Sprint Chemistry: reasons not to use it

StoneNYC said:

:shrug:

I like the results with my current developer, I was considering sprint for the other baths. The MIT thing is really irrelevant, no need to fixate on it further.

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LOL fixate .. nice ... just don't turn the lights on too fast

glad you have things that work ...

jnanian said:

you can say that again ..

although i went to school with someone who used to print nicholas nixon's work and she never spouted any BS at all ..
she actually is pretty calm cool and collected, currently teaches and shoots, and got something like a fullbright scholarship
for the documentary work she was doing ... and when i was in school with her she printed masterfully, and used the full array of sprint chemistry
blacks you could get lost in .. prints that sang ...

if everyone was the same, life would be pretty boring

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Agreed - there is a very real skill of internalising the chemical aspects of the craft so that it's entirely automatic, freeing up your creative decision making processes.

Greg Davis said:

As for blown highlights, etc., you can easily overdevelop in Sprint. And from looking at tons of student film, it also reduces the film speed by 2/3 to one full stop on average, but of course, your methods may vary.

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What about using XTOL in a student environment, which would solve the film speed problem?

Tom

Back to the topic in hand: http://sprintsystems.com/products/archive-fixer-remover/ says:
"Any one of the following variations on the BASIC PROCEDURE will reduce thiosulfate concentrations to less than 1 mcg/cm2. Any five of the following variations will reduce thiosulfate to undetectable levels.
Use RECORD Fast Print Fixer (2:8) and limit fixing time to 30 seconds.
Limit Fixer Capacity to twelve 8×10 prints per liter or use a second fresh fixer bath (20-60seconds) before Prewash.
Extend Prewash (Step 1) to 5-10 minutes.
Extend Final Water Wash (Step 3) to 20 minutes.
Repeat Steps 2 and 3, with or without selenium toner.
Omit Alum Hardening Converter"

There seem to be no reasons not to use it

Stone:

I think part of what you are up against is due to the fact that, frankly, a lot of really good photographers and darkroom magicians (technicians?) are characters.

Not to mention creatures of habit!

And a lot of us who have been doing this for a while can get downright grumpy when we have to change something we like and are really comfortable with.

What you describe as someone who "do(es)n't know what they would do if they didn't have anymore Kodak stop" is actually reported in your link as "he hopes Kodak doesn’t take his stop bath away".

The former doesn't make sense. The latter is something really different - it is personal and quite subjective, and I can really identify with it.

In some ways, you are very fortunate. You don't have any decade long histories that you are going to have to unlearn due to changes in formulation.

There was a thread recently where someone like Gerald C Koch posted something like an observation that he could tell whether or not his stop bath was nearing exhaustion because it felt slightly slippery between his fingers. Once you have been doing this stuff for a while, that sort of nuanced experience can become second nature. But it only works if they don't change or eliminate the stuff you are used to working with.

Greg Davis and John Nanian have worked extensively with the stuff you are asking about. Both of them wouldn't hesitate to:
1) read the instructions;
2) contact the manufacturer and ask them questions; and
3) ask around here and otherwise if others can add even more tricks and tips.

They have lots of experience, so they can evaluate information they receive from APUG and other sources other than the manufacturer. But even with all that experience, they are happy to advise you to read the instructions and ask the manufacturer.

I have a lifelong, pro-Kodak bias. I am happy to tell you that if you decided to choose an all Kodak workflow, you will have made a great choice. And you know what, Simon Galley would say the same thing! Not that he wouldn't recommend Ilford as well!

I am equally comfortable, however, recommending Ilford and (based on my brief researches and the recommendations here) Sprint. Just as I would in years gone past have supported recommendations for Agfa and others.

MattKing said:

Stone:

I think part of what you are up against is due to the fact that, frankly, a lot of really good photographers and darkroom magicians (technicians?) are characters.

Not to mention creatures of habit!

And a lot of us who have been doing this for a while can get downright grumpy when we have to change something we like and are really comfortable with.

What you describe as someone who "do(es)n't know what they would do if they didn't have anymore Kodak stop" is actually reported in your link as "he hopes Kodak doesn’t take his stop bath away".

The former doesn't make sense. The latter is something really different - it is personal and quite subjective, and I can really identify with it.

In some ways, you are very fortunate. You don't have any decade long histories that you are going to have to unlearn due to changes in formulation.

There was a thread recently where someone like Gerald C Koch posted something like an observation that he could tell whether or not his stop bath was nearing exhaustion because it felt slightly slippery between his fingers. Once you have been doing this stuff for a while, that sort of nuanced experience can become second nature. But it only works if they don't change or eliminate the stuff you are used to working with.

Greg Davis and John Nanian have worked extensively with the stuff you are asking about. Both of them wouldn't hesitate to:
1) read the instructions;
2) contact the manufacturer and ask them questions; and
3) ask around here and otherwise if others can add even more tricks and tips.

They have lots of experience, so they can evaluate information they receive from APUG and other sources other than the manufacturer. But even with all that experience, they are happy to advise you to read the instructions and ask the manufacturer.

I have a lifelong, pro-Kodak bias. I am happy to tell you that if you decided to choose an all Kodak workflow, you will have made a great choice. And you know what, Simon Galley would say the same thing! Not that he wouldn't recommend Ilford as well!

I am equally comfortable, however, recommending Ilford and (based on my brief researches and the recommendations here) Sprint. Just as I would in years gone past have supported recommendations for Agfa and others.

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Thanks, makes sense as well.

MattKing said:

"In my experience, darkroom materials that are designed for commercial or industrial or educational environments are usually the most robust and dependable available. If Sprint is selling into that market, they are selling into the most demanding market of them all. Low quality materials in those environments create way more problems for a manufacturer than any materials designed primarily for small darkroom use.

What they may lack is flexibility - that tends to be the result of designing for dependability and robustness."

MattKing is a guy worth listening to, methinks. And his post is the best one of it's ilk I've read in years.

His experiences seem to parallel mine in commercial kitchens (my Mom was a chef). Our ingredients were bought in bulk, and plain old generic tomato paste, which was the basis of about half the sauces we made, came from a source that most home kitchen folk wouldn't recognize, or even use because it had no "brand-name" snob appeal. But it was great stuff. We worked from a fixed system of equipment and products, and got to know the "feel of them" intimately because we didn't change them.

And you said:

"Finally, and you guys are not going to like this, I would like to hear from people who are master printers, those of you who are printers and do this as a job as a living, people like Bob Solomon and Dan (Kodachrome) and only the most Nikki D printers, not those who are less than precise in there methods or think that things are "good enough" I would also welcome comments from the likes of PE etc."

Well, I did a three year stint at the "Really Big Print Company" in Vancouver as a darkroom rat and printer of giant enlargements. I think you've got it backwards. I bet money in large amounts that there are guys on this forum (myself included), who are WAYYYYY more precise in what we do in our own darkrooms than many do at the lab. While most public might not have access to temperature-controlled equipment as labs do, you can get it. And this is pretty much the exclusive property of color processing.

At Really Big, we used ONE negative developer (D76), ONE paper developer (a soup we mixed ourselves that was similar to Ansco 130 but allowed us to add chemicals or change dilutions to lower or raise contrast, etc), ONE stopper (Kodak Indicator), ONE Fixer, a plain non-hardening fix we used similar to Ilford quick-fix because we usually toned our prints, FOUR toners depending on what the customer wanted or which of 4 paper stocks we printed the negatives on. Even internegs were shot on a 4x5 and souped in D76 with a thing or two added on the way.

We used little in the way of temperature control, doing everything by eye. (The darkroom was about 30'x20', lit from above with amber safelights, and there was a vestibule we entered that allowed us to get used to low light before printing. Our wash was a great big plywood trough that had a hose running into it from the cold water tap, and we rinsed the pictures for two hours in the icy flow. Never had a problem toning.

If we used anything else besides chemicals named above, we went out and bought it that day, used it, labelled the job a "special order," and that's it. If you had seen us work, I'm sure you'd have considered us sloppy. I remember running out of stop, and using vinegar (photo stores are not usually open at 3:00 AM). We even drank water from the trough in rinsed Nikkor film tanks, used the same water to mix in our Scotch which was always present in volume at the lab (we were often drunk at work) . . . . But our work was considered the best in town, and from what I saw, it was.

Most "great" printers use one system and variants to produce their work, and are not "experimenters" throwing chemicals around like some painters spatch paint and other substances on a canvas. Beethoven was not an experimenter . . . he used the idiom around him developed by the likes of Clementi and Steibelt and simply did it better than anyone else. Very few greats are experimenters, rather they are culminatory figures. Control of product is everything.

I've won a couple of exhibitions with my own prints, and I use Dektol, Kodak Indicator, and Kodafix for what I do, unless I have a very good reason not to. With this set, D76, Rodinal and a few other odds and ends, I can deal with just about anything with this limited palette. Almost all of my printing used to be done on Luminos X or Gloss, or Kodak Ektalure. Now that I can't get these I use Kentmere pretty much for everything.

Most artists in other areas, from my experiences, are minimalists as well. I think Sprint chemicals must be very good if they are reaching a commercial market, but probably come in volumes that are inconvenient for the homebrewer.

Best of luck in your project!

moltogordo said:

Most artists in other areas, from my experiences, are minimalists as well. I think Sprint chemicals must be very good if they are reaching a commercial market, but probably come in volumes that are inconvenient for the homebrewer.

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its available (world)nationwide, comes in concentrates 1 L slugs 1 gallon cubes and if i am not mistaken 5L cubes.
if its not in your local store just order it from their website ...

You will have to do the tests yourself. We can't do them for you.

Developer: Buy a bag of Dektol and process similarly exposed sheet of the same paper in separate trays of Sprint and Dektol and compare the prints side-by-side. Judge development time by factoring the time needed for the initial image to come up. It is up to you if the results are acceptable.
Stop: mix up some Sprint and check that the pH is 2.5 to 3.5 with a test strip.
Fixer: Process a print for the recommended time and test the print for residual silver.
Hypo Clearing: Wash a print with the recommended sequence and test the print for residual fixer.

Another source for economical fixer is Kodak C-41 fix, the downside is that it is only available in 25 Liter packages, but it's $12 bucks from B&H (and they only sell it in multiples of 2). However, even with shipping charges, it's cheap compared to most of the alternatives.

It's a basic near-neutral PH non-hardening rapid fix. The usual dilution of the stuff for B&W work is 1:7.

I think Moltogordo said it very well above. Great printers don't experiment.

I worked my way through college at one of the largest photofinishers in Pittsburgh. They did pretty much what is said in Moltogordo's post. You just cannot play with production.

I have developed 2 modes to work in. I work as an experimenter and as a production person. I keep these apart in my darkroom because if I crossed them over I would get nowhere and would ruin a lot of materials. You want to be a good printer, you go in to production mode. Learn one and stick to it.

PE

Greg Davis said:

I have a book called Darkroom 2 in which Sprint is discussed as being formulated as a more environmentally safe version of D-76 and Dektol with the ease of liquid concentrates. In my experience with both, the results are very similar as to be indistinguishable.

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i had suggested this same thing in a different thread
and it was suggested that the film developer was nothing like d76
and the print developer was nothing like dektol ...

im glad this is published in a book ...

thanks greg

Prior to reading this thread I knew next to nothing about Sprint, now I'm intrigued. I love the documentation on their site, I might give it a shot.

Arcturus said:

Prior to reading this thread I knew next to nothing about Sprint, now I'm intrigued. I love the documentation on their site, I might give it a shot.

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Does this mean that Stone has secretly been hired to "guerrilla market" Sprint chemicals?

MattKing said:

Does this mean that Stone has secretly been hired to "guerrilla market" Sprint chemicals?

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If they are, they aren't paying me enough... lol

MattKing said:

Does this mean that Stone has secretly been hired to "guerrilla market" Sprint chemicals?

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Yes, but not the pink stuff.

I am still hoping to hear from Nikki D and her printer.

Truzi said:

Yes, but not the pink stuff.

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you add a little chinese amidol to it, it might make your prints pink ..

cowanw said:

I am still hoping to hear from Nikki D and her printer.

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didn't she sing with elton john in the 70s? typ[o] for kikiD?

Can anyone explain to me about "buffers"?

I think I'm actually going to settle on two of the Sprint chemicals, the hypo clear and the stop.

The problem with the stop is that it says it IS acidic which I want, but then also that it has buffers to prevent damage to prints that supposedly some other acid stops can cause.

I really wanted the kodak indicator stop actually it seemed cheap and high dilution, but can't ship it...

Freestyle can, but I'm not sure how potent the smell is either.

I have to say I do like the less strong smelling chemistry (to which Ilford is NOT one of them, their chemistry is strong smelling).

I would consider the photo formulary stuff but I'm under the impression they have a non acidic stop/fixer (but I'll have to look to make sure).

I know I might be "over thinking" but I would rather do a little more thinking before I end up with half bottles of various chemistry when I'm not happy with it.

StoneNYC said:

Can anyone explain to me about "buffers"?

I think I'm actually going to settle on two of the Sprint chemicals, the hypo clear and the stop.

The problem with the stop is that it says it IS acidic which I want, but then also that it has buffers to prevent damage to prints that supposedly some other acid stops can cause.

I really wanted the kodak indicator stop actually it seemed cheap and high dilution, but can't ship it...

Freestyle can, but I'm not sure how potent the smell is either.

I have to say I do like the less strong smelling chemistry (to which Ilford is NOT one of them, their chemistry is strong smelling).

I would consider the photo formulary stuff but I'm under the impression they have a non acidic stop/fixer (but I'll have to look to make sure).

I know I might be "over thinking" but I would rather do a little more thinking before I end up with half bottles of various chemistry when I'm not happy with it.

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According to the MSDS, the Sprint stop has a pH of 4.0 at the 1+9 dilution, so it is certainly acidic.

A well buffered chemical is one that responds to the introduction of either acidic or alkaline additives by reacting to them in a way that maintains the original solution's pH.

So if you add a print with a bunch of developer on it (usually fairly alkaline) to a well buffered stop bath, the stop bath quickly adjusts the pH of the resulting mixture back to near where it started.

As a result, when the print then leaves the stop bath and heads on to the fixer, the pH of the print works well with the mildly acidic fixer.

There are generally practical limits to buffering capacity.

The chemists here are welcome to correct this, where needed!

Perfect Matt!

PE

MattKing said:

According to the MSDS, the Sprint stop has a pH of 4.0 at the 1+9 dilution, so it is certainly acidic.

A well buffered chemical is one that responds to the introduction of either acidic or alkaline additives by reacting to them in a way that maintains the original solution's pH.

So if you add a print with a bunch of developer on it (usually fairly alkaline) to a well buffered stop bath, the stop bath quickly adjusts the pH of the resulting mixture back to near where it started.

As a result, when the print then leaves the stop bath and heads on to the fixer, the pH of the print works well with the mildly acidic fixer.

There are generally practical limits to buffering capacity.

The chemists here are welcome to correct this, where needed!

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That makes sense, sounds good, and was easy to read, just enough chemistry without getting overwhelming thanks!

So how do I compare the sprint fix and photo formulary to the Ilford Hypam to make sure the Hypam will work well with the Sprint Stop? How much pH variance is acceptable?

StoneNYC said:

…….

I really wanted the kodak indicator stop actually it seemed cheap and high dilution, but can't ship it...

Freestyle can, but I'm not sure how potent the smell is either.

I have to say I do like the less strong smelling chemistry (to which Ilford is NOT one of them, their chemistry is strong smelling).

…….

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Sometimes, I can get the Kodak shipped and not the SprintStop, sometimes other way 'round. Either one will be ground only, I think.
The Kodak has a little more smell to it than the Sprint and Sprint's has a vanilla scent rather than just acid. I've never smelled Ilford's Stop.
FWIW, I think the dilution of 1:9 is much easier to think through than whatever Kodak's is (partially because that's a very common one).

StoneNYC said:

That makes sense, sounds good, and was easy to read, just enough chemistry without getting overwhelming thanks!

So how do I compare the sprint fix and photo formulary to the Ilford Hypam to make sure the Hypam will work well with the Sprint Stop? How much pH variance is acceptable?

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From the Sprint and Ilford (and in one case, Kodak) websites:

Ilford Hypam works at a pH of 5-5.5. The Sprint fixer works at a pH of 6.0. So both are mildly acidic.

The Ilford stop bath concentrate is at a pH of 1.0 - very acidic. Ilford doesn't supply the pH of it at working strength. As a matter of interest, the MSDS for the more concentrated Kodak product indicates that it is less acidic - it is at a pH of 2.0.

The Sprint stop bath working solution is at a pH of 4.0 - more acidic than fixer, but not remarkably so.

All of the Kodak and Ilford products work well with each other, and are designed to respond to fairly diverse pH environments. After looking at the MSDS and the information on the Sprint website, there is no reason to expect Sprint to respond any differently.

winger said:

Sometimes, I can get the Kodak shipped and not the SprintStop, sometimes other way 'round. Either one will be ground only, I think.
The Kodak has a little more smell to it than the Sprint and Sprint's has a vanilla scent rather than just acid. I've never smelled Ilford's Stop.
FWIW, I think the dilution of 1:9 is much easier to think through than whatever Kodak's is (partially because that's a very common one).

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The Ilford citric acid based stop is definitely nicer smelling than the Kodak when they are at working dilution.

Sprint is diluted 1+9, Ilford is diluted 1+19 and Kodak is diluted 1+31 - I can work with each.

I use the Kodak for film (usually at half strength) and the Ilford for prints (frequently at half strength). My reason for using both? The Kodak is cheaper, and I can get more use out of a single bottle, but the Ilford smells better when I'm developing prints in trays.