Room temperature stand development -- for C-41?!

Anon Ymous · Oct 13, 2020

@Donald Qualls I think the catch is, apart from wasted time that @Bormental mentioned, increased contrast and granularity, along with crossover. If you ever try to optically print this film, I'd expect it be impossible to have a reasonable colour balance. Assuming a negative with a gray-scale from black to white, you'd probably be able to balance the print for a specific patch and the rest becoming progressively worse the farther you go from it. Obviously, when scanning you'll have a chance to correct this issue, but it can still be too much of a chore.

Anyway, IMHO stand development is hugely overrated and problematic, even when used with BW film, let alone colour, but to each his own.

NB23 · Oct 13, 2020

I was going to totally bypass this thread but then I read someone not caring about Seinfeld.

I am Shocked (read shocked as Naked, not as Baked).

Вormental_old · Oct 13, 2020

NB23 said:
I was going to totally bypass this thread but then I read someone not caring about Seinfeld.

Meh, Sienfield haters are like UFOs: you read about them but there's never any hard evidence. Everyone cares deeply about Sienfield.

Donald Qualls · Oct 13, 2020

@Anon Ymous Hey, you seem to be one of those people I specifically said I didn't want to hear from.

No, actually, that was more or less my concern; that's why I used a roll from testing a "new-to-me" camera body to test the process. Even if the color balance is wonky and I have enough crossover that I can see it, I'll be able to tell if the camera shutter is working right and the focus is calibrated -- and even if the focus and exposure are fairly far off I'll be able to see if I got reasonable to good color quality.

FWIW, I wouldn't have even tried it if not for the examples linked in a post back up the thread. If I had to describe them in short, I'd say it makes consumer film look like grainy Ektar -- contrasty and saturated -- but the balance is at least correctable (no crossover that I could see). If you haven't tried it, you're guessing. After I get time to scan my negs (and I make no attempt to correct anything beyond the auto-correction for film type in my scan software) I won't be guessing any more.

pentaxuser · Oct 13, 2020

MattKing said:
I await with anticipation how RA-4 optical prints with people in them after being developed this way.

Yes me too, Matt but as Long John ( the British pirate one I should add just in case there is an American folk singer of this name) said: " I think it may surprised us all favourably as I can feel it in me bones." Aargh( West Country speak i.e. the British West Country)

pentaxuser

grat · Oct 13, 2020

Вormental said:
Meh, Sienfield haters are like UFOs: you read about them but there's never any hard evidence. Everyone cares deeply about Sienfield.

I'm not a Seinfeld hater... I just thought it was boring. Hate would be far too much of an investment in the series.

The series finale confirmed something I'd suspected for years-- that the show was actually an elaborate, 9 year practical joke played on the TV community.

Donald Qualls · Oct 13, 2020

grat said:
The series finale confirmed something I'd suspected for years-- that the show was actually an elaborate, 9 year practical joke played on the TV community.

Now, see, I thought that was the entire '90s lineup, not just that one show...

pentaxuser · Oct 13, 2020

Anon Ymous said:
@Donald Qualls I think the catch is, apart from wasted time that @Bormental mentioned, increased contrast and granularity, along with crossover. If you ever try to optically print this film, I'd expect it be impossible to have a reasonable colour balance.
With respect to the increase contrast, granularity and crossover,is this a general problem that you anticipate happening with stand development at room temp?

What does the room temp development and stand contribute respectively to the three problems and finally it these are problems you can see in the pictures russell_w_b showed us can you point them out with reference to which photos show them I am particularly interested in those showing colour crossover. I would like to be able to recognise colour crossover more easily so an indication of what I am looking in those pictures exhibiting crossover would be helpful

Thanks

pentaxuser

mshchem · Oct 13, 2020

Maybe interesting experiment.

I would also propose a new method. The "I Can't Stand because I've got to Pee" development. Raise the temperature to 115F, use the Flexicolor RA C-41 minilab chemistry 3:30 seconds start to finish. Open tanks in the dark. 90sec developer, 45 sec Bleach, 45 sec Fixer, 10 seconds each in 3 consecutive stabilizer baths. Vigorously, pardon the expression, pumping the reels up and down in the tanks.

MattKing · Oct 13, 2020

pentaxuser said:
Yes me too, Matt but as Long John ( the British pirate one I should add just in case there is an American folk singer of this name)

Actually, the Long John I am familiar with was English, although Canada became his adopted home in his later years:

Anon Ymous · Oct 13, 2020

@pentaxuser C41 films are meant to be processed in a very specific way, any deviation from this could be, to some, or to a large extent problematic. Crossover is a basically guaranteed. Leaving the film that long in the developer, even at lower temperatures, can easily lead to overdevelopment, which means higher contrast and coarser grain. In my experience, a rather modest increase in development time (at the correct temperature) gave a significant increase in granularity. This may, or may not be a problem, depending on someone's taste. Telltale signs of these problems aren't necessarily easily detectable in a low resolution scan posted on a website. Contrast can be tamed, crossover can be corrected, but the time wasted trying to correct it can be an issue. I've made my fair share of mistakes and when I do, the time wasted trying to correct crossover is far longer than when inverting a reasonably good negative. For the record, I habitually bracket a gray card, so I have the data points to plot a characteristic curve for a film. Trust me, some of them look really ugly and there's a correlation between ugliness and time wasted...

pentaxuser · Oct 13, 2020

Tthanks for the reply Anon Ymous I was just interested in whether crossover in particular was present russell's pics

pentaxuser

pentaxuser · Oct 13, 2020

Yes Matt I also remember Long John Baldry from the 60s along with other stalwarts Blues singers of the period such as Eric Burdon, Paul Jones. My formative years

pentaxuser

Donald Qualls · Oct 13, 2020

@Anon Ymous This was and is, for me, in the nature of an experiment. If it doesn't work out well, I've lost nothing but some time and a roll of film that was a camera test anyway -- and as I noted, I'll be able to confirm camera operation regardless what the developer turns out to have done, and vice versa, so I can test two things with one roll of film.

I will say, though, that @russell_w_b posting his examples decided me to try it. I don't see any color issues with those scans. Of course, grain is hard to quantify on the web -- and my scanner probably won't tell me anything more about it, nor would I consider decade-expired film a good exemplar in any case. But if the colors are good, I'm likely to try this again, with fresh film, and probably larger negatives.

Anon Ymous · Oct 13, 2020

@Donald Qualls If it turns out that you like it, who am I to tell you that you shouldn't do so? As I always say in cases like this, whatever floats your boat.

Donald Qualls · Oct 13, 2020

I'm halfway through scanning the film now. Aside from dust and hairs due to dropping the film on the floor while trying to hang it... ...the colors look excellent, nothing I can identify as crossover even when specifically looking for it, no significant cast (probably none at all, my scanner software doesn't have a film profile for Superia X-Tra 400 and certainly not for 10 years expired). Grain is no worse than I'm used to for this film in the same kind of light (i.e. dark areas get a little grainy if I try to use the brightness setting to pull the image up out of the dark).

Kiev 4 (#2), Jupiter-8 50mm f/2, Superia X-Tra 400, Flexicolor (room temperature stand).

4800 ppi 1:1 crop from the above negative.

mshchem · Oct 13, 2020

That's pretty good. Amazing how robust the process is. Grain looks non-existent.

I was a huge fan of Polaroid peel apart film, type 669, a 1960's era Polaroid Big Shot portrait camera, a couple Magicubes. I've got 30 year old prints that are stunning. Develop them under your arm, or just lay on the counter and peel apart in 4 or 5 minutes. That technology is lost forever.

Keep having fun!!

Вormental_old · Oct 13, 2020

This is crazy. No grain! Either you're getting better-than-normal results, or you're losing a lot of resolution during scanning, i.e. the grain is not getting resolved. I hope it's the former.

Here's how Superia 400 looks like for me (Plustek 120 Pro, approx 3800ppi):

100% Crop:

Athiril · Oct 14, 2020

Вormental said:
This is crazy. No grain! Either you're getting better-than-normal results, or you're losing a lot of resolution during scanning, i.e. the grain is not getting resolved. I hope it's the former.

Flatbed scanners are very low resolving, something on the order of 1600 dpi.

russell_w_b · Oct 14, 2020

That seems to have worked, Donald! Not half as grainy as mine were.

Donald Qualls · Oct 14, 2020

@russell_w_b As Athiril just reminded us, flatbed scanners are notorious for not living up to their resolution claims. Then again, Epson flatbeds with wet mounting are said to be the best you can get for medium format short of a drum scanner (of course, that's for the newer models that claim 6400 ppi, and I don't have wet scanning capability). This is no more visibly grainy than the same film in standard C-41, maybe less.

I plan to run a test soon: one film of a test subject, bracketed exposure, and cut in half, one strip in standard process, the other in stand, then scan both. That takes out a lot of variables -- same camera and lens, same light, same subject, same film (same factory cassette!) -- and after establishing the scanner settings with auto levels, change to manual so I can lock them for other frames and second strip.

That should tell us everything we need to know, within the limits of ten year old Epson technology...

russell_w_b · Oct 14, 2020

Donald Qualls said:
@russell_w_b As Athiril just reminded us, flatbed scanners are notorious for not living up to their resolution claims. Then again, Epson flatbeds with wet mounting are said to be the best you can get for medium format short of a drum scanner (of course, that's for the newer models that claim 6400 ppi, and I don't have wet scanning capability). This is no more visibly grainy than the same film in standard C-41, maybe less.

Am I correct in saying that flatbed scanners actually exaggerate grain on 400 ISO films when scanned above their 'native' resolution? I have an Epson V600 Perfection and use it with a Lomography Digitaliza neg carrier (120 film) although I've noticed no difference between negs on the glass directly and carrier-mounted negs 0.5 or even 1mm above the scanner glass. I also use an ancient Acer Scanwit (SCSI-driven) dedicated 35mm / slide scanner which, I feel, is better for 35mm negs than the flatbed.

I wouldn't have made this observation if I didn't compare the scans with my preferred method of digitising negs: for 35mm I use a Canon EOS 5D and an Elicar slide duplicator placed directly on a light box with the neg interposed beneath a mask made from a cut-out section of printed circuit board, and for 120 negs I use a Sony RX-100 II on a tripod, levelled, 4.5" above the neg which is held flat by a sheet of glass, and a card mask around it. Cameras set to RAW each time. Both copying methods, to my mind exceed the quality of those particular scanners.

Donald Qualls · Oct 14, 2020

I can't tell you whether flatbeds exaggerate grain. It might be the case due to artifacting. FWIW, I'm using actual Epson negative carriers, for a model or so newer than what I have (modified to fit and focus correctly -- I have a 4870 and the carriers are for a 4990).

The only full-control digital cameras I have access to is a pair of Nikon D70 and a D90 with a variety of zooms, macro rings, and diopters -- and 16 MP max, with resolution limited below that by the lenses. We're not here (in this thread, or in the analog section of the site) to discuss digitizing methods, though. I'm doing the best I can with what I've got, and with the technology I have at present, these negatives look as good or better than the same film processed in standard conditions. I don't have either the time or inclination to learn how to beat my flatbed with a lower-resolution DSLR (stitching would be required, at the least, which in turn would need sub-frame resolution positioning of the negatives and give me a PITA getting the colors straight in GIMP after reversing to positive).

russell_w_b · Oct 14, 2020

Donald Qualls said:
I can't tell you whether flatbeds exaggerate grain. It might be the case due to artifacting. FWIW, I'm using actual Epson negative carriers, for a model or so newer than what I have (modified to fit and focus correctly -- I have a 4870 and the carriers are for a 4990).

Yes. As you say, if you're using the same scanner for both test-strips (stand and conventional), it doesn't matter about resolution or any of that as it's all relative. Interesting to see the results! I found my other 'stand' C-41 results: taken on my Olympus Trip on Kodak Pro 100. They're still grainy but the colours are as good (I would say) as conventionally-processed ones.

Donald Qualls · Oct 14, 2020

russell_w_b said:
Interesting to see the results!

I'll likely be able to shoot the test roll and do the processing this coming weekend, then it'll take me a few days to get it scanned.

Room temperature stand development -- for C-41?!

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