most commonly used short-hand terms.

Here on a photography forum, we assume other members know that TLR means twin lens reflex, and TTL means through the lens. Less common terms like BTTB (Barry Thorton two bath) and BTZS (beyond the zone system) are less likely to be known by younger, newer forum readers. And even commonly used abbreviations like "MF" can be ambiguous. Here on Photrio, "MF" most often means medium format, but on another photography forum it usually means manual focus.

BTW, "EI" means exposure index (and "BTW" means by the way).

I have no idea what "IDKWTFTS" means.

 

[koraks]

I have have feeling it breaks down into IDK, WTF and TS.
Development by inspection I've used for orthochromatic sheet film; I don't see it working very well for roll film. But IDK for sure so YMMV.