Restrainer: Combating the flat highlights of pyro + MG paper

[Jarin Blaschke]

Yesterday I ran a subjective test comparing Ilford MGWT versus chloride papers Lodima (now extinct) and Lupex (only available in one lonely grade). It was an 8x10 negative, contact printed. The developers were Amidol and a low-HQ Ansco 130. The MGWT stood up shockingly well against the gold standard, as far as sharpness (same), D-max (hard to tell), and "dimensionality" (excellent but slightly less 3D effect than Lodima). The only thing wrong with the MGWT look is that the highlights flatten out too much with my pyro negs. Just like we're warned about.

My question: Is this something I can combat with a hearty dose of restrainer in the print developer? The darkroom cookbook would imply that I can, but I also have read reports of restrainer just slowing down development overall. Does restrainer restrain low densities, or all densities?

The Amidol developer looked a little better than the 130 overall, but the 130 highlights are indeed a little crisper. I hope that this is from the higher levels of restrainer in the 130. I would just dump more benzo in the Amidol tomorrow, but I won't be able to print for the next several months.

Lupex lowered the contrast of their only grade of paper some years ago, and now I have hundreds of negatives with the wrong contrast. My dwindling 2016 Lodima supply won't suffice. If I can get MGWT to look right, I'll be saved!

Jarin

 

[john_s]

By "pyro" do you mean PMK?

 

[Augustus Caesar]

Staining developers leave a yellowish-green stain in the heavier areas. This acts as a "soft" filter with VC papers, but only in the most heavily exposed areas. With graded papers, which are sensitized only to blue light, there is no problem. But VC papers are sensitive to green light, so you have a problem. Best advice is to use non-staining developers.

I don't think restrainer will accomplish what you need.

 

[revdoc]

David Kachel mentions increased highlight contrast when applying SLIMT to paper. I haven't tried it, but maybe it would work for you.

Variable Contrast from Graded Papers

 

[DREW WILEY]

The disparate results you're seeing has nothing to do with pyro dev of the negative. Rather, Amidol is simply an inappropriate developer for MGWT. It comes out rather muddy and disappointing, depending on the exact formula. But 130 works great
with MGWT. It won't help much to boost the restrainer. You could try opening up the print highlights with Farmer's Reducer; but that would just be a salvage operation, not a real answer. (Incidentally, the appropriate restrainer for 130 is 2 g/l of KBr, not benz.)

 

[Patrick Robert James]

It doesn't sound like you are availing yourself of the flexibility of MGWT. You should try filtering the light first.

I don't think Benzo is going to help you much at all.

A quick dip in weak Ferri might be just what you need if nothing else works.

Hard to say what would help you without seeing the images/problem.

 

[Alan9940]

I assume from your post that you're using a pyrogallol formula. Try Pyrocat-HD and I'll bet you'll see an improvement.

 

[Jarin Blaschke]

I must state that there is no disaster going on, I'm just trying to make the best portfolio prints I can from 7 years of 8x10 negatives - from the Sierras to the bayou to Corsica to Sicily. I can't change the film formula now. And I'm certainly not going back to non-staining negs.

I didn't want to get into the weeds in the first post, but I'll give more information now:

I did filter the MGWT to 3.5.

Lodima G4 (2016 batch) looks like a 3.75 to 4 equivalent. Lupex (2023 batch) looks like a 3. The negs were developed to print on 2016 Lodima G4 and 2016/17 Lupex, which used to be the same paper, or at least match each other. At some point Lupex softened their paper and for a few years I went on developing film to the same low CI, unaware. Whoops.

The film developer is WD2D+ (and WD2H now that I live in the UK). WD2D+ is the first and last pyrogallol formula I've tried. I instantly loved the tonality so much I never tried PMK, ABC, 510, etc. I've been using it for 12 years and it still knocks my socks off subjectively. I have used catechin before: Pyrocat HD & MC, DiXactol, Prescrysol EF. Most of these looked good but nothing wowed me in the tonality department like the 'gallol developer.

Wimberley himself used MGWT so there must be a way.

The Amidol paper developer is basically based on Michael Smith's with a little Benzo and extra Amidol added. There is still relatively little restrainer so there's room to go up:

Sodium Sulfite. 30g
10% KBR. 2ml (.2g)
Benzotriazole .1 g
Citric Acid. 3g
Amidol 10g

90 sec development

130E (my designation)
Metol. 2.2
Sodium Sulfite 50g
Hydroquinone 2g
Sodium Carbonate 78g
KBr 5.5g
Glycin 12g

150 sec development

I use 130E at stock dilution but note the much reduced HQ. With chloride the result generally matches the contrast of this Amidol formula but the color is cooler. This is why I was going to add Benzo rather than KBr to the Amidol (or some mix of the two).

The Amidol is not "muddy and disappointing" at all from my findings. The mids separate slightly better than the 130 actually. The only thing to improve is the bottom 1/3 of the curve.

So, back to the queries:

1. When I get back into the darkroom, can I expect more restrainer to reduce the toe of the paper at all? Or does it just slow everything down universally?

2. Does citric acid affect anything other than the keeping properties of the amidol?


I'd be happy to send images, but I have no flatbed scanner. I'm skeptical that phone snapshots will convey, but I suppose I can try.

Thanks,
Jarin

 

[Jarin Blaschke]

Indeed. All tonal subtleties lost on an iPhone, combined with print reflectance. (My skin tone is reflected in places as well. )You can see very crude color difference though.

Top: Lodima G4 in Amidol v7
Bottom: MGWT in Amidol v7, grade 3 1/2

 

[Jarin Blaschke]

Top: MGWT in 130E
Bottom: MGWT in Amidol v7

 

[Milpool]

Jarin,

Sorry if this is off topic but I assume you are the Jarin Blaschke who photographed The Lighthouse (among other films)?

 

[Jarin Blaschke]

Jarin,

Sorry if this is off topic but I assume you are the Jarin Blaschke who photographed The Lighthouse (among other films)?

Yes, I guess I am.

One of my life’s ambitions is to shoot a black and white motion picture developed in replenishable pyrogallol. I have someone on it now, will take some years to sort out the formula, if ever, I’m sure.

 

[Milpool]

That would certainly be a feat - in particular the replenishment part. I'm struggling to imagine how you'd keep a staining pyrogallol developer going in that way and maintain process consistency/control with respect to combined stain-silver.

An ambitious project to be sure.

Yes, I guess I am.

One of my life’s ambitions is to shoot a black and white motion picture developed in replenishable pyrogallol. I have someone on it now, will take some years to sort out the formula, if ever, I’m sure.

 

[Jarin Blaschke]

That would certainly be a feat - in particular the replenishment part. I'm struggling to imagine how you'd keep a staining pyrogallol developer going in that way and maintain process consistency/control with respect to combined stain-silver.

You might have a look at some of the old Technicolor research - although this will largely have to do with tanning without stain, which is easier to achieve (based on some Kodak research some Phenidone derivatives have even been suggested for tanning purposes).

An ambitious project to be sure.

Yes, way above my pay grade. I’m still learning the intricacies of restrainer!

But if anyone can figure it out, it’s the person I have working on it. We shall see.

 

[Lachlan Young]

I'm struggling to imagine how you'd keep a staining pyrogallol developer going in that way and maintain process consistency/control with respect to combined stain-silver.

There's some evidence that Kodak looked into aspects of this (for various reasons) and promptly dumped it round about when Phenidone (and derivatives) came online. I'd imagine a look into Technicolor's patents would probably be quite enlightening too, as their prints depended (like all the other dye imbibition processes) on tanning/ crosslinking unhardened gelatin.

I'd reckon that for cinema neg processing, a sensibly designed PQ (or ascorbate for that matter) developer could produce the right set of effects, be fully replenishable - and a whole lot less of an industrial hazmat than pyrogallol. I recall that Coutard used Ilford HPS (spliced into camera loads from bulk rolls) run in Microphen on some of Godard's early films, as the Cameflex could handle KS perf.

 

[Lachlan Young]

The film developer is WD2D+ (and WD2H now that I live in the UK). WD2D+ is the first and last pyrogallol formula I've tried. I instantly loved the tonality so much I never tried PMK, ABC, 510, etc. I've been using it for 12 years and it still knocks my socks off subjectively. I have used catechin before: Pyrocat HD & MC, DiXactol, Prescrysol EF. Most of these looked good but nothing wowed me in the tonality department like the 'gallol developer.

Wimberley himself used MGWT so there must be a way.

Wimberley's formulae can essentially be summarised as a Beutler derivative. There was quite a bit of research into the finite (and perceptual) characteristics of things like Beutler by the major manufacturers, and most of the effects that get attributed to pyrogallol are almost always really just those of metol exhaustion in certain pH ranges. Parallel behaviours were found in PQ developers, without the issues of dilute single shot metol, and those were commercialised to some extent from the 1980s-2000s. Unfortunately, Wimberley, Smith and others seem to have been fortunate beneficiaries of the safety margins of modern materials when used with less than sensible choices of chemistry, rather than highly chemically able - i.e. they got lucky, achieved an aesthetic that others seemed to want to emulate, attributed that success to what are questionable chemical methods (which may have simply been zeroing out their errors, rather than providing anything beneficial), then heavily promoted those methodologies in publications and workshops.

More productively, what grade of MGWT are your highights printing well at? It's quite likely that Wimberley may well have been developing to a higher density in the first place (e.g. G2-3 enlargement with diffusion/ cold light source vs G3-4 contact prints) and/ or dodging shadows too - as well as having more leeway to punch up contrast (given he used an Ilford MG500 head, it's very easy to use multiple grades on a given print at speed). First stop would be to see if printing using different grades (think multigrade, not split-grade) makes a difference. If that fails, there are highly effective methods of resolving the problem, it's just that they mean making register masks - so I can see the attraction of chemical methods. Ansco 130 is overall a more active developer at its recommended dilution (and, again, it's chemically questionable - glycin isn't a magic ingredient at all - cf. Ilford ID-78, where they'd have made glycin if they needed it) than many other developers, so that's why you may be seeing/ thinking you are seeing a small difference. You might find that selective print bleaching is overall more effective than dumping in something like PMT (which will change the print colour) - and there are other things that are possible, depending on the effects on print colour that you might class as desirable/ undesirable.

 

[Doremus Scudder]

Jarin,

Another viewpoint here:

In my experience, I simply haven't been able to get the highlight contrast and delicate whites from my PMK negs with Ilford (or anyone else's) VC papers. It seems that the toe of the paper is just too long and shallow for much of its length. The same negatives delivered crisp, delicate highlights with paper-base whites and then a rapid change to detail with old (now discontinued) premium graded papers like Oriental Seagull or Emaks. The problem, as I see it, lies in the built-in curve shape of the paper.

Increasing contrast/filtration doesn't seem to help much; the toe remains much the same regardless.

My solutions have been more highlight dodging, picking up the bleach brush more and just printing down and living with grayer highlights. Bleach is a really good tool for me these days.

Best,

Doremus

 

[Jarin Blaschke]

Wimberley told me his aim was grade 3 on MGWT, souped in 130 with the KBr swapped with .2g of benzotriazole. He said aiming for G3 gave him a more straight line negative than one aimed for G2, not to mention more latitude, although the WD2D highlights go on forever anyway.

Going forward I'm going to develop the negs to grade 3, which is what the latest Lupex is anyway. I can't get WD2D+ in the UK, so I've been making WD2H from scratch. I've slowly been taking the restrainer out of the WD2H formula, as I like a little more toe. Maybe if I take it further, and compensate for this with developing to higher CI, the highlights could benefit. But maybe the curve starts getting too funky.

Before printing I'd taken half the Benzo out of WD2H. FP4 (my primary film) shows no ill effects yet, but TriX came out quite foggy. For that film I'll have to use the full amount.

I'll also experiment with up to .7g/L Bernzotriazole, or 7g/L KBr, or some combo therein. Old Lodima will be the base comparison.

I'm sure to some degree, I'll have to accept the rounded highlights as part of the "look". Or else beg Paula to buy some Azo from her freezer. Or go to Platinum...

J

 

[DREW WILEY]

Your amidol formula: Yes, citric acid acts as a preservative, at least for several hours. I always mix up everything else in advance, but only add the amidol itself right before use. Otherwise, it goes prematurely flat. You could add a little more benz restrainer if needed.

Your own version of 130 is awfully low in hydroquinone.

You should give PMK pyro a try when it comes to film development. The debates are endless; but I happen to distinctly prefer PMK over Pyrocat. Just realize that what works best for regular silver printing might not be ideal for a long scale process like Pt/Pd, Carbon, or possibly even Azo-style contact papers.

 

[Lachlan Young]

In my experience, I simply haven't been able to get the highlight contrast and delicate whites from my PMK negs with Ilford (or anyone else's) VC papers. It seems that the toe of the paper is just too long and shallow for much of its length. The same negatives delivered crisp, delicate highlights with paper-base whites and then a rapid change to detail with old (now discontinued) premium graded papers like Oriental Seagull or Emaks. The problem, as I see it, lies in the built-in curve shape of the paper.

I think a much more likely cause is that the specific colour of dye formed by the oxidation of pyrogallol is stronger filter than people have assumed (possibly as much as a Wratten #6/ K1). The curves of Emaks are not dramatically different from equivalent grades of MGWT (for example).

 

[Augustus Caesar]

I think a much more likely cause is that the specific colour of dye formed by the oxidation of pyrogallol is stronger filter than people have assumed (possibly as much as a Wratten #6/ K1). The curves of Emaks are not dramatically different from equivalent grades of MGWT (for example).

I concur. Why use staining developers? They create problems with VC papers. If he doesn't like the results, he should change the film developer. There is no cure for this.

 

[MattKing]

I concur. Why use staining developers? They create problems with VC papers. If he doesn't like the results, he should change the film developer. There is no cure for this.

I'm just trying to make the best portfolio prints I can from 7 years of 8x10 negatives

The OP is trying to work with his existing 8"x10" negatives, which are well suited to papers that are no longer available.
The solution, if any, will not be found in a film developer.

 

[pentaxuser]

I concur. Why use staining developers? They create problems with VC papers. If he doesn't like the results, he should change the film developer. There is no cure for this.

Why do staining developers cause problems with VC papers?

Thanks

pentaxuser

 

[Jarin Blaschke]

Your amidol formula: Yes, citric acid acts as a preservative, at least for several hours. I always mix up everything else in advance, but only add the amidol itself right before use. Otherwise, it goes prematurely flat. You could add a little more benz restrainer if needed.

Your own version of 130 is awfully low in hydroquinone.

You should give PMK pyro a try when it comes to film development. The debates are endless; but I happen to distinctly prefer PMK over Pyrocat. Just realize that what works best for regular silver printing might not be ideal for a long scale process like Pt/Pd, Carbon, or possibly even Azo-style contact papers.

So confirming that citric acid has no visual effect, it is solely a preservative?

The HQ is low but at stock dilution matches the overall contrast of Amidol very well. It’s just a cooler color.

I’m using WD2D+ and WD2H, not Pyrocat. As stated, extremely happy with the tonality overall. It’s just the top of the scale with VC that could be a little better.

I have used it almost exclusively with Azo style papers. See above. But yeah, my grade 3.5 negs may not translate to platinum.

 

[MsLing]

Why do staining developers cause problems with VC papers?

In my memory,some kinds of oxidate in some of staining developers have colors and may stain emulsion as VC filter.And the zone more silver halide developed by developer,stronger staining effect would happen.

If something is wrong,please tell me.

(I edited because I think ''zone'' is better)