Sharpness in the slow lane

ChrisW · Feb 22, 2006

Does anyone have advice on producing the sharpest negatives using Rollei Pan25, Efke 25, and Ilford PanF Plus films? I print 30x30 inches. I have tried the forum search feature, but I can't find someone who needs sharpness above all. The images are mostly architectural, and while some shadow detail is important, tonality is not. I have discovered some threads that discuss minor and major dilutions, but I never read the effects on sharpness. I am a recent evacuee of all Kodak products. Well, I still have 30 rolls of TP25, but I covered the Kodak name with permanent marker. May they rot in consumer electronics purgatory. I digress.

Also, anyone reading this who is not a subscriber, think hard about what you are gleaning from these forums. I subscribed the day I discovered the site. My first post returned over US$200 worth of advice within 24 hours. This is not a social experiment. APUG is a resource for like-minded professionals and enthusiasts. I digress.

avandesande · Feb 22, 2006

I would give acros a whirl too. The grain is almost identical to efke 25 in rodinal. What do you mean by sharpness, acutance sharpness or fine grain sharpness?

ChrisW · Feb 22, 2006

I use Acros as well when a little speed helps. Love the grain. My definition, which may be completely wrong, is linear clarity. The appearance of contrast without loosing shades.

rbarker · Feb 22, 2006

You're likely to get a variety of opinions on this question, Chris. Assuming you're talking about medium-format negs, I'd start with the physical aspects before thinking about developers. A good tripod (pronounced heavy), cable release, and mirror lock (if appropriate for the camera) is the best starting point.

The films you mention are all "traditional" fine-grained films. You may find that a more-modern T-grained emulsion will give you better sharpness - particularly in situations where the "tonality" of the film is less important.

To a point, I think you'll find that grain and (apparent) sharpness are trade-offs. For the prints to appear maximally sharp, you'll need to produce somewhat larger grain. Thus, you might select developers that are intended to produce higher accutance (edge sharpness) at the cost of larger grain.

And, don't forget the enlarger. Setting aside the argument of condenser versus diffusion enlargers, proper alignment and a high-quality lens will help translate the quality of the negative onto the print.

In the final analysis, however, the whole question is very subjective. What is "ideal" to one person may not fit well with your visual preferences at all.

Gerald Koch · Feb 22, 2006

Despite what you may be told, Rodinal will NOT produce the sharpest negative with fine grain films such as Efke 25 or PanF+. Use Neofin Blue or the Beutler formula. This recommendation is based on studies made by Leica.

ChrisW · Feb 22, 2006

This is great. Excellent advice, all. What about DD-X and Perceptol? Does higher dillution produce finer grain or larger grain.

Thanks.

ChrisW · Feb 22, 2006

rbarker said:
You're likely to get a variety of opinions on this question, Chris. Assuming you're talking about medium-format negs, I'd start with the physical aspects before thinking about developers. A good tripod (pronounced heavy), cable release, and mirror lock (if appropriate for the camera) is the best starting point.

The films you mention are all "traditional" fine-grained films. You may find that a more-modern T-grained emulsion will give you better sharpness - particularly in situations where the "tonality" of the film is less important.

To a point, I think you'll find that grain and (apparent) sharpness are trade-offs. For the prints to appear maximally sharp, you'll need to produce somewhat larger grain. Thus, you might select developers that are intended to produce higher accutance (edge sharpness) at the cost of larger grain.

And, don't forget the enlarger. Setting aside the argument of condenser versus diffusion enlargers, proper alignment and a high-quality lens will help translate the quality of the negative onto the print.

In the final analysis, however, the whole question is very subjective. What is "ideal" to one person may not fit well with your visual preferences at all.

Thanks for your help.Enlarger is Besseler 23CIII condenser, Rodagon 80mm, camera is 503cw on a very solid Manfrotto. Is there a better lens for sharper large print? Stability is not an issue. Also, I've never endeavored to mix my own chemicals due to unfamiliarity and lack of sources. Or brainpower.

avandesande · Feb 22, 2006

I have seen threads like this before where someone will change everything they know about for one ideal. Have you printed 30x30 before? Do you have a favorite film/developer combination? If you do and you haven't, I would make some test prints with what you know, and then starting messing around with different films/developers.

Paul Howell · Feb 22, 2006

Gerald Koch said:
Despite what you may be told, Rodinal will NOT produce the sharpest negative with fine grain films such as Efke 25 or PanF+. Use Neofin Blue or the Beutler formula. This recommendation is based on studies made by Leica.

I agree with Gerald, last summer I shot Efke 25 and processed in both Rodinal and Neofine Blue. I think that neofin gave the sharpest negative but I likeed the tonality of Rodinal which did a fine a job up to 11X14 with 35. For a 20X24 or larger I would consider neofin.

Lachlan Young · Feb 22, 2006

What about FX-1 or FX-2? They appear to be the highest definition developers on the market today and are not only ridiculously sharp but speed increasing too.

Just my £0.02/$0.02 worth,

Lachlan

ricksplace · Feb 22, 2006

You might want to try lith film, particularily if tonality is not of paramount importance. Rodinal at 1:150, shot at iso 5 works for me. 7 mins, develop by inspection with the safelight on. Incredibly sharp. Far better than efke 25, or ilford pan f. I haven't used the others.

See an image in my gallery called "roadside lake" for an example of the tonality of this combination.

Only problem is, you are pretty much stuck with sheet film.

Rick.

ChrisW · Feb 22, 2006

avandesande said:
I have seen threads like this before where someone will change everything they know about for one ideal. Have you printed 30x30 before? Do you have a favorite film/developer combination? If you do and you haven't, I would make some test prints with what you know, and then starting messing around with different films/developers.

Thanks for your advice. I've been printing 30x30 for about 4 years, but was blissfully ignorant in my loyalty to Kodak. TP25 and Technidol, minor dilution, sometimes X-Tol for high contrast. Iford Pan F Plus in x-Tol, Efke in X-Tol. I have not shot the Rollei Pan 25.

The prints are great, I just want better.

Craig · Feb 22, 2006

You might try Delta 100 in Xtol, that is a very nice combination. With my Pentax 6x7 I found the biggest contributor to sharper negatives was using the mirror lockup.

fwp · Feb 22, 2006

Lachlan Young said:
What about FX-1 or FX-2? They appear to be the highest definition developers on the market today and are not only ridiculously sharp but speed increasing too.

Just my £0.02/$0.02 worth,

Lachlan

I've been using Efke-25 with fx-2 and the prints are almost painfully sharp.

Gerald Koch · Feb 22, 2006

For many years Leica used Ethol T.E.C. for their lens demonstrations.

Here are their catagories and results as they appear on LUG.

Highest Acutance:

FX-1, Beutler, Ethol T.E.C., Neofin Blue, some catechol developers.

High Acutance:

Patterson FX-39, Acutol (FX-14), PMK, FX-2, FX-37.

Good Acutance:

Dilute DK-50, Rodinal (1:50 and higher dilution), HC-110 (dilution F or higher),
Johnson Unitol, Ethol FG7 (with no added sulfite).

Reasonable Acutance:

Solvent developers strongly diluted - good acutance but less than first three
categories. D-76, FX-15, D-23, Microdol-X, Perceptol (all diluted at least 1+3); dilute Xtol

BTW, FX-1 is just the Beutler developer at half strength.

avandesande · Feb 22, 2006

I guess than it is fine grain/vs acutance. Maybe edge effects are what you are after and maybe not. I would try one of the fine grain developers and try rodinal to see what you like.

ChrisW said:
Thanks for your advice. I've been printing 30x30 for about 4 years, but was blissfully ignorant in my loyalty to Kodak. TP25 and Technidol, minor dilution, sometimes X-Tol for high contrast. Iford Pan F Plus in x-Tol, Efke in X-Tol. I have not shot the Rollei Pan 25.

The prints are great, I just want better.

sanking · Feb 22, 2006

I notice that most of the answers are based on choice of developer, which is ok if acutance is the only issue.

However, be aware that resolution, also important to sharpness, is primarily a quality of film type, not developer, and although slow speed traditional films will give good resolution it will not be as high as that of medium speed T-grain emulsions such as TMAX-100 and Delta 100.

Sandy

rhphoto · Feb 22, 2006

For what it's worth, Brett Weston said he "Sweat blood" over his method of acheiving large format results with his Rollei 66, and later with RB 67s. As far as I know, he was shooting (some of the time) Agfapan 25 in DK-50, and he printed with a point source enlarger light. Believe it was a Durst. Now, if you are not concerned with tonality as much as sharpness, the point source gives you an edge on that end of the equation. It also shows up scratches and dust like crazy. But it's just one more tool in your arsenal, if you want to consider it.

Soeren · Feb 22, 2006

fwp said:
I've been using Efke-25 with fx-2 and the prints are almost painfully sharp.

Times Man, Times ?
Cheers Søren

Alan Johnson · Feb 22, 2006

For a practical measurement of sharpness I have seen a research paper from Kodak where they asked a number of volunteers to compare prints of the same scene and put them in order of sharpness.The result was I believe,not the order of resolution but probably related to acutance and adjacency effects.To max out adjacency effects,try stand development.

dancqu · Feb 22, 2006

Gerald Koch said:
Use Neofin Blue or the Beutler formula.
This recommendation is based on
studies made by Leica.

Beutler, FX-1, Ansco 120 and Beer's A are all
of the same type; carbonate-metol-sulfite. At
proper dilution any, I'd say, could be used with
same or very similar results, film or paper. I've
worked with all four. Perhaps I should say
three. Ansco 120 and Beer's A are the
same developer save for dilution. Dan

Jay Packer · Feb 22, 2006

For a comprehensive and scholarly discussion of resolution, acutance, and sharpness, get a copy of "Image Clarity: High Resolution Photography" by John B. Williams (Focal Press, 1990). I'm not sure that it's still in print, but it's an excellent, thorough, and very readable treatise.

fwp · Feb 22, 2006

Soeren said:
Times Man, Times ?
Cheers Søren

I've been using a semi stand development 73F (The reason for that temp is a long and involved story that had to with the temp of the tap water when I was doing the testing)
The total development time is 20mins with 30secs to fill my combi plan and 30sec of aggitation. After that I aggitate gently for 5sec every 3min.

Phillip P. Dimor · Feb 22, 2006

I'd agree with what i've read about neofin blue. I've used Acufine and Tri-X, pushed to 1000. Its absolutely sharp. Not sure about using Acufine at a films rated speed, as your dev. times would likely be very short. Sorry if this isn't quite helpful..

mcgrattan · Feb 23, 2006

I've used Maco Ort25c which is a 'document' type orthochromatic film with a clear base.

I used semi-stand development in Rodinal at 1:200 and had very sharp very crisp results. It would be possible to get very contrasty results from it.

I haven't compared it to Acros or other modern technology films at a slightly higher speed.

However, some of the faster modern films are (for me) very good. I've had results from Neopan 400 that have rivaled slower films for sharpness and detail.

Sharpness in the slow lane

Privacy & Transparency

Privacy & Transparency