Overdeveloped negatives?

[AlexK]

This is my first post here, and thought I'd ask this right away.

I just started playing with BW film, and absolutely love it! =D I have a Canon AE-1 Program, and have used Ilford HP5, Delta 3200 & 400, and T-Max 3200 films. The 3200 films mostly for most grain possible..=)

Anyway, I've now developed two Delta 3200, the 400, HP5 and one T-Max.
The problem is that all the Ilford films I've developed have had no tonal range whatsoever. Very burnt out highlights and pitch black shadows with no detail. Only the T-max has had some tonal range, and the Delta 400 to some extent.

I'm using T-Max developer and following the developing times from Ilford's own chart from their website..
What can I be doing wrong?
I thought maybe my camera overexposed the images, but the "program" can't be made into a "non-program", and that sucks. As far as i know it chooses the aperture automatically at all times, so if I step down on the shutter, it compensates with the correct aperture..=\

Any suggestions to how I can save my films from this doom? ^^
Thank you in advance!

 

[jim appleyard]

Yes, you're getting too much contrast. Exposure controls the density of the neg, development controls the contrast. Websites and charts are starting points. You must do tests to see what time for each film in each dev. This may take several rolls to find out what times, etc., work for you.

If your contrast is too high, you should cut the time in the developer, OR, cut the amount of agitation, OR, lower the temperature, but not all three. Only do one experiment at a time. I would start by cutting the dev time by 10%. See what that does.

 

[Jerevan]

Welcome to APUG!

Of course you can use the AE-1P in manual mode. Do a search for a manual on the net, there are a few. As for the development issues, start with one kind of film and one sort of developer and go from there, it is hard to know what's wrong if you have too many variables when you are just beginning.

 

[AlexK]

Thank you both for the inputs! =)
Jim:

I actually didn't know agitation mattered at all, and I had a hunch that I was maybe over-agitating at some point, thought I was following ilford's "10 seconds at the start of every minute" rule. I'll try to cut back on the dev time, like you said, on my next film, and see that happens..!

Jerevan:
I like different types of film just to see which I prefer the most, but I see your point.
That's a great idea, I tried to find out myself but didn't get anywhere.. Already found a manual on google too! ^^ Thanks!

 

[pentaxuser]

I don't want to sound like a "dismal Jimmy" here but if you have followed the Ilford times and agitation and assuming that the developer temp was right for the dev time used then I think you should have got at least reasonable negs. Most people when starting out use manufacturer's times and get reasonable negs. If the manufacturer's times weren't pretty accurate then people would stop using their developers.

I think you can certainly rule out agitation as a cause. Check dev. temp and if you are sure it was OK then could it be that your auto camera is overexposing?

If it is, then maybe you could compensate by altering ISO speed on it but that is assuming that the camera will allow you to do this. With auto everything, you could be left with simply compensating by dev time. As long as it is overexposing and it sounds that way rather than underexposing, then you should have recoverable negs with good shadow detail. Most B&W films will take much better negs if overexposed than underexposed and have more latitude for overexposure.

Best of luck

pentaxuser

 

[Rick Jones]

Pitch black shadows - cause: under exposed / cause: wrong ISO set on camera, faulty meter, very contrasty scene with highlights predominating (meter will under expose unless you override) Cure: meter important shadow area and reduce indicated exposure by 1-2 stops, consider halving ISO. Very burnt out highlights - cause: extremely contrasty scene, film over developed due to too much time, poor temperature control or excessive agitation, developer mixed or diluted improperly Cure: reduce development time starting with 20%, carefully monitor temperature using a water bath if using stainless steel tank, limit agitation to 5 sec every 30 or 10 sec every 60 GENTLY Finally: be consistent, pay close attention to details and change only one variable at a time. You are experiencing negative reinforcement - that's how you learn.

 

[AlexK]

Thank you, Rick Jones! That was extremely helpful..!
The last film I developed had the same problem, much because of a very contrasty scene because pictures inside my appartment turned out okay while the outside night shots looked very overexposed..

I have a thermometer that cost me 2 bucks at a radioshack-like store, and it's supposed to be used for measuring outside temperature.. the problem might be that it's simply not accurate enough..
This last film was a FP4 Plus 125 iso, and I noticed the thermometer was showing about 20,5 degrees or so, so I reduced the dev time by about 30 seconds just for trial.. did 7:30 in t-max instead of 8, as Ilford told me.. And, as I said, the normal contrast shots turned out pretty okay, maybe still slightly overexposed/developed..

About my meter not metering correctly, it might be..but when I used colour film with it a couple of years ago it wasn't overexposed at all and looked okay..
I think I'll try to take one film and cut it into two parts, develop one at home and leave one in the canister and develop at a lab to see the difference..!

 

[Claire Senft]

If you wish to try and save the negatives that you have already developed RA4 bleach...the bleach from color negative printing paper... Rewet the film, snip off a frame of each film type and then put it into RA4 bleach an watch it until it looks as a negative should appear. Then bleach each roll for the required amount of time and rewash and dry your films. If the bleaching seems too fast you can work with a diluted bleach.

 

[AlexK]

really? THANK YOU! =D
This sounds great, I'm going to try it as soon as I get home from work.. have to borrow some bleach from work and try this out.. but my problem is that I've never really seen how a negative should look like.
But that doesn't matter, google is my friend on this one.

Edit:
Checked now and we only have bleach for colour negatives (C-41), it's called 52N-2S.. would this work as well, or do I have to have the one you listed?

 

[Thomas Bertilsson]

After you bleach you should also re-fix the negatives.

Too little shadow detail = underexposure
Too much highlight density / too little detail = overdevelopment (usually in combination with overexposure).

Something doesn't add up here.

I second the advice to use one film and learn how to expose and develop that before you try out all these different films. You simply don't learn enough about each film otherwise.

If you are unsure about exposure, try shooting in broad daylight on a sunny day. If you use an ISO 100 film, you shoot at 1/100th second at f/16. That's the Sunny 16 rule. If it's an ISO 400 film, it's 1/400th second at f/16, etc. That way you don't have to rely on a meter and will give you pretty bullet proof exposure to calibrate your film development with.

Temperature also seems to be critical. If you overdeveloped that much and agitated normally, developer concentration and dilution and temperature is the only thing that remains to give you overdevelopment.

- Thomas

 

[gainer]

When you said "pitch black shadows" were you describing the negative or a print from it. If it was the negative, it sounds like overexposure rather than overdevelopment. You should be able to read print through the shadow areas. Developing according to manufacturer's instructions should allow you to see a negative image of the scene you photographed.

IIRC my old AT-1 had a sort of pulley connection between shutter dial and shutter mechanism. If the belt breaks, you have no shutter speed control. Check the shutter speeds. You should be able to see the difference between 1/1000 and 1/30. If it accidentally got set on "b" the shutter will stay open as long as you hold down the shutter release.

 

[Nicholas Lindan]

Very burnt out highlights and pitch black shadows with no detail.

For night scenes this is about par for the course.

What you are describing are classic symptoms of under-exposing and over-developing.

Try setting the ASA dial to 800 when shooting the '3200' films for night scenes and reduce developing time by 30% with a dilute developer.

The highlight detail _is_ there, it is just outside of the dynamic range of the paper or scanner. If you are printing you may have to really burn-in the highlights to get detail. If scanning, see if you are saturating the scanner by looking at the histogram display.

 

[AlexK]

The prints' shadows are pitch black, and most of the time at least..
I still suspect my thermometer.. I don't think it's the camera's metering fault because as I said I've shot colour c-41 film and developed at a lab without any exposure issues.

Nicholas:
The scanner at my work (I work at a photo store) doens't have a histogram, it's just kind of "put the negative in and the scanner does all the work"-type of thing. If I have underexposed negatives I can push the contrast, but that's about it..

Gainer: I've checked the shutter, and it works fine. You can see a clear difference between about 1/1000, 1/60 and 1, for example.. I've also shot with a Canon Eos 300 with more or less the same results (slightly better).

Maybe I should try the "Sunny 16-rule" Thomas was talking about, it sounds like an idiot-proof solution.

 

[Thomas Bertilsson]

Sunny 16 works for me, so it must be idiot proof...

 

[jmal]

I agree with Nicholas entirely. This sounds like underexposure and overdevelopment. Classic errors when beginning. I personally find all of Ilford's times to be too long (excluding 3200), resulting in blown highlights. Try increasing exposure and cutting development 20-30%.