Myriad of pinholes on Efke PL100

[Deckled Edge]

I just developed two sheets from the same 7x17 film holder. On one sheet, just at one end for about an inch there are 30 - 50 tiny round pinholes. They are not dust-shaped and irregular, but variable in size from the tiniest pin-prick to .5mm. I am not unaccustomed to one or two per negative, but 30 or more non-randomly placed at the extreme short edge of one negative baffles me. I used a water stop. The particulars are as follows:
HC110 (b) mixed from a stock solution which was stored in an amber plastic jug for 3 months. Stock was room temp (65 F) and mixed 1:7 with filtered water to 68F. Developed in a tray after a 2 min. filtered water soak at 72F. 5.5 min development followed by 2 min. in filtered water stop at 68F. Then fixed in one tray of fresh Lauder Hypo 1:3 @65 F for 3 min. Then turned on the lights and voila.
The other negative from the holder has two random pinholes only, with same developement a few minutes beforehand.

I know about base-acid shifts with acetic acid stop, gas production in the emulsion, and after 20 years of LF I know all about dust, but what might be wrong here?

 

[eumenius]

Hello,
thу case reminds me my own problems in the past with USSR-made films - yes, even at EFKE factory they can pour the emulsion unevenly... maybe the film base was defective, inadvertenly sprinkled with something water-repellent? Or that particular sheet was cut from the very end of master roll? Hope you didn't lost a valuable shoot.

Zhenya

 

[Ole]

I had one roll of EFKE R17 (now R50) many years ago which was full of pinholes too. I think it might be a coating problem, maybe a slipup in the quality control?

 

[Deckled Edge]

Hello,
th? case reminds me my own problems in the past with USSR-made films - yes, even at EFKE factory they can pour the emulsion unevenly... maybe the film base was defective, inadvertenly sprinkled with something water-repellent? Or that particular sheet was cut from the very end of master roll? Hope you didn't lost a valuable shoot.

Zhenya

51 "microdots" of India ink with a 000 nib and Voila! What would have been 51 tiny black dots converts to 51 white dots which then get Spotoned back to the appropriate gray. No one will ever know.

I, too, now think it was a coating problem. This was the 10th sheet from that box, and the only one so affected.

Efke still rocks! (Though "Adox rocks" has a nicer ring to it)

 

[MikeK]

I've seen similar pinholes in the J&C Pro 100 in 120, which is more of a problem in that the pinholes are enlarged along with the negative. It's frustrating because it's such a beautiful film at such a great price that I'm not willing to abandon it yet. I'm glad that you salvaged your 7x17 neg, and I hope that the problem is an anomaly.

I have had the pinhole problem with Kodak TMX-100. Kodak refers to this as a negative density or minus density problem. To give Kodak credit they replaced the film immediately - through in a couple of extra rolls for good measure. Kodak Technical support is good and their product technical documentation is superb. Hope they can stay the course

- Mike

 

[Will S]

I've had this problem with Ilford Hp5+ 120 too. On probably the best single roll of film I ever shot - 3 keepers out of 15. I've spent a lot of time repairing the negs. They didn't replace my film though....

 

[Bob F.]

I don't have the heart to complain to J&C about their Pro 100 film, because it's so cheap, and I don't want to discourage them from offering these kinds of unproven products. QUOTE]

On the other hand, if you don't tell them there is a problem, they will not be able to pass it back to the factory and they may not realise they have a problem until much later....

Cheers, Bob.

P.S. (OT) I found a supply of Triethanolamine in the UK....

P.P.S. I'm impressed: the forum spell checker detected that I mis-spelt Triethanolamine and supplied the correct spelling!

 

[Peter Schrager]

PL100

While trying out some J+C100 and PL100 I got what look like dust marks or whatever on my proof sheets. All negs developed to archival standards. Never see this with my HP-5 or Tri-x negs.. The negs look clean to me visually. Personally I'm stumped but haven't had time to go back and play more with these negs. I'm not giving up though because I see what amounts to good tones for my beach scenes with the J+C100. Has anyone else had this happen or am I just special? I'm going to rewash these negs and I'll post back.
Regards Peter

 

[Will S]

"I gave my opinion POINDEXTER!"

A bit of trivia that I shouldn't probably know: Poindexter was a character on Felix the Cat who was a child genius/scientist. The name "Poindexter" was the name of the animator's lawyer, who was evidently very geeky for 1959 or thereabouts when Felix was revived.

Poindexter had a sign above his bed that said "Home Is Where the Computer Is" which was probably funny in 1959 when computers were the size of several large rooms and the smallest ones were at least room-size.

Will

 

[rjr]

Zhenya,

another face from the Kiev Report? ;-)

Pinholes are not a problem of "pouring the emulsion", they occur when dust is attracted to the uncoated base and the emulsion coated onto that.