Rollei Retro 100 / APX100 pushed to 1600 - how to develop

Yesterday, I found myself in a tight spot. Dark indoor conditions, and the only film in my bag was a Rollei Retro 100. I decided to rate it at 1600 and just give it a go. Any suggestions on how to develop it (I use Rodinal)? I was thinking about using stand development, and just give it 2 hours in 1+100 Rodinal. How does that sound?

Welcome to the dark side...

I would use a developer that is more suitable for push development and give it a try in XTol 1:1 for at least 1 hour. In the massive dev chart a maximum of 800ASA is given for 29 minutes.

Well, so far the lesson is that APX100/Rollei Retro 100 does not handle being pushed to 1600 well. Having only Rodinal and Fomadon P available, I tried stand development in Fomadon P for one hour. Some images did register on the film, but for most of the roll, only isolated black spots. I am scanning the negatives now, and so far there is only one usable shot. And that might well be the result of an accidental one stop "overexposure" (ie only a 3 stop underexposure). I guess 800 is the limit for APX100, but it is much better shot at box speed

Necator said:

Well, so far the lesson is that APX100/Rollei Retro 100 does not handle being pushed to 1600 well. Having only Rodinal and Fomadon P available, I tried stand development in Fomadon P for one hour. Some images did register on the film, but for most of the roll, only isolated black spots. I am scanning the negatives now, and so far there is only one usable shot. And that might well be the result of an accidental one stop "overexposure" (ie only a 3 stop underexposure). I guess 800 is the limit for APX100, but it is much better shot at box speed

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most film is way better when shot so that it is capable of reproducing detail and contrast within it's density/exposure range. personally i find the outer limits of APX 100 to be about 100 at the most assuming you have your meter set for 100 and happen to be pointing it at part of the scene that you want rendered in zone III and closing down 2 stops.

;-)

RB

Necator said:

Well, so far the lesson is that APX100/Rollei Retro 100 does not handle being pushed to 1600 well. Having only Rodinal and Fomadon P available, I tried stand development in Fomadon P for one hour. Some images did register on the film, but for most of the roll, only isolated black spots. I am scanning the negatives now, and so far there is only one usable shot. And that might well be the result of an accidental one stop "overexposure" (ie only a 3 stop underexposure). I guess 800 is the limit for APX100, but it is much better shot at box speed

Click to expand...

You might get 1600, but with stand development, I'm thinking you would need substantially more than one hour to get the development you need. It's a pretty extreme push, but I've heard of worse.

Yep, I would try 1:100 rodinal overnight. That should do it and the grain should be quite nice too

I'll try the 1:100 Rodinal overnight next time, but to be on the safe side, I have ordered a few rolls of Tmax 400 for the next time I find myself in a low light situation.

Rodinal is not good for pushing.

Next time you're in a tight spot, buy some microphen.

Stand development doesn't work either, as you want fresh developer to keep working on the highlights.

Extreme contrast vs extreme push? Do I understand this?

waileong said:

Stand development doesn't work either, as you want fresh developer to keep working on the highlights.

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OK, help me think this through.

Stand development isn't particulary good for extreme pushing, but it is good for controlling extreme contrast? (Do we confuse this because these two attributes are so often present hand-in-hand?)

The compensating effect with extreme contrast I understand well enough. But tell me if my analysis of the "not good for extreme push" holds up. (By extreme push I do not mean one or two stops, which would imply that "most" of the latent image in within the response curve of the film, but rather something like 4 or more stops like the OP has, such that "most" of the desired image range is stuck down in the toe if it is even there at all.)

The problem with an extreme push isn't that there is such a high contrast recorded in the latent image, but rather that there's almost nothing above the noise floor down in the toe.

So then, would one want to consider a rotary processor with constant agitation for a long time? This will (maybe) expand the compressed image to something "usable" even if it's not awesome?

(Yea, yea, and popcorn size grain. Better than nothing at all, isn't it?)

So, if what we "wanted" to be in zones 3-7 are in fact only recorded in zone 1-2, then we really do need tremendous expansion (instead of highlight compensation). And we may be forced to accept the highlight blowout to get the image at all? Clearly you cannot agitate part of the negative and not agitate another part, so a compromise is the best we can get.

Do I understand this? Or have I missed the boat?

I'd say that you have it. You can't make something from nothing however. There gets to be a point where not only will you not be able to expand the image density further, but that the developer will just go to work on non-image silver, ie: chemical fogging. I've seen this with extreme stand with Rodinal, base fog level goes way up. At least now the empty areas will show grain!

waileong said:

Stand development doesn't work either, as you want fresh developer to keep working on the highlights.

Click to expand...

It does. The stand development with Rodinal helps with flattening out excess contrast that is likely with pushed speed. This was 400 at 1600 in Rodinal for 2 hours stand. And yes, it prints wonderfully. and its 35mm film

neat

Schlapp, what film is that?
interesting tone

I have one roll of delta 400 pushed to 3200 (full moon landscape) yet to develop

Denis R said:

Schlapp, what film is that?
interesting tone

I have one roll of delta 400 pushed to 3200 (full moon landscape) yet to develop

Click to expand...

Twas HP5+.

1. There is no such thing as 'compensating effect' That is simply a film with overexposure latitude being given gentle development to not fully develop the overexposure. A developer like Rodinal is good for this because it is relatively inefficient at developing shadows. Giving a long, minimal agitation scheme to an grossly over exposed negative can look quite normal. It is handy to have practiced this in case you need it. It is futile to try to hit it the first time when you have made a mistake. This was handy back in the '60s because there wasn't always to carefully spot meter a night scene, filled with people who wished you harm. So you exposed film at what you thought was right, and then at what was the longest you could hold the camera. One second at f/2 was the proper exposure for more pictures than you could imagine.

2. Pushing film can mean one of two things. First, it can mean giving massive overdevelopment in order to raise the midtones to the level of highlights. You've exposed Agfa at 400. Your midtones were accidently placed as a shadow and the highlights as midtones. You've lost the shadows, but can lift what's rest.

Second, it can mean raising the grossly underexposed shadows to the normal density of shadows. That can be done one of two ways. First, using a developer whose property is to efficiently develop shadows (such as XTOL, and to a lesser degree, D-76), extend the development time to give the shadows a chance to develop. The next trick is to balance the negative, so reducing the agitation is necessary to starve the highlights. With an EI 400 film, you can usually give 2 or 3 stops underexposure and get a manageable negative, depending, of course, on the film, the scene, and your developer.

The limiting factor to exposing a film like Agfa 100 at 1600 is that you have probably underexposed the midtones below the threshold of the film. The film didn't see anything, there is nothing to develop.

Possibly gas-hypering (see astronomy) might squeeze EI 400 with some shadow detail, but it is a long shot.

I would try Ilford's DDX... I have had good results i an extremis situation like this.... check it out first and see what they recommend for such matters.

Logan