Mysterious Streaks on 120 with C41 Fuji X-Press Hunt Kit (lsfw images)

[Ellis Au]

Hello,

I've been racking my brain trying to solve for these mysterious streaks I am getting using the Fuji Hunt X-Press Kit.

Left is frame 11, right is frame 12 (censored to be SFW). Yes, the top has some bubbles, and I'm more congiscent of tapping the tank on the counter now.

Zoom in on similar parts of frame.

Agitation method (@ 6:45): ().

Chemistry temp maintained with sous-vide water bath.

Paterson Multireel 3 Tank (Fits 2x 120)
Hewes 1500120 metal reels
Fuji Hunt X-Press Chemistry
-Developer fully mixed and divided into 1L bottles 3/2021. Stored with Bloxygen preserving gas.
-Developer replenished with fresh solution 30mL/roll to the working developer. Bloxygen sprayed before storage.
-Bleach replenished with 5mL/roll and oxygenated with aquarium pump for ~20min per developing session
-Fixer replenished 60mL/roll. Bloxygen sprayed before storage
-Final rinse used for ~10 rolls and replaced with full fresh batch. Bloxygen sprayed before storage.

As noted by frames "usually" occur on the outermost frames on the spool. I've mainted the image rotation to reflect how it sits in the Paterson tank. It's unusual that it occurs on one but not the other. I also don't notice any streaks on my 35mm.

From what I've read on this forum and my Google searches, *maybe* this is an argument to use stop bath? Or is my chemistry going bad?

Any help is appreciated.

 

[gone]

Is that one of those twirley agitator sticks I see on the video still there? I don't do color films, but one of those little sticks ruined many of my B&W films in the beginning until I threw it away and went to tank inversions. It's never happened again, and that was maybe 20-30 years ago and countless films later.

 

[Ellis Au]

I use the method at 6:45 in the video which involves a twist and invert.

 

[mohmad khatab]

After developer, rinse and then take a pause bath of 2% food vinegar for two minutes, with rapid stirring at room temperature, then a quick rinse.

 

[Ellis Au]

Did some bracketed test strips, ONLY adding an acetic acid indicator stop bath at 1+63 after developing. Same chemicals. Placed the 3-frame strip in the top reel position to have the best (worst) chance of getting streaks and bubbles.
Darker bracket compensated up to try to show any streaks (which I don't notice any). The coincidence of being on one frame vs another is likely the happenstance of where the developer carry over stuck. I also wanted to add just one new variable (the stop bath) to see if my bleach was still any good.

Zoomed in 1:3 (The long black strip on the color checker is glossy, so it reflected the environment a bit)

I'm posting so people can make their own conclusions and hopefully help someone else with visual examples.

Granted, this was also only a 3-frame strip in a Paterson Super System 4 Tank (1L size), so your mileage may vary with full rolls in the tank.

As for bubbles, I did a test of popping the lid off immediately after an inverstion: liquid lingers in the funnell/fill area for ~5 more seconds before it settles full down into the tank. So I'd venture any taps should happen after that to dislodge all the bubbles.

I believe my bleach is still good, but going to start fresh on all chems on the next batch.

From now on, I'm going to add a stop bath, and no longer replenish the developer and fixer (use it to about 15 rolls and toss).

 

[koraks]

Looks interesting...but what are we looking at?
Digital reference shot vs. film?
Without stop vs. with stop, both film?
Both film, with stop, but different brackets?
Something else...?

 

[brbo]

We are probably looking at properly vs underexposed (amplified in post) frame.

In my experience, though, problems with streaky development are most prominent on uniform areas with higher density (like bright sky or such). Which makes sense since the developer (if not stopped immediately with stop or bleach) will still have plenty to develop in those areas. In shadows, there won't be much... So, maybe this is not the best test to find the cause of the streaks in negatives.

 

[koraks]

maybe this is not the best test to find the cause of the streaks in negatives

I agree.
Still curious what the examples are though. If they're exposure brackets, I would be kind of worried about the gross difference in color balance.

 

[Ellis Au]

Yes. These are both film, one shot as incident metered to the camera, and one shot 2 stops underexposed.

I show these as examples of specific tests to hopefully help someone as I've mostly seen words of advice without pictures to help illustrate. So I'm posting this here as more of a record of reference for myself as well as someone else that may be experiencing issues.

I have another roll shot before this that showed streaks in dark areas shot of buildings/broad textures (You can see them in the ceilings of the following images). It's very seldom skies or lighter than say Zone VII. I also had a studio shot that experienced streaking on a dark fabric background, so I was trying to replicate that with the test setting. (I thought it would have been agitation, so it was same chemicals, no stop bath)

Again, I hope someone here appreciates the steps taken to try and resolve this, and I would gladly encourage you to share your own imagery and process to contribute.

 

[koraks]

Okay, I understand now. I gather that your streaking problem seems to be positively affected by the use of a stop bath, which certainly makes sense. I also understand a little better the relevance of that earlier example with the deliberately underexposed frame. I don't see any streaking there. But again, you do seem to have a pretty severe crossover in your process somewhere. Look at that initial example of correctly metered vs underexposed; you've got magenta highlights and green shadows in one and then the opposite in the other frame.
Also in the final image you posted above there's a very odd cyan shadow across the person's feet. I'm not sure how relevant this is to you, but perhaps it's something to look into.