Speckled/mottled 120 negatives: issue with the film or my process?

Hi all,

I'm trying to reduce the number of 'fails' from my work, as I've had a run of them lately, the biggest being due to a backing paper problem with T-Max film. I'm going back over some of them to try and work out the most likely cause and would appreciate any feedback.

This one has happened more than once: an ugly mottling effect, particularly in the highlights. The first time this happened I figured I had a problem in my development, but now I'm not so sure. I will post the image then a 100% portion.

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speckle in sky at 100%
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Camera: Hasselblad 501C. Film: Ilford FP4+.
Location: Inishbofin island, West coast of Ireland. Maybe 5 minutes at f8 with Big Stopper.
Development: Less than one week after exposure. Rodinal 1+25, 8 minutes. Ilford stop bath, 1 minute or so, 20 inversions. Ilford rapid fixer 5 minutes. 12-15 minutes washing with loads of tank inversions/empties: 5/10/15/20/25/30/35/40 + dunk into photoflow for 30s + 20/10 inversions/empties.

Other frames on the roll are also affected, to different degrees.

I had no such problems with rolls of 35mm FP4+ that I developed on the same morning, and no problems of the same 'scale' with the 2 other rolls of 120 (Delta/Rollei Retro 80S).

I had similar problems earlier this year with some Pan F 50.

My own opinion now, especially given my experience with the T Max backing paper problem, is that this too is a backing paper problem.

I tried fixing and washing the negatives again as I saw it mentioned that inadequate fixing might be a root cause, but this did not help at all, and in fact the subsequent scans (Epson V550) had lower sharpness than before, and the same spots.

Is it possible that the salty sea air had an effect? I have taken many sea photos without the problem but it was windy that day. Hmmmmmmm.

Cheers!

Donal

Normally I would say that it is a developer problem, but with Rodinal, probably isn't. How old is the film and developer? Did you mix the Rodinal yourself?

Did you wet print? scan?
Do you see this on the print / scan, or also on the negative?

I am surprised to see the two notches (the v-shaped things, specific to Hasselblad backs) on the RIGHT side of your picture. This makes me think that your negative might not be correctly inserted in the scanner or enlarger (you typically want the emulsion facing down).

Also, the negative (or negative holder, etc.) might not be entirely dust free. I had such ugly effects on my early prints. Cleaning the neg with canned air before printing solved the problem.

Municipal or well water? Are you filtering the water?
To me this looks like particles from water, but other things can cause similar problems. In particular, sometimes fix will accumulate silver compounds, but in my experience water is the more common cause.
To rule out a scanning issue, is this visible in the negative with a magnifier or loupe?

Patrick Robert James said:

Normally I would say that it is a developer problem, but with Rodinal, probably isn't. How old is the film and developer? Did you mix the Rodinal yourself?

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Hi Patrick, yes I mixed it myself and have old semi-clear 35mm film canisters marked with the required amount, so it's fairly unlikely I used the wrong amount by much. The developer is not old- I have had issues with aging Ilfosol but never noticed anything with Rodinal, which is one of the reasons I tend to stick with it. Do you think that if I did use the wrong dilution by mistake that it could have produced this effect?

etn said:

Did you wet print? scan?
Do you see this on the print / scan, or also on the negative?

I am surprised to see the two notches (the v-shaped things, specific to Hasselblad backs) on the RIGHT side of your picture. This makes me think that your negative might not be correctly inserted in the scanner or enlarger (you typically want the emulsion facing down).

Also, the negative (or negative holder, etc.) might not be entirely dust free. I had such ugly effects on my early prints. Cleaning the neg with canned air before printing solved the problem.

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Thanks ETN, well spotted, yes this is a scan that needs to be reversed. I sometimes put the film into the V550 this way if it has a curl across the width. If I put it in with the curl pointing down it can touch the scanner glass. This is another of the bits of my workflow that I am trying to improve; I get curling at times, nothing major but it was noticeable with this roll. However I tried at least 4 scans of this negative before I posted here, and the speckling is identical, i.e. if you scan it the other way round and compare the results at 100%, the little dots are in the same places.

bdial said:

Municipal or well water? Are you filtering the water?
To me this looks like particles from water, but other things can cause similar problems. In particular, sometimes fix will accumulate silver compounds, but in my experience water is the more common cause.
To rule out a scanning issue, is this visible in the negative with a magnifier or loupe?

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Hi bdial, thanks for the reply. This water is municipal I guess (municipal is not a term used in Ireland ) though it is in the countryside and I wouldn't be fully sure of its consistency. However the fact that I developed a bunch of rolls with the same workflow that morning, and a couple of hundred with the same water over the past two years, I'm not sure it could be a factor. All the same, I would like to use distilled or filtered water: I'm currently living at home with my folks so I try to minimise my footprint on the household I haven't figured out if people here distil their water, and if so, do they do it themselves? It's not something I've googled much yet. I don't have a loupe but I have scanned this neg a bunch of times, including after a second fix/wash and putting it in different ways. I'm pretty sure it's in the neg. I'll try and have another look later. Hmmmmmmmmmmm

I've experienced a very similar problem, but with acros 100 only. I narrowed it down to fixer. I use distilled water throughout my process. Even just fixing a piece of film, washing it thoroughly, I see tiny particles under magnification that are suspended on the surface of the film, and no amount of washing can get rid out them.

Could be a contamination issue so it would be good practice to 1) remove photoflo from process, 2) discard all chemistry that's being reused, 3) clean everything really well or start with unused bottles tanks reels etc. and no cross purpose use of containers or beakers 4) mix new chemistry with purified water. Work as normal and see if the problem remains. This is a good factor to eliminate. If that's not the problem look at film storage issues including humidity and condensation issues in freezer or refrigerator. Good luck these issues can be maddening and often the problem isn't directly observable.

I agree: repeat the process with fresh chemistry - no re-using stop and fix - start fresh and see what happens. I suspect this is a chemistry-induced problem.
As an aside, do you test your fixer periodically to determine when it reaches exhaustion?

Saganich said:

Could be a contamination issue so it would be good practice to 1) remove photoflo from process, 2) discard all chemistry that's being reused, 3) clean everything really well or start with unused bottles tanks reels etc. and no cross purpose use of containers or beakers 4) mix new chemistry with purified water. Work as normal and see if the problem remains. This is a good factor to eliminate. If that's not the problem look at film storage issues including humidity and condensation issues in freezer or refrigerator. Good luck these issues can be maddening and often the problem isn't directly observable.

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I don't mean to hijack this thread, but I've had a similar experience, and it drove me crazy. I did all of that, and finally eliminated each step, leaving only fix, as the source of the problem. Most of my films (Ilford HP4 and HP5) aren't nearly as susceptible to this "contamination" but Fujifilm Acros 100 is awful. Looking at the film fixed (all fresh, prepared with distilled water. I used 3 different brands of fix), and thoroughly washed at high magnification, you can see tiny particles (much smaller than dust) floating on the surface of the film, as if suspended (or at least stuck to) the gelatin. When dried in a film cabinet, the particles remain on the surface, and are accentuated by scanner. In wet printing, they are much less a problem, at least up to 8x10 prints.

The curious thing is that when I look at my Acros negatives from a few years ago, they're clean! And my process used city water exclusively back then. I wasn't nearly as careful and methodical back then. Curious, and frustrating.

Although it probably isn't related to this issue, it seems to me that rewashing the film after dunking in Photoflo completely eliminates any possible benefit from Photoflo. I assume that is what is happening when the OP describes "dunk into photoflow for 30s + 20/10 inversions/empties.".

I've always used wetting agent as the last step in the process prior to drying.

I see a lot of that on Reddit's analog forum - people think Photoflo is like stop or fixer and needs to be rinsed off.

Man, I'd go with distilled water. You don't need to distill it yourself (at least in the US), they sell jugs of it at the grocery and pharmacy. My tap water occasionally blasts out a bunch of rust and my tub turns orange after a few weeks. God knows what's in there and how it changes from day to day, but chances are, your water travels through some REALLY old pipes somewhere in the system. And who knows how stable the amount of chlorine and flouride and whatever-else they put in it is from week to week?

I just ran a bunch of Acros and got no surface issues, and I use masks and a glass carrier so I'm constantly checking the film with an illuminated magnifier - it's clean. I used distilled for pre wash and developer, filtered water for stop, and filtered water to mix my fixer, tap water to wash and distilled + photoflo for my final rinse. And I don't just dunk in the final, I consider it a final wash step.

If I were the OP, I'd do some tests - grab a neg and see if the junk comes off with a wash in 99% iso alcohol. Put it on a light table, get a magnifying glass, and see if the spots come loose with an artist's brush and alcohol (I Find 99% iso can get anything off of film without damaging it). Re-wash in running tap water, rinse in distilled, then dunk in a fresh batch of distilled plus photoflo. Run the shower in the bathroom til steamy, shut it off and hang the film, turn off the HVAC and stay out til it's dry.

Thanks all, a lot of food for thought here. I definitely rinsed after the photo-flo with this one, I had an urge to make sure it was fully washed- I can see that it may have been counter-productive

The fixer seems to come up a lot, so I'll try to change what I'm doing here. I don't think i keep it too long, and normally mix it up when I do a batch (tend to do about 4 rolls per session), but there could be something going on with the water or something. I've never seen distilled water for sale here, will look into it; just found 1 litre of 'pure water vapour distilled' on a health food chain website for about $2

I will also add a step to my workflow to fully clean everything before I start. I don't think I'm careless here and the sporadicness of this issue is curious. I haven't had this with Acros but I haven't used many rolls of it- I actually found it hard to scan; seemed quite thin and hard to get flat. I'm planning to try and improve my scanning. I like the idea of a film holder for the v550 with some kind of dividers that can go between each frame. Or maybe those glass plates that flatten them.

It sounds like a good idea to have a closer look at the actual negative and see if I can clean off it with alcohol. I've been looking back at some more examples from the few times this happened. Here's another exhibit from a roll of Pan F that was basically destroyed. Boo!

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I have nothing to contribute but wanted to say the photos look wonderful and I hope you sort out the problem.

Be of good cheer the famous photographer Lisette Model once commented "Dahling if you think my prints are bad you should see my negatives." Good prints depend on good negatives which in turn depend on attention to detail. Being aware of the faults of your process is the first step in getting good prints.

donakello said:

Thanks all, a lot of food for thought here. I definitely rinsed after the photo-flo with this one, I had an urge to make sure it was fully washed- I can see that it may have been counter-productive

The fixer seems to come up a lot, so I'll try to change what I'm doing here. I don't think i keep it too long, and normally mix it up when I do a batch (tend to do about 4 rolls per session), but there could be something going on with the water or something. I've never seen distilled water for sale here, will look into it; just found 1 litre of 'pure water vapour distilled' on a health food chain website for about $2

I will also add a step to my workflow to fully clean everything before I start. I don't think I'm careless here and the sporadicness of this issue is curious. I haven't had this with Acros but I haven't used many rolls of it- I actually found it hard to scan; seemed quite thin and hard to get flat. I'm planning to try and improve my scanning. I like the idea of a film holder for the v550 with some kind of dividers that can go between each frame. Or maybe those glass plates that flatten them.

It sounds like a good idea to have a closer look at the actual negative and see if I can clean off it with alcohol. I've been looking back at some more examples from the few times this happened. Here's another exhibit from a roll of Pan F that was basically destroyed. Boo!

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My tap water is very hard and contains a lot of calcium and magnesium salts so I mix my chemicals with deionized water and do the final rinse with it as well. In the UK you can buy deionized water from Halfords (for topping up motor car batteries) and from some larger supermarkets for use in steam irons etc. Deionized water is not quite as pure as distilled water but is more readily available and cheaper. It tends to be sold in 5 litre containers. You might also find it at one of the big DIY warehouse places.

donakello said:

Hi Patrick, yes I mixed it myself and have old semi-clear 35mm film canisters marked with the required amount, so it's fairly unlikely I used the wrong amount by much. The developer is not old- I have had issues with aging Ilfosol but never noticed anything with Rodinal, which is one of the reasons I tend to stick with it. Do you think that if I did use the wrong dilution by mistake that it could have produced this effect?

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Those spots could be increased development, so maybe you didn't mix the developer enough and there were crystals in it. Check to make sure your concentrate is clear with nothing floating in it and make sure you mix it well with the water before you pour it in the tank. What formula did you use to mix it? That could be your problem right there if you tried one of those hokey weird Tylenol recipes. After looking a second time, the increased density spots happen with the parts of the neg that have increased exposure, so I would definitely think the developer is the problem.

I would also take Carter's advice above and clean the film with alcohol just to eliminate any possibility that there is a deposit on the film. He suggests 99% which may be hard to find. I use 91% and that works fine.

Hope that helps.

Julie McLeod said:

I have nothing to contribute but wanted to say the photos look wonderful and I hope you sort out the problem.

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Thanks very much Julie! Thankfully the negatives are normally ok- otherwise I'd probably have given up already

Gerald C Koch said:

Be of good cheer the famous photographer Lisette Model once commented "Dahling if you think my prints are bad you should see my negatives." Good prints depend on good negatives which in turn depend on attention to detail. Being aware of the faults of your process is the first step in getting good prints.

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Thanks Gerald, yeah it certainly takes some rounds of refinement. It's amazing how many organic factors are involved; I guess it's less isolated from the big bad world of chemical reactions than those inside a sensor pixel!

Svenedin said:

My tap water is very hard and contains a lot of calcium and magnesium salts so I mix my chemicals with deionized water and do the final rinse with it as well. In the UK you can buy deionized water from Halfords (for topping up motor car batteries) and from some larger supermarkets for use in steam irons etc. Deionized water is not quite as pure as distilled water but is more readily available and cheaper. It tends to be sold in 5 litre containers. You might also find it at one of the big DIY warehouse places.

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Thanks Svenedin, I did find mention of deionized water and we do have a Halfords in Galway so I'll aim to pick some up.

donakello said:

Thanks Svenedin, I did find mention of deionized water and we do have a Halfords in Galway so I'll aim to pick some up.

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What a lovely city! It’s years since I’ve been there. I took a lot of photos on the Aran Islands too. Your photographs are lovely. Good luck and don’t be disheartened.

I've had exactly the same problem on my last 5 rolls of 120 FP4+.

I had one unexposed roll of 120 FP4+ left. Just to make sure that the problem is not my chemistry I mixed everything afresh, exposed the last roll and developed it with fresh chemistry...it had the same spots. In my opinion the cause is not the chemistry. BTW, in 20 years of film developing I've never had such a problem before. And I also didn't have any problem with either Tmax or HP5+ films which were exposed and developed around the same time as the FP4+'s.

How do you store your unexposed film? I used to keep it in the fridge. I found some posts about condensation on the film being a possible cause, so for the time being I''m keeping my films at room temperature...but whether this is the real cause is all speculation for the time being (as far as I'm aware).

I'm in the UK and I had similar problems years ago. I initially switched to 5 litre cartons of water from Halfords or the local garage. Later on I bought a decent filter set up off of ebay that connects to a tap, so doesn't need to be installed or anything. This is what I use alone and all the time now for all of my photo water needs. Well worth investigating.

Terry S

I've had the same speckling on two of my own rolls of FP-4. This happened two years ago, I think. I hadn't changed my process in a long time and I never had any issues like that before, so I didn't suspect the chemicals. I did, however leave the roll in the camera for a couple of months in both cases. Since the summer months are really humid over here, I assumed it had something to do with that. After this happened for the second time I tried to finish my rolls quicker and I didn't have the problem again.

I have no idea if humidity really is the problem or even related to it.