Tri-X - should I be surprised?

[chuck94022]

I've been following my son around lately with a Nikon N70 using bulk loaded Tri-X.

Yesterday he had his annual spring play. I shot out the last couple of frames of the Tri-X that had been in the camera, shot at the rated speed (400). I loaded a new roll, and because I wanted to shoot available light, decided to push this roll two stops to 1600. (My wife was next to me with her little digicam, so I wasn't that worried about losing all records of this event if I screwed up...)

I shot the roll, and before leaving the school loaded a new roll of Tri-X and reset my camera back to the rated speed.

When I got home I realized I had forgotten to identify the pushed roll. Oops.

I decided that the shots of the play were more important than whatever was on the other roll (I wasn't sure but it was probably random little league shots). So I decided to process both rolls pushed to 1600 (in D76 non-diluted for 13 minutes, normal agitation). I figured the play shots would come out OK, and the other shots would be ruined.

I was very pleased with the shots of the play. This was my first time pushing Tri-X, and I think it performed beautifully.

I was also pleasantly surprised with the quality of the overdeveloped roll. While it is too grainy, the shots are useable, and I'm glad they are - I had some really good memories on that roll.

I've attached two shots: The baseball shot is a negative scan (tweaked only to correct for scanner lossiness) from the overdeveloped roll. The play shot is from the pushed and correctly developed roll.

According to my cheat sheet for Tri-X, the baseball shot should have only been in the soup for 8 minutes. Instead it got an extra 5 minutes. I'm pretty impressed with how the image held up, given that. Of course, I don't like the grain in that roll, but at least the images are salvageable. They won't win any awards, but they certainly preserve some great moments in my son's childhood!

[Edit: He was a hermit crab in the play, which expains the backpack and the claw...]

 

[shyguy]

i think they came out real nice!

 

[Dean Williams]

I'm not surprised. Tri-X is probably the most tractable B&W emulsion ever invented. A great film that does many things very well. Nice shot of your young man.

 

[David Brown]

With Tri-x, I tend to make my "possible" errors go toward overexposure and/or over development. You can't print what's not there, but, as you discovered, it's hard to over do it. A lot of people shoot it at 200 and develop normally. Good stuff!

Cheers y'all.

David

 

[TPPhotog]

I agree they both came out real nice. At the moment I'm having a lot of trouble deciding between Tri-X and HP5+ as I love them both and both seem to be able to be used & abused with cracking results. I think Tri-X has the edge at being more forgiving though.

 

[jrschulz]

Though the grain may be too much for your liking, the prints looks fine. Tri-X rocks.

If you play with it a bit you can find an exposure/developement combination that works for you. I tend to be more concerned with contrast and tonal range (and not terribly worried about grain) and try to expose it at 200 and then push a stop at developement to get a nice dense negative. But regularly "violate" my rule if there's a reason to and have rarely been disappointed.

js

 

[fschifano]

There's a reason Tri-X is still around after all these years. I think you've found out why.

 

[noseoil]

Looks like the baseball shot was taken in overcast lighting. This must have helped a bit too.

 

[Bob Carnie]

Hi There
I have found over the years that some very interesting results can be had from printing film that has been grossly over exposed (bulletproof). Once you blast through the density and put a 4.5 filter on the enlarger the resulting images can be excellent. They pick up grain but also seem to be very sharp. I cannot figure out why so sharp but it works.
trix film seems to work as well as other films that are overexposed this way.
For lith printing an underexposed and overdeveloped negative is the cats ass and creates that wonderful lith look.
Deviating from perfectly exposed , perfectly developed , negatives is something each photographer should try to see the other possibilities available to them.

 

[fhovie]

The "new" tri-x at 1600 in Xtol is unbelievabley smooth and it really adds the contrast otherwise lacking at asa 400.

 

[gareth harper]

Things seem to have worked out well for you.
I'd have probably developed the lot for a one stop push myself. I usally find it's very workable within +/- 1 stop. If anything I like negs that slightly underexposed.