Provia-100F developed with Foma Excel and C41

removedacct2 · May 31, 2021

a search here on Photrio lists few threads about this, as a well on the other photographic forums.
I don't shoot slides but I get some rolls from time to time in a lot of other 120 films. Sometimes, for non-important pictures, I use some that I cross-process in C41, can be fun, can be useable with more or less post-processing, but it's quite a lottery and waste of film.

yesterday I decided to use the recipe mentioned in the first comment of this page:
https://www.instructables.com/Develop-Slide-Film-With-C-41-Chemicals-AKA-E-6-/

I don't use Xtol but the Fomadon Excel clone. So it went like this:

all baths at 38°C
pre-soaking
Fomadon Excel, stock solution, 13 mn, regular agitation ie. 30s then 10s/mn
acidic stop (Fomacitro), shake for a minute
wash thoroughly inside the tank (no exposition to light)
remove the film and expose it both sides for well over half a minute each to the light of the lamp by my developing sink with a regular E27 bulb, in this case a 9W led, equivalent 60W incandescent. Markings are 9W, 2700K, 806 lm
reroll the film. I used a steel spiral and tank, so wet is easy
re-soak to bring back to 38°C
regular C-41 processing but extended times: DEV 5 mn (15s agitation, then 2s/15s), BLEACH just to be sure 10mn, same for FIXER. Wash and stab

this is how it looks (120 film, 6x9):

detail with film code:

some scans, Vuescan with Epson V700, ColorPerfect inversion (ie. ColorPos module) and slight tweaking with Gimp, mainly had to adjust the gamma betwen 1,80 and 2,20. Requires a bit more tweaking.

thuggins · Jun 1, 2021

There is an extensive thread here for developing E-6 film in C-41 chemistry. The results there are much better than your images.

foc · Jun 2, 2021

thuggins said:
There is an extensive thread here for developing E-6 film in C-41 chemistry. The results there are much better than your images.

Can you post a link to the thread, please?

I think the OP did a good job for a first attempt, well done antonia_b

RPC · Jun 2, 2021

Here is one:

https://www.photrio.com/forum/threa...-6-transparencies-with-c-41-chemicals.160510/

YoIaMoNwater · Jun 2, 2021

I agree that OP did good job on the first try. The link posted by RPC where earlz explains his attempts is super helpful. I was going to try this but other things got my handful so would be interested if OP will do more trials.

Also, it really bugs me how people here will straight up talk shit when people try something different, especially when they haven't done it themselves. People come here for ideas and discussions, if you're not gonna contribute then why the hell even bother posting.

grat · Jun 2, 2021

YoIaMoNwater said:
Also, it really bugs me how people here will straight up talk shit when people try something different, especially when they haven't done it themselves. People come here for ideas and discussions, if you're not gonna contribute then why the hell even bother posting.

That pretty much sums up the internet and social media as a whole.

gone · Jun 2, 2021

Or, it pretty much sums up people. I'm a realist. Those colors are really nice. Well, that one color I should say, since blue is my favorite color. I only do B&W, and am in awe of those who do color because it's so much more exacting, or at least that's my understand of it.

thuggins · Jun 2, 2021

YoIaMoNwater said:
Also, it really bugs me how people here will straight up talk shit when people try something different, especially when they haven't done it themselves. People come here for ideas and discussions, if you're not gonna contribute then why the hell even bother posting.

No one is talking shit here, except maybe you. My post merely pointed out that there was an extensive history on this topic, and if the OP was interested he could svail himself of the resource.

Tel · Jun 2, 2021

momus said:
I only do B&W, and am in awe of those who do color because it's so much more exacting, or at least that's my understand of it.

Aha! Time you gave it a try, then; if you can do B&W you can do C-41.

YoIaMoNwater · Jun 3, 2021

grat said:
That pretty much sums up the internet and social media as a whole.

True true. Seems like the pandemic really got a lot of people bored these days.

thuggins said:
No one is talking shit here, except maybe you. My post merely pointed out that there was an extensive history on this topic, and if the OP was interested he could svail himself of the resource.

Are you blind? You offered no advice and just straight up dissed OP's attempts. If you haven't tried doing the experiment yourself then why even bother posting at all.

MattKing · Jun 3, 2021

I find it interesting that in a thread about Antonio experimenting with a technique, when Tim took the time to reference to the contents of another thread as showing better results, that someone considers Tim to be "dissing" Antonio's work.
It isn't like Tim said something bad about Antonio's photos!

foc · Jun 3, 2021

MattKing said:
I find it interesting that in a thread about Antonio experimenting with a technique, when Tim took the time to reference to the contents of another thread as showing better results, that someone considers Tim to be "dissing" Antonio's work.
It isn't like Tim said something bad about Antonio's photos!

The way I read Tim's original comments

thuggins said:
There is an extensive thread here for developing E-6 film in C-41 chemistry. The results there are much better than your images.

was that is sounded very dismissive. There was no link to the threads mentioned and the last comment sounded very blunt.

MattKing · Jun 3, 2021

foc said:
The way I read Tim's original comments

was that is sounded very dismissive. There was no link to the threads mentioned and the last comment sounded very blunt.

And "dismissive" may have been his intent, but I would be surprised.
I think we are all reading "tone" into an internet post - always an unreliable thing.

YoIaMoNwater · Jun 4, 2021

MattKing said:
I find it interesting that in a thread about Antonio experimenting with a technique, when Tim took the time to reference to the contents of another thread as showing better results, that someone considers Tim to be "dissing" Antonio's work.
It isn't like Tim said something bad about Antonio's photos!

Nice we have someone here to defend his friend.

MattKing said:
And "dismissive" may have been his intent, but I would be surprised.
I think we are all reading "tone" into an internet post - always an unreliable thing.

Did he provide the link of the supposed thread? No. And the tone (why the hell are putting that in quotation?) is pretty obvious. No need to sugarcoat it.

Bronson Dugnutt · Jun 4, 2021

I wonder what reversing under ultraviolet or some other narrow spectrum light source might yield...

Edit: Excellent photos by the way... haphazard in blue !

foc · Jun 4, 2021

MattKing said:
I think we are all reading "tone" into an internet post - always an unreliable thing

Yes I agree that reading tone into a post can be very unreliable because it's not like face to face where we can read the subtlies.

I was trying to be polite and point out that Tim's original post #2 was a two sentence, unhelpful rude reply.
In Tim's posting # 8 the reply was confrontational.

It is no skin off my nose how anyone replies or talks to each other here.

If someone is trying something new (to them) or experimenting or asking a question, the last thing they need is someone jumping down their throat
(ok rant over)

laingsoft · Jun 4, 2021

thuggins said:
There is an extensive thread here for developing E-6 film in C-41 chemistry. The results there are much better than your images.

There's extensive threads on every topic you can imagine, this forum is like 20 years old and half of the threads from before 2018 are just packed full of broken links to offsite resources.

antonio_b said:
regular C-41 processing but extended times: DEV 5 mn (15s agitation, then 2s/15s), BLEACH just to be sure 10mn, same for FIXER. Wash and stab

That's probably why you got such an odd blue cast, if I'm remembering reading correctly they use all sorts of tricks to offset the diffusion time to get the cyan layer to develop quickly enough, and the 3'15" c41 dev time is the outcome of the 3 layers reaching the correct density at the correct time.

MattKing · Jun 4, 2021

YoIaMoNwater said:
Nice we have someone here to defend his friend.

Did he provide the link of the supposed thread? No. And the tone (why the hell are putting that in quotation?) is pretty obvious. No need to sugarcoat it.

No, I am not defending Tim - I am challenging your taking offence at something that appears to only be obvious to you. I did not read his post the way you did - perhaps I'm not alone in that?
Yes Tim could have been more helpful if he had at hand and shared a link to the thread he referenced. Thanks RPC for providing a link.
Tim is a long time poster - the fact that I respect the posts he has made over the last 13 years doesn't make him a friend, but it does mean that I'm prepared to respond to one of his posts by asking for clarification rather than attacking him.

YoIaMoNwater · Jun 4, 2021

MattKing said:
No, I am not defending Tim - I am challenging your taking offence at something that appears to only be obvious to you. I did not read his post the way you did - perhaps I'm not alone in that?
Yes Tim could have been more helpful if he had at hand and shared a link to the thread he referenced. Thanks RPC for providing a link.
Tim is a long time poster - the fact that I respect the posts he has made over the last 13 years doesn't make him a friend, but it does mean that I'm prepared to respond to one of his posts by asking for clarification rather than attacking him.

Really funny how he has stopped posting here and it’s just you writing a bunch of nonsense. Why does it matter how many years he was here? Does that justify being a dick? I love how the auto response from you is, hey this guys has been here for 13 years so he has seniority and can do whatever he wants. Great job there, I wonder if he would come to your aid as a white knight just like you did.

As an on topic comment, OP I don’t know if you still follow this thread since it’s being spammed by idiots (myself included for wasting time and replying to them), but if you are still experimenting this, try use a stronger first developer as that can affect with the color cast.

laingsoft · Jun 4, 2021

YoIaMoNwater said:
try use a stronger first developer as that can affect with the color cast.

What? How would that happen?

YoIaMoNwater · Jun 4, 2021

laingsoft said:
What? How would that happen?

Mostly has to do with undeveloped silver halides (similar to B&W reversal) which can creat a color cast. Also if OP is using the C41 bleach/blix it will require longer bleaching and that can have an effect as well.

Hunter_Compton · Jun 4, 2021

Now everyone calm down here, there's no need for all this squabble over what is largely immaterial. As I see it, nobody was being dismissive or rude here, we are simply seeing disagreement among a subjective opinion.

As to the comment about other images being "better" I didn't see it as being rude. Better can be a subjective term, in this context better could either mean closer or truer to the results achieved in a true E6 process (which is what I take Tim's comment to imply) but it could also imply that Antonio's results were somehow aesthetically or technically inferior (which is why Foc hopped in defensively). I don't think anyone would argue that the results seen above are not one would expect from the same film processed in E6 chemistry, as it shows low contrast and a noticeable color shift towards cyan and perhaps a bit towards magenta as well. To those who scan and digitally edit their films, these may not be concerns.

As to Antonio (if he's still reading this), I also experimented with this process using Provia 100F, and posted some of my results in the thread linked to above, although they may be buried now.

As with the OP of that thread, I found that the older formulations of HC-110 worked best as the first developer, showing higher contrast and saturation than the images shown above. These are straight scans with no manipulation other than dust reduction:

I'd encourage others to continue to work with this concept, as there were deficiencies in the original process. I did not see much use in experimenting with C-41 films in this process as the orange mask prevented direct viewing or projection. Provia 100F and HC-110 seemed to be the only combination that produced results similar to E6 processing, with color shifts noticeable in other films and alternate first developers. Experimenting with a wider range of alternate first developers would perhaps find something else workable, which would be helpful since Kodak reformulated HC-110 and the new version apparently is not as successful as a first developer as its predecessor.

Xtol is a fine black and white developer, but I fear it may not be ideally suited to work as a first developer. It's too slow, although some experimentation with higher temperatures may overcome this, I have also read that ascorbic acid can deactivate color couplers, which if true might explain the reduced contrast and saturation of Antonio's images above since Xtol (or Fomadon excel) is noteworthy as containing ascorbic acid.

I'd be curious to see what Kodak's Polymax-T paper developer does as a first developer, and I think a case could be made for a lower than average dilution of T-max developer, as I find that at 1:4 it behaves a lot like the older HC-110 formulation at dilution B 1:31. Perhaps diluted 1:2, T-Max would behave as a good first developer in this process.

One developer to avoid is Adox Rodinal, although strong enough to be a first developer at lower dilutions, something goes wrong with this developer in this process. I tried it as a first developer with some Provia 100F and found that after the first development, there was already color generated on the negatives. Something in the Rodinal formulation causes color coupling prematurely, which is a problem for reversal development.

Also, the color temperature of light may play a factor in reversal. I recall the OP of the original post mentioned matching the color temperature of the re-exposure to the color balance of the film. I notice that Antonio used a 2700K lamp to re-expose film with a 5000K color balance. This may or may not play a part in the color shift seen, as more experimentation needs to be done. In theory, reversal is done to completion, so the color temperature should not matter. All I can say is that I used a 5000K LED flashlight to get the results above.

One other thing to mention is that if you aren't aware it is much easier to replace the wet film on a plastic reel if you submerge both the reel and film underwater during this process. Trying to get wet film back on a plastic reel can be quite a struggle otherwise, especially in medium format.

YoIaMoNwater · Jun 4, 2021

Hunter_Compton said:
Now everyone calm down here, there's no need for all this squabble over what is largely immaterial. As I see it, nobody was being dismissive or rude here, we are simply seeing disagreement among a subjective opinion.

As to the comment about other images being "better" I didn't see it as being rude. Better can be a subjective term, in this context better could either mean closer or truer to the results achieved in a true E6 process (which is what I take Tim's comment to imply) but it could also imply that Antonio's results were somehow aesthetically or technically inferior (which is why Foc hopped in defensively). I don't think anyone would argue that the results seen above are not one would expect from the same film processed in E6 chemistry, as it shows low contrast and a noticeable color shift towards cyan and perhaps a bit towards magenta as well. To those who scan and digitally edit their films, these may not be concerns.

As to Antonio (if he's still reading this), I also experimented with this process using Provia 100F, and posted some of my results in the thread linked to above, although they may be buried now.

As with the OP of that thread, I found that the older formulations of HC-110 worked best as the first developer, showing higher contrast and saturation than the images shown above. These are straight scans with no manipulation other than dust reduction:
View attachment 276465 View attachment 276466 View attachment 276467

I'd encourage others to continue to work with this concept, as there were deficiencies in the original process. I did not see much use in experimenting with C-41 films in this process as the orange mask prevented direct viewing or projection. Provia 100F and HC-110 seemed to be the only combination that produced results similar to E6 processing, with color shifts noticeable in other films and alternate first developers. Experimenting with a wider range of alternate first developers would perhaps find something else workable, which would be helpful since Kodak reformulated HC-110 and the new version apparently is not as successful as a first developer as its predecessor.

Xtol is a fine black and white developer, but I fear it may not be ideally suited to work as a first developer. It's too slow, although some experimentation with higher temperatures may overcome this, I have also read that ascorbic acid can deactivate color couplers, which if true might explain the reduced contrast and saturation of Antonio's images above since Xtol (or Fomadon excel) is noteworthy as containing ascorbic acid.

I'd be curious to see what Kodak's Polymax-T paper developer does as a first developer, and I think a case could be made for a lower than average dilution of T-max developer, as I find that at 1:4 it behaves a lot like the older HC-110 formulation at dilution B 1:31. Perhaps diluted 1:2, T-Max would behave as a good first developer in this process.

One developer to avoid is Adox Rodinal, although strong enough to be a first developer at lower dilutions, something goes wrong with this developer in this process. I tried it as a first developer with some Provia 100F and found that after the first development, there was already color generated on the negatives. Something in the Rodinal formulation causes color coupling prematurely, which is a problem for reversal development.

Also, the color temperature of light may play a factor in reversal. I recall the OP of the original post mentioned matching the color temperature of the re-exposure to the color balance of the film. I notice that Antonio used a 2700K lamp to re-expose film with a 5000K color balance. This may or may not play a part in the color shift seen, as more experimentation needs to be done. In theory, reversal is done to completion, so the color temperature should not matter. All I can say is that I used a 5000K LED flashlight to get the results above.

One other thing to mention is that if you aren't aware it is much easier to replace the wet film on a plastic reel if you submerge both the reel and film underwater during this process. Trying to get wet film back on a plastic reel can be quite a struggle otherwise, especially in medium format.

Nice results Hunter. When you say you had color cast with rodinal as first developer, what dilution did you use? I have used rodinal as the first developer in B&W reversal at 1:6 dilution. The fact that it is high pH allows swelling of the emulsion for developing all the silver halides.

Also it’s interesting your first developer is HC-110, which is what I use as the second developer for reversal (also at 1:6 dilution). Just curious if maybe your rodinal wasn’t concentrated enough? Or perhaps the high pH does something weird to the color couplers?

As for the light re-exposure stage, I have found that it is earlier to not take the film out from the reel and instead submerge it in a bowl of water. Expose each slide of the reel for 1.5 min under 100W lamp (or like me two 50W lamps) and that should be enough. No worries about emulsion damages from putting it back on the reel.

Hunter_Compton · Jun 4, 2021

YoIaMoNwater said:
Nice results Hunter. When you say you had color cast with rodinal as first developer, what dilution did you use? I have used rodinal as the first developer in B&W reversal at 1:6 dilution. The fact that it is high pH allows swelling of the emulsion for developing all the silver halides.

When I tried Rodinal, I used it diluted at 1+25 at 104F/40C. I believe the test time was 10 minutes for this developer but it may have been up to 12.

The problem was not just color casts in the finished slides though, I could tell something was wrong because when I pulled the Provia from the Rodinal for re-exposure I could see color in the film already. At this point point in the process what you should see is a high contrast black and white image only. I saw areas of magenta and yellow oddly positioned on the film with no relation to the content of the image. When sent though the color developer and blix, these slides turned out basically useless as in addition to the color shifts the film base did not clear in the areas where the color shifts occurred making them unscanable. So I discontinued using Rodinal and focused on HC-110, this being the best developer for this purpose I have seen thus far.

I don't really use Rodinal anymore, so I'd have to order it to repeat the experiment, but I theorize that the para-aminophenol in the Rodinal is reacting with the color couplers prematurely, but I don't have the background in molecular chemistry to back up this reaction mechanism. It's only with the discontinuation of the older style syrup HC-110, that I have renewed interest in trying other developers.

YoIaMoNwater said:
As for the light re-exposure stage, I have found that it is earlier to not take the film out from the reel and instead submerge it in a bowl of water. Expose each slide of the reel for 1.5 min under 100W lamp (or like me two 50W lamps) and that should be enough. No worries about emulsion damages from putting it back on the reel.

I have found the same to be true, but for those who want to take their film off the reel, it's easier to put it back on underwater.

Bronson Dugnutt · Jun 4, 2021

an ektachrome frame

Provia-100F developed with Foma Excel and C41

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