Never Give Up - Dev Tank Opened Accidentally

[Randy_Va]

Last week I was trying to rush through a roll at lunchtime, and after finally getting the hang of spooling Rollei Pan25 in the dark, when I went to add water for the presoak, I opened the top of the tank just long enough to see the spool before I slammed the lid back on.

The room was pretty sunny, and I was close to tossing the roll in the garbage. I continued on mostly as I obviously need more practice at this.

I was surprised that I had images, and a couple were good (by my admittedly low standards). I am sure if this was a fast film I would have been done for, and maybe those new low UV transmission windows helped a bit.

Here is an example of one that still had some usable image even though a bit got blasted, and one that survived mostly intact. More images on Flickr http://www.flickr.com/photos/ieblog/sets/72157623540717077/ (all those labeled Rollei Pan25 were exposed to this particular error).

 

[sepiareverb]

I've had students manage every possible screw-up developing film and it always surprises me just how many times they'll get useable negs. I've made my share of screw-ups too, like pouring stock Indicator stop in a tank.

As slow as ISO 25 seems sometimes when shooting that little nip sure does show.

 

[Rick A]

Jeez, I wish I had a dollar for every oops I've done. I did a similar boo-boo a couple of months ago. I went to pop the small lid off my tank, and the large one came up instead. It pays to hold lids when opening stainless tanks, the little guys stick ocassionally.

Rick

 

[Ronald Moravec]

Never work under pressure or you screw up.

 

[Christopher Walrath]

Don't need pressure to screw up. Just forget you had spooled some 135 onto spools and left them in the tank until you come back a couple of weeks later. OOPS!

 

[2F/2F]

I always stick a piece of gaffer tape from the lid to the tank whenever there is film in the tank, and I always remove the tape and place it over the little cap when there is not. Kind of like a dark slide code (silver or black side).

White gaffer tape is good, 'cause you can write notes on it. Sometimes I will load up a few tanks and/or load them up to be precessed at a later time. The notes help for this.

 

[nickandre]

Just makes you realize how bright it needs to be to expose 25 ASA film...

 

[lxdude]

Just makes you realize how bright it needs to be to expose 25 ASA film...

And how bright you need to be to not....

 

[Randy_Va]

For a bit I thought I was only bright enough for a camera phone.

Although as with everything it seems I need to make every possible mistake at least once.

 

[michaelbsc]

I always stick a piece of gaffer tape from the lid to the tank whenever there is film in the tank...

THANKS!!!

 

[2F/2F]

THANKS!!!

A trick learned from experience...

...and that time that it happened (worn out PLASTIC lid slipped off the Nikkor tank when dumping the developer), the film was Ilford HP5, and I got a few printable frames, and some really cool solarizations.

Lesson number one learned: Never invert the tank without something (like your fingers or tape, or both) holding the lid in place as a backup!

 

[MattKing]

2F/2F's gaffer tape idea works well.

For 120, I use tape plus a portion of the backing paper that shows the film inside.

Generally, I only need to do this when I've got more than one type of film to develop, but it will prevent simpler screw ups too (I think ).

 

[thisismyname09]

The first time I developed C41 film by myself, the cap came off the tank during the bleach/fix. Since the tank was sideways on the roller, everything spilled all over the table. I refilled as quickly as possible and tried again, the cap came off once more. I managed to open the tank somehow while refilling it for the third and final time. By the time I'd gotten the thing together and refilled, the temperature was sure to be far off and I'd completely lost track of the time. I finished anyway, and, to my surprise, I had printable, albeit difficult, negatives.