New film processor: Filmomat Light

Steven Lee · Aug 9, 2023

I spotted this new film processor on CatLABS website today:

Filmomat Light: compact manual rotational film processing

Filmomat Light is a compact workstation for manual rotational film processing - at a very affordable price point! The centerpiece is a pivotable...

www.catlabs.info

TLDR: it's a rotation-agitating bath-based film processor which does not have a built-in temperature control, meant to be used with a sous vide cooker. Super compact too, and works with a wide variety of tanks (not just JOBO), which I found particularly appealing.

Appears to be an effective low-cost alternative to a JOBO unit, so I'm flagging it here.

jejes · Aug 20, 2023

I use it everyday as a replacement of my broken jobo. It works perfect. And the owner of the company answers the requirements you have.

its a nice machine

Steven Lee · Aug 20, 2023

JOBO responded with their own. Let's see... we now have the following options:

Classic JOBOs
Stark SST4/SST5
Heiland TAS
Filmomat
Dev.a
Chromabox-4
Filmomat Light
JOBO Silverbase

I probably missed one or two, but even if not - that's a lot of choices for a film processor! If only we had the same resurgence of competition in the film scanner market...

miha · Aug 20, 2023

Thanks Steven, most interesting!

STR1015 · Aug 21, 2023

Steven Lee said:
JOBO responded with their own.

Yes, I saw this tonight on the CatLabs website, I assume that the rotation speed cannot be adjusted right?

pentaxuser · Aug 27, 2023

STR1015 said:
Yes, I saw this tonight on the CatLabs website, I assume that the rotation speed cannot be adjusted right?

In respect of the Silverbase it is interesting that Jobo or is that Catlabs appear to be saying that the minimum amount of liquid required is 120ml whereas the smallest of my tanks, the Jobo 1510, says 140ml and yet it is still the same 1510 tank rotated horizontally?

So has Jobo (1) revised its minimum level down to 120ml on the basis that its checks have revealed that 140ml is 20ml more than is really required

or (2) Catlabs has got it wrong and it is still 140ml

or(3) Catlabs has tested the Jobo Silverbase machine and has independently decided that 120ml is enough in a 1510 tank?

or (4) There is another tank, unspecified but not a Jobo, that does in fact work properly on the Silverbase with 120ml?

pentaxuser

tykos · Aug 28, 2023

Steven Lee said:
JOBO responded with their own. Let's see... we now have the following options:

this one cannot be immersed in water, or can it?

pentaxuser · Aug 28, 2023

tykos said:
this one cannot be immersed in water, or can it?

No there is no water bath and the maker, Jobo, makes this clear in the description

pentaxuser

fiddle · Aug 28, 2023

After seeing a bunch of these being released, and they're prices. I have made my own. Used a plastic storage box, arduino to run a timed motor, and a sous vide i already owned. All in all it came out way cheaper, plus i like projects. albeit, not as pretty..

bags27 · Aug 28, 2023

A stupid question;
Aside from perfectly replicable results, using less developer, and not having to stand over the sink and invert every 30 seconds or so, is there any advantage to this over just agitating through inversion oneself?

fiddle · Aug 28, 2023

My reasons for building mine was for using a jobo 3010 drum i bought a while back for pennies. Having a hard time getting even exposure across 4x5 negatives, and reading from many that the 3010 gives very consistent even negatives. I said why not. Any set of wheels on a bar would do really, only reason for the extras would be for the water bath and doing c41 as well.

MattKing · Aug 28, 2023

bags27 said:
A stupid question;
Aside from perfectly replicable results, using less developer, and not having to stand over the sink and invert every 30 seconds or so, is there any advantage to this over just agitating through inversion oneself?

These advantages extend as well to all the other steps in the development process - including the wash step(s), if you are using something like the Ilford low water use procedure. It is the first of your listed advantages - the "perfectly replicable results" - that I value the most, but I appreciate the smaller volumes for stop, fixer and HCA as well.
I do, however, use a full tank of replenished developer, and (for all but the first 30 seconds of rotary agitation) intermittent inversion agitation. That choice came from problems I was having when I developed two rolls of 120 in each Paterson clone reel - the films moved too much in the developer stage when I used rotary agitation for the whole time.

tykos · Aug 29, 2023

pentaxuser said:
No there is no water bath and the maker, Jobo, makes this clear in the description

pentaxuser

so we're looking at 450€ for a set of rollers (like many old ones on the market) to develop bw, main advantage being saving a couple of bucks of developer. In a time span of only 200-300 rolls there's profit, not bad!!

xtol121 · Aug 29, 2023

With my experience in the past with a Jobo CPE-3 (fine) and the Dev.a (awful), I think the new Jobo SilverBase is probably the smartest processor on the horizon. I love my Jobo CPE-3 with the lift for C-41 processing, but I don't even bother using the water bath anymore because the tanks leak and you end up with gallons of contaminated water and a processor that you need to clean. The SilverBase looks like a very elegant solution using the magnet base of the jobo tank. I'd be happy to use the SilverBase just to make my setup smaller, cheaper (if I didn't already own a CPE-3), and easier to set up and break down. I don't think everyone should get worked up over the lack of temperature control during processing. It's very easy to do a temperature drift test and adjust your starting temperature to make the average processing temperature meet your targets. Works great with C-41 and Kodak even recommends and describes the process in their flexicolor docs. The Filmomat Light looks promising as well, but given all tanks leak at least once in a while you will run into a situation where inevitably you're developer is sitting a water bath that's contaminated with bleach. That's a disaster waiting to happen. My preference would be keeping the water bath that's warming chemistry to be separate from the machine that's processing and possibly leaking.

miha · Aug 29, 2023

I don't see why the JOBO Silverbase can't operate in a tray of warm water. Just make sure the electronics don't ger wet. What I'm not sure about, or at least isn't clear from the instructions is wether the rotation it offers is back and forth or one way only.

tykos · Aug 29, 2023

miha said:
I don't see why the JOBO Silverbase can't operate in a tray of warm water. Just make sure the electronics don't ger wet.

the electronics seem to be coaxial to the tank, so...

miha · Aug 29, 2023

Obviously, but the tank only needs to be submerger an inch or so which is far away from the axis.

tykos · Aug 29, 2023

i don't know if i'd trust the gaskets on the axle with the occasional water droplets / waves due to spinning or an immersed hand or the tank movements when engaging/disengaging the magnet.
Better: i probably woudn't trust it with 450€ of mine.

mshchem · Aug 29, 2023

Steven Lee said:
JOBO responded with their own. Let's see... we now have the following options:

Classic JOBOs

Stark SST4/SST5

Heiland TAS

Filmomat

Dev.a

Chromabox-4

Filmomat Light

JOBO Silverbase

I probably missed one or two, but even if not - that's a lot of choices for a film processor! If only we had the same resurgence of competition in the film scanner market...

The Jobo version looks nice. Price is a bit breathtaking. Hopefully this reflects typical Jobo highest quality German manufacture.

tykos · Aug 29, 2023

miha said:
Obviously, but the tank only needs to be submerger an inch or so which is far away from the axis.

View attachment 347746

i understand, but put a hand in there to attach the tank and you have a (little) wave, that can reach the axis. If you are very very delicate it will be smaller, but that's an hassle and one more thing to look after. If i buy a semi-automatic thing, i expect it to facilitate my job.
there's this contraption that does the job for a dry process: https://www.etonephoto.com/it-it/pr...base-automatic-for-jobo-ap-jc-developing-tank (and many more similar but older)

miha · Aug 29, 2023

tykos, yes I understand your concerns and I certainly agree.

fiddle · Aug 29, 2023

Simple enough solution for the Jobo I think. Plastic tub, drill 2 holes for the railes, take the magnet off, seems to have a set screw, mount the motor on the outside of the container.

Trond · Sep 6, 2023

I recently sold my Jobo ATL-1000 and replaced it with a Filmomat Light. So far I'm pretty happy with it. Made some small modifications to stop the tanks wandering from side to side. It can also slip when using the large 5-reel tanks in the 2500 series, but a little more weight on the motor solved that.

The machine is used for B/W without a water batch.

Henning Serger · Sep 6, 2023

tykos said:
this one cannot be immersed in water, or can it?

It indeed can be. It generally can be used in the same way as the JOBO rotary processers CPE and CPP.
You just have to safeguard / assure that the water level of the water bath is just a tiny bit lower than the motor case / housing.
In that case the lower part of the developing tank will be in the water bath, just like the other rotary processors.

Best regards,
Henning

Henning Serger · Sep 6, 2023

xtol121 said:
With my experience in the past with a Jobo CPE-3 (fine) and the Dev.a (awful), I think the new Jobo SilverBase is probably the smartest processor on the horizon. I love my Jobo CPE-3 with the lift for C-41 processing, but I don't even bother using the water bath anymore because the tanks leak and you end up with gallons of contaminated water and a processor that you need to clean.

I am also using the CPE-3 for years, and I have never had a tank with a leak.
I get perfect results with the CPE-3 for E6, C-41 and BW reversal, which are even surpassing the results of the best professional labs here. That and the significant lower developing costs have made the CPE-3 one of my best investments in photo gear.

Best regards,
Henning

New film processor: Filmomat Light

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