rollei retro 80s!

hello apug!
first, to have said it at least once, i am happy to have found this community of enthusiasts, artists, perfectionists, nerds, scientists,... i tip my hat to you (yes, YOU!) all, spending your precious time on sharing knowledge, researching, helping others - like me - to learn and move forward.

but now to my question..
i have recently began testing/using rollei retro 80s, a very fine grained and a bit tricky, but i assume once mastered, a beautiful film. (fist tests in rodinal were... contrasty and.. lossy:confused

as it happens i was taking a long walk a few days ago, here in the south of france, late afternoon..
came across a shot that could be relevant, not more than 5 stops, tripod, cable release, generous exposure! (rated the film at iso50 and placed important shadows on IV) plus a second, even longer exposure, guess i have rather pushed it all "up" the curve..

so.. i need all info on VIII and would like to make sure in developing the film that i potentially get as much as possible contrast on IX whistling

i dont really care too much about the other 8 exposures on the film (120).
(different settings)

how would you advise me to develop?
i am planning to wet print with condenser enlarger, no scanning.
in another forum i saw the stunning straight curve of this film in A49 done by a user called Uwe Pilz.
literally no shoulder (and a EI of around 50)

is there another, different opinion (before i order the developer)?

thanks (as always)
and if somebody could show me examples, would be great.

chris

Dear Chris,

RR80s has a tendency to blocking highlights. I guess you have seen it with Rodinal.

I found two solutions (sic!) for that problem:
- High diluted RHS-DC (it is based on the Amaloco-74 formula): Highlights have still a tendency to be blocked, but it is much better than other tries. ISO value is 25. I don't have the time here, but I look after that if you need it.
- Atomal 49, diluted 1+1, continuous agitation for 10 minutes. This is quite a short time which prevents the highlights from blocking. But: The highlights are still poorly separated. The short development time limits the maximal density but zones 9 and beyond clump together. It is the best development I foun. ISO is around 40.

For me, it remains a problematic film.

Yes, problematic - but very fine grained film, and no so expensive. I used Rodinal 1+25 - and when scene is not contrasty - results are ok:

Dead Link Removed

But when scene is contrasty - no good results:

Dead Link Removed

On the end I moved on to other films, if I get it somewhere again, I would try Rodinal 1+100 semi-stand.

I have HD curves for Atomal 49 and RHS-DC. If somebody ist interested, I'll scan it.

piu58 said:

I have HD curves for Atomal 49 and RHS-DC. If somebody ist interested, I'll scan it.

Click to expand...

hello piu.
please do so. it is intersting to see these curves!
thanks for chiming in.

darkosaric said:

Yes, problematic - but very fine grained film, and no so expensive. I used Rodinal 1+25 - and when scene is not contrasty - results are ok:

Dead Link Removed

But when scene is contrasty - no good results:

Dead Link Removed

On the end I moved on to other films, if I get it somewhere again, I would try Rodinal 1+100 semi-stand.

Click to expand...

yes, semi stand is what i did when i tried this film first.
very poor highlight separation and shadows where also lacking detail..
nice tonality (as always with rodinal?) in the midtones though..

ps. i like your images. very dark stuff ! lots of athmosphere..

RHS-DC 1+15. First 5 tilts, then 9 mins stand development

Atomal 49, 1+1, 13 mins. Continuous agitation

Atomal looks fine if I view at the curve. I don't know where my impression of compressed highlights comes from.

I am looking forward to read something about your experiences.

===

> shadows where also lacking detail..

This can be cured by giving more light. But the highlights get even more problematic then.

I have had great success with RR80s using pyrocat-hd rated at 50 for 13 min 70 degrees. best results came from perceptol 1+3 rated at 25 68 degrees (20 C) for 12.5 min. also have used rodinal 1:50 for 11 min when rated at 50 also with good results.

its a great film once you get it dialed in, especially using an orange or red filter

piu58 said:

Atomal 49, 1+1, 13 mins. Continuous agitation

Atomal looks fine if I view at the curve. I don't know where my impression of compressed highlights comes from.

Click to expand...

This is the most beautiful graph I've seen in a long time. Your handwriting and the rich black ink is both artistic and scientific.

It's got a long straight line, so if anything happens to block the highlights it's just because you are reaching a relatively "high" contrast.

So perhaps less development time will make negatives that are easier for _*_ to print.

Bill Burk said:

This is the most beautiful graph I've seen in a long time. Your handwriting and the rich black ink is both artistic and scientific.

It's got a long straight line, so if anything happens to block the highlights it's just because you are reaching a relatively "high" contrast.

So perhaps less development time will make negatives that are easier for _*_ to print.

Click to expand...

very good point bill.
i agree on the graph, really like it too..

destroya said:

I have had great success with RR80s using pyrocat-hd rated at 50 for 13 min 70 degrees. best results came from perceptol 1+3 rated at 25 68 degrees (20 C) for 12.5 min. also have used rodinal 1:50 for 11 min when rated at 50 also with good results.

its a great film once you get it dialed in, especially using an orange or red filter

Click to expand...

hi.
good to hear that someone actually likes this film. so far most reviews on forums are mixed.
pyrocat-hd... hmm.
i am going to try that as well. stain could be one answer to the easily blown out highlights..
nice day.
chris

_*_ said:

hi.
good to hear that someone actually likes this film. so far most reviews on forums are mixed.
pyrocat-hd... hmm.
i am going to try that as well. stain could be one answer to the easily blown out highlights..
nice day.
chris

Click to expand...

if you treat this film like slide film, you can get great results. this is the only film i use now to shoot black and white slides and i think it out resolves velvia 50. the great thing is that if you order it from maco in germany its almost half the price of B&H. $40 for a bulk roll and 3.85 for a 120 roll is hard to beat (yeh you gotta pay shipping though). I have a 16x20 enlarged print from a 35mm negative and you have to get your face right in the print to see any grain. Sharp, high resolution, a great price and a film that takes some getting used to (you have to shoot a few rolls to really get it nailed down. an excuse to shot more!). what more can you ask for. The 400s is a great film as well. with the massive price of tmax 400 in 35mm I now shoot the 400s in 35mm for my fast film. while its really a 160 or 200 speed film in most developers, its a great film at a great price as well

I've had more trouble with shadows than highlights with this film. It does build up contest quickly though, and dime people aren't fond of how the infrared sensitivity makes portraits look. I usually rate at 64 and develop in xtol 1+1.

I am one who REALLY likes this film: fine grained in 35 and pretty much grainless in 120, I really have liked my results so far. I send my film out to a commercial lab that uses TMAX and the results are pretty decent, though sometimes the shadows get lost, so I'll shoot the next roll at ISO50 and see what it gets me. I'm being tempted to get some Monobath R3 and just try developing myself for a change, as I can't put the time and space into a 2 or 3 step development process.

I used to rate it at @25, super fine and smooth film.

I use the Rollei 80s 120 (medium format) rated at 20 ASA and develop it with SPUR Acurol-N according to the manufacturers data sheet http://spur-photo.com/spur-acurol-n-datenblatt-27-05-14/. I have not printed the results yet, but the developed negs are looking very nice so far and SPURs developing data are well known as beeing very reliable.

Fritzenpapa said:

I use the Rollei 80s 120 (medium format) rated at 20 ASA and develop it with SPUR Acurol-N according to the manufacturers data sheet .

Click to expand...

If the true speed is about 20-25 or nearly two stops less than the speed quoted I wonder on what grounds Rollei decided to call it an 80?

pentaxuser

Good question ... with other developpers, the Rollei 80s reaches 40 ASA (A49 among some others). But ISO 80 seams to be far exaggerated.

piu58 said:

Atomal 49, 1+1, 13 mins. Continuous agitation

Atomal looks fine if I view at the curve.

Click to expand...

piu58's curve shows EI 42 by Zone System calibration at an above normal development. By ISO this could easily be a real 80.

In other words, it is 80 ISO.

The different speeds people report could be from a developer that costs speed, or a metering technique that defines speed differently than ISO (like Zone System which is often half rated speed).

depends on the developer. in perceptol i shoot at 25. with pyrocat hd(mc) I shoot at 40 or 50 depending on the light. with Beutler, I shoot at 100. for reversal processing I shoot at 125

destroya - sounds interesting. I´d be glad to use Rollei 80s with 100 or 80 ASA. What do you mean by "Beutler"? Tetenal Neofine blue? May you provide me with informations how you are treating the 80s in Beutler chemistry - agitation, temperature, time, delution? Thank you!!

not sure if the neofin is the same formula, but I use:

Part A:
1000 ml water
10 g metol
50 g sodium sulphite

Part B:
1000 ml water
50 g sodium carbonate

mixture depends on the film, but for RR80's (and 400s) I use 1+1+8 at 68 degrees (20c) for 10 min. I also did a roll shot at 50, developed for 5 min at 72 degrees. I try to keep my dev times above 8 min but wanted to see the results using beutler shot at 50. I guessed on the time and it seems pretty close. I agitate initially for 1 minute then 2 slow inversions every minute. I have gone to agitation every two minute in high contrast scenes as well but have yet to see any major differences in results.

Here is the shot at 100, developed 1+1+8 for 10 min RR80s shot at 100



here is an example of RR80s shot at 50 developed beutler 1+1+8 for 5 min at 72 degrees



I have yet to enlarge the negs though as I have to wait till october. I'm doing my best to save water in this terrible drought, so I only wet print every 4 months for three weeks at a go. love dark room marathons!

Destroya, Those shots look really good! I never get that much tonal range out of my 80s.

Rollei Retro 80s is a very finicky film, the previous post stating that it should be treated like slide film is correct. I use it mostly in 120 when it's overcast, but I took this shot with an orange filter on 35mm wide angle lens with my Pentax MX, processed with Rodinal 1:50. With more contrasty conditions, stand development with Rodinal 1:100 does seem to tame the contrast a bit, but I generally use Rodinal 1:50 when it's overcast.

fine examples everybody !
thanks for the interesting discussion, great to read about different approaches with this film.