Modifying ID-62 for colder tones

[ooze]

Hi,

ID-62, which is a neutral tone paper developer, contains 2g KBr and 0.2g Benzotriazole per liter. How low on KBr and how high on Benzotriazole can one go for the coldest tones, if colder tones with phenidone based developers are at all possible?

My benchmark is the cold tone Agfa 103 formula (with the version in the Darkroom Cookbook that contains 0.6g KBr and 0.25g Benzotriazole) with Ilford Classic paper. The standard ID-62 gives a slight green tinge which I'm not a fan of*. As I'm a bit short on metol but have plenty of phenidone I wonder whether I could modify ID-62 to resemble Agfa 103 as much as possible.

I could try it myself of course, but if possible I'd rather not waste Hydroquinone in the process, which for me is difficult to get.

*Selenium toning gives a different tonal palette. It is not what I'm after.

Thank you!

 

[koraks]

Just leave out the KBr altogether. I don't know how far you can go with the btz; it evidently acts as a restrainer, so you can compensate for a higher concentration by increasing exposure. It might also act as a toe-cutter, I don't know, in which case you'd see something resembling increased contrast at some point. In your place I'd just experiment with a smallish volume and keep adding btz from a known concentration solution to the point you run into trouble or no appreciable tone difference is achieved.

As to the green hue: it's pretty much default among papers but it's intensity varies. It's just what small silver grains do in terms of light scattering, I suppose. Using a cooltone paper should help, but I never tried it.

If you don't like the somewhat warm tone of selenium, consider gold toning. I have a feeling it pretty much exactly does what you're looking for. It's somewhat pricy, but you can of course choose which prints you'll tone.

 

[Tom Kershaw]

I made some fairly extensive explorations in this area a few years ago, and generally came to the conclusion that toning is the best option for colour tone control. D-72 probably gave the most convincing cold tone.

 

[ooze]

Thanks for your thoughts so far.

I just want to say that with the Agfa 103 formula there is no greenish hue at all with Ilford Classic. So, I know that this much of tone control is possible with developer choice only. The question is, is there a PQ alternative.