Real life differences between developers?

Hi,

im quite new (~6 months) to developing my own film and printing in the darkroom (I don't scan) so I do not have enough experience to feed this discussion but there is something that is haunting me.

There is a lot of discussion going on about different kinds of films and developers. Strong opinions are being thrown around.
Im trying to make an understanding for myself so I was looking for real scientific-style comparisons of different films and developers. This means, same situation, same image, just changing one variable, the film and/or developer.

The only real comparison I found is this article http://www.fotoimport.no/filmtest/filmTriX.html
They compare different developers on same films and you can also change the film.

To my eye, there is a extrem subtile difference between the developers. Maybe sharpness, maybe grain but to the naked eye, from an artistic point of view, I don' see enough difference. Maybe technically speaking one is cleaner then the other, but just talking about tonality, smoothness of the image, I can not see enough difference to switch developers.

Also everything is contradicting. A lot of sources say D76 should be producing less grain then HC-110 but in the images it looks the other way around. At least to my eye.

Is the test wrong? Are my eyes not good enough to see the differences? Do they even matter if you don;t care about the technical perfect image? Is choosing developer just about grain and sharpness or also about image appeal?

Im totally lost.

Maybe someone can point me to the differences.
Im looking to choose the right developer. I don't care about sharpness and technical perfection. I just want to have nice images with character. Creamy shadows. Hard to find the right developer combination. From this images, HP5 looks much harder then tri-x. On other occasions they look similar.

Best,

meno said:

To my eye, there is a extrem subtile difference between the developers. Maybe sharpness, maybe grain but to the naked eye, from an artistic point of view, I don' see enough difference. Maybe technically speaking one is cleaner then the other, but just talking about tonality, smoothness of the image, I can not see enough difference to switch developers.

Click to expand...

So... believe your eyes.

meno said:

Are my eyes not good enough to see the differences?

Click to expand...

No. Your eyes are good enough. You will find so many threads and posts where people claim superiority of this or that on the basis of just one or a few pics made with their favorite combination, without any A/B comparison, even less a double-blind test. And, before the fan-clubs start shouting at me: yes, differences exist; They must exist at some level. But the evidence given to back up claims is most often inadequate.
You mention D-76 and HC-110. There you have two classics. Choose one based practical criteria. With HC-110 you have reproducible results with a concentrate that will keep for years. With D-76, the initial investment (one pack of powder) is less that for HC-110 (1 litre of concentrate); and with proper storage (e.g. wine bladder) you can keep the stock solution longer than the safe (pessimistic) estimate of Kodak (2 months in partly filled bottle).

meno said:

I don't care about sharpness and technical perfection. I just want to have nice images with character. Creamy shadows.

Click to expand...

Probably what is generally called tonality. I agree it's more important than sharpness or grain. Good advice in this post by Doremus Scudder: https://www.photrio.com/forum/threa...pment-time-few-questions.139291/#post-1819459

There is some archived film info from Leica guru Erwin Puts from before Leica went digital:
http://web.archive.org/web/20050727025324/http://www.imx.nl/photosite/technical/indextech.html

Yep...you noticed.
Just find one you like and stick with it.
I have been through a LOT of developers over my short couple of years doing film...thinking the same thing you are but after all that...just realized that it was taking up a lot of time and not accomplishing anything. There are SO many variables that it's just about impossible to nail down differences that mean anything in real life.

Pick one...have fun.

bernard_L said:

So... believe your eyes.

No. Your eyes are good enough. You will find so many threads and posts where people claim superiority of this or that on the basis of just one or a few pics made with their favorite combination, without any A/B comparison, even less a double-blind test. And, before the fan-clubs start shouting at me: yes, differences exist; They must exist at some level. But the evidence given to back up claims is most often inadequate.
You mention D-76 and HC-110. There you have two classics. Choose one based practical criteria. With HC-110 you have reproducible results with a concentrate that will keep for years. With D-76, the initial investment (one pack of powder) is less that for HC-110 (1 litre of concentrate); and with proper storage (e.g. wine bladder) you can keep the stock solution longer than the safe (pessimistic) estimate of Kodak (2 months in partly filled bottle).

Probably what is generally called tonality. I agree it's more important than sharpness or grain. Good advice in this post by Doremus Scudder: https://www.photrio.com/forum/threa...pment-time-few-questions.139291/#post-1819459

Click to expand...

I'm going to print that and save it every time I feel like messing around with a bunch of test shots and obsessing.
Great post.

Somehow you missed one of thos pesky little qualifiers 'slightly.' Whar Kodak stated is this

Compared to D-76, this chart indicates that HC-110 (dilution B) produces:

Slightly less shadow detail or true film speed;
Slightly finer grain;
Slightly lower acutance

Commercial and many that are not will ALL give you excellent results. There are no holy grails. So dont's worry be happy..

Welcome to the alchemy. Developer choice isn't always about miniscule differences in grain size. Ease of preparation, keeping properties, agitation preference, storage requirements, etc. will influence people's decision as well. It still has to give you results that please you, but as you observed, a number of developers will likely do that. You also need to pick one that you can work with.

meno said:

...

To my eye, there is a extrem subtile difference between the developers. Maybe sharpness, maybe grain but to the naked eye, from an artistic point of view, I don' see enough difference. Maybe technically speaking one is cleaner then the other, but just talking about tonality, smoothness of the image, I can not see enough difference to switch developers.
...

Click to expand...

On fotoimport.no you are observing the hybrid workflow fallacies.

Scanning a neg/pos will give you equalized results with enough digital mockery to call it a wash.

Proper evaluation requires wet printing with decent enlarger and nice set of papers, developers, etc...

Most of the standard developers to my eye are more or less the same. It's when you get to the interesting stuff that things can be different.

For instance, D-76, HC-110, and Tmax Dev look just about the same to me. Sure there can and are slight differences but in the end it's more or less the same. Once I start with Rodinal though things look significantly different. It's almost night and day.

Id have thought its going to depend on the size of the enlargement whether one will see any significant differences.

Ansel Adams mentions in one of his books that perhaps you shouldn't make too much out of the differences in developers--that's being very frank!

There are slight and subtle differences between developers, but you'll probably see bigger differences based on agitation techniques than between standard developers. There are certain developers that have a characteristic look to them or are good for special purposes; Rodinal is one with a characteristic appearance, and DK-50 is one (not for small formats) that has excellent mid-tone separation for scenes of limited contrast.

So, don't ignore different developer types, but don't fret over them, either.

Recommended reading: Steve Anchell & Bill Troop's Film Developing Cookbook.

I'll save the opinions for others, but physical characteristics of dry and liquid developers have a big influence on ease of processing. Also, developers that require short process times can lead to un-even development. So, I use T-max developer. It has reasonable process times at 24C and it is a long-lasting liquid that can economically be used on-shot.

Craig75 said:

Id have thought its going to depend on the size of the enlargement whether one will see any significant differences.

Click to expand...

Exactly - to standard enlargements there isn't an issue about grain to most developer and most films.The border is 5 x 7 (not bigger than this size everything is the same)And secondly it is the way to find out : correct enlargements in 40 x 60 (cm) will show the characteristics of film/developer/development/exposure/focus in 35mm bw.
BUT THERE IS NO WAY TO COMPARE VIA SCANNING.The right method need a darkroom.Otherwise it is ALLWAYS a test of the scanner and the software.

with regards

meno said:

Hi,

im quite new (~6 months) to developing my own film and printing in the darkroom (I don't scan) so I do not have enough experience to feed this discussion but there is something that is haunting me.

There is a lot of discussion going on about different kinds of films and developers. Strong opinions are being thrown around.
Im trying to make an understanding for myself so I was looking for real scientific-style comparisons of different films and developers. This means, same situation, same image, just changing one variable, the film and/or developer.

The only real comparison I found is this article http://www.fotoimport.no/filmtest/filmTriX.html
They compare different developers on same films and you can also change the film.

To my eye, there is a extrem subtile difference between the developers. Maybe sharpness, maybe grain but to the naked eye, from an artistic point of view, I don' see enough difference. Maybe technically speaking one is cleaner then the other, but just talking about tonality, smoothness of the image, I can not see enough difference to switch developers.

Also everything is contradicting. A lot of sources say D76 should be producing less grain then HC-110 but in the images it looks the other way around. At least to my eye.

Is the test wrong? Are my eyes not good enough to see the differences? Do they even matter if you don;t care about the technical perfect image? Is choosing developer just about grain and sharpness or also about image appeal?

Im totally lost.

Maybe someone can point me to the differences.
Im looking to choose the right developer. I don't care about sharpness and technical perfection. I just want to have nice images with character. Creamy shadows. Hard to find the right developer combination. From this images, HP5 looks much harder then tri-x. On other occasions they look similar.

Best,

Click to expand...

Just try out Rodinal pls. by pushing Ilford HP5 up to E.I.1600 then use Ilford Perceptol and pull Delta 100 with E.I ISO25.
The rest in bw. processing is in the middle.That means you try out the extrema to find the middle of characteristics step by step.In shell live it is the same.
with regards

There's an interesting chapter in "Way Beyond Monochrome" where they test 4 different common developers, same shot, same film. I think it was like Pyro, D76, HC-110, and Rodinal. IIRC, their takeaway was "for all the arguments over this stuff, there's little essential difference, except for Rodinal, which has a look all its own". Personally, every developer I test feels a little ho-hum after getting used to Rodinal. I don't have grain issues with it since I rarely need a film faster than 320 or so. I also very much like the convenience and shelf-life of syrup devs, but that's just me. I do keep HC-110 around for various mask-making tasks.

trendland said:

BUT THERE IS NO WAY TO COMPARE VIA SCANNING.The right method need a darkroom.Otherwise it is ALLWAYS a test of the scanner and the software.

Click to expand...

You assume everyone using film is printing it in the darkroom. If you only ever scan your film, then you absolutely should pick a developer based on how it scans. Scanner software does make adjustments and corrections, but it doesn't nullify what a particular developer does. To your point, making printing decisions based on how it scans would be backwards.

ETA: Acknowledging that I took your statement out of context, since you were specifically responding to a printing concern.

I would not use Rodinal for 400 films and 400 pushed films. I'd rather use Lith developer to have super grain instead.
I prefer HC-110 for printing negatives. Just because it is much more convenient over D-76 and X-TOL. Which I also used before I discovered HC-110.

As a hybrid guy developing negs and scanning for digital printing (I don't have a darkroom), I would tend to backup agreement that the differences are probably elsewhere. Scanners play a difference and to be fair to some scans I've done and the developers I'm less enthused by, it was probably an issue in my scanning approach that resulted in escalated grain size.

I live BVY's comment on ease of use. I started with DD-X and HC-110, and as many folks who like their keeping properties, I didn't like the handling of HC-110's thick syrupy goop for measurement and always felt I was kind of mis-measuring it. Keeps well. But it's more eyedropper and syringe handling than I like. Yet I went there 'cause I was afraid of powders and mixing soups... until I tried Pyrocat HD... which I liked very much. But I began to worry about the handling a bit n general, read material on safety, and decided I could up my technique and probably get great results with more common powder developers like XTOL, Perceptol, ID-11 and Microphen... maybe even D23 or Divided D23. Nothing fancy. The challenge was laid down.

So I tried mixing up the powders and it was easy. I take precautions, but the only trick is heating the water in the microwave. Otherwise, it couldn't be simpler. And with gloves, an apron and goggles, it's probably safer than the Pyrocat HD. Most of the time I'm using Perceptol, but not exclusively (though it seems like it). What I find with mixing up powders is that this is a LOT easier to mix to working strength than it was to do with HC-110. All I do is measure out in a beaker 500ml of "stuff" and another 500ml of distilled water, give it a good stir and I'm "done". I get to do this at the MACRO level rather than the MICRO level we'd use for HC110. Take the temp.... 'cause the STOCK and the DISTILLED water have been sitting in the same environment always... so this is easy.

The rest is the same: I pour into containers 1000ml of Stopper and 1000ml of Fixer (which gets reused), and pour 2000ml of distilled water with 2 "drops" of Photoflow into a double bucket for Final Rinse. Prep is "done" in 5 minutes. If I need to, I'll start washing off gear like stir sticks and thermometers while the Pre-Rinse runs for 5 minutes and begin clean-up of the previous step's stuff while I'm doing the next. Let my Jobo tank ride the Uniroller, and it's pretty easy.

So I'd say that after 9 months of this... and about the same place I imagine you're at... I've done 70 or 80 rolls, and finally figured these powders ain't worth avoiding. If you go for replenishing, I think it gets even easier. I haven't done that yet, but 1:1 mixes that are recommended for Rotary Agitation are pretty easy and consistent.

First, welcome to Photrio!
Most common developers will give similar results.
Some of the differences between developers relate to how they perform in high volume commercial environments - most likely not of concern for you.
Other differences relate to practical concerns like capacity, ease of storage, flexibility of dilution, cost and availability - great reasons for making your choice.
Do you have the opportunity to see the real world results that other people achieve in their prints, and to ask those people for advice? If so, than seek out that sort of help, because internet views are rarely as informative as being able to actually see negatives and prints.
If I was as new to this as you are, I would make my decision based on mundane criteria like cost and local availability.

Its interesting that given that so many agree that developer choice makes a very small difference to the end result why so many are using speed loosing developers, and not the state of the art products from the big two Xtol and DD-X.

I prefer XTOL stock and even better replenished XTOL. The chart below shows the trade offs.

bvy said:

You assume everyone using film is printing it in the darkroom. If you only ever scan your film, then you absolutely should pick a developer based on how it scans. Scanner software does make adjustments and corrections, but it doesn't nullify what a particular developer does. To your point, making printing decisions based on how it scans would be backwards.

ETA: Acknowledging that I took your statement out of context, since you were specifically responding to a printing concern.

Click to expand...

Gotta say, I scan all of my film and you can see the difference in some developers quite clearly.

You can see it with a grain focuser as well, D76/ID-11 v Rodinal 1:50 for example is very obvious under a 20x grain focuser, much less obvious when looking at a 10x8 print.

I'm in a similar position to you, I've only been developing for a short time, but I am having success now. I don't agree that all developers are very similar, I've tried a few and they all give different results. However I have found one that is definitely superior in terms of versatility and consistently excellent results, pushed or at normal speed, and that's Ilford DD-X, it's also excellent for stand development too, and relatively economical. For me it's head and shoulders above anything else I've tried and I'll be sticking with it. Another tip is to keep liquid developers in 1 litre glass bottles with a standard size neck that will take a wine cork. Then get yourself one of these wine vacuum pumps and some corks. https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Vacu-Vin...212213&hash=item2a4d208029:g:KgMAAOSwZjJU-FaX They're fantastic, you can pump the bottles every time you use them and your chemistry will stay fresh much longer, they're not expensive either, I wouldn't be without this set-up now. Find a developer you like and stick with it, get to know it, but if you haven't tried DD-X you should, it's excellent and very easy to use.

this is why i sometimes shoot color film, just one developer so less to worry about.

years ago i did the mad chemist thing and tried many different developers. there were subtle differences and some showed up on wet prints. but after having it distract me from whats really important, the final image in print, i settled on 2 developers to keep it simple, one for 100 and slower films and one for 400 films. keep it simple