Troubleshooting odd negative results

dearcomposer · Apr 14, 2025

Hey y'all,

I've just finished developing a roll of Kodak GC 400 - 24 frames. It is an older roll, and the friend who shot the roll is very inexperienced (shooting on Auto on a borrowed Minolta X-700).

However, I fear the issue was caused in the development stages. There seem to be about 1.5 frames that came out okay, then half a frame is a pink line, then 3 frames greyed out, as if they didn't receive any development chemicals. It loops in this pattern, but the pattern is not lining up with my Paterson Reel (in other words, the length of the pattern is a bit longer than one spool of film wound in the reel), which makes me thing something else is going on.

Hoping anyone has any insight so I can not make this mistake again. Or maybe, if this is just some sort weird expiration pattern? I'm a bit stumped.

I developed using fresh CineStill C-41 chemistry, in my paterson reel tank.

Attached is a photo:

loccdor · Apr 14, 2025

The film wasn't in the reel's track, causing it to touch itself, blocking development in the areas that touched. Try reeling in the light to get the hang of it, make sure the two ball bearings in your Paterson reel are present.

Dr. no · Apr 14, 2025

The dark areas appear to include the edges, and have a fairly sharp delineation that you would see with a light leak of some type, not the feathered edge of a chemical misadventure. They seen too long/far apart for a can felt leak, might your friend have opened the back of the camera a couple of times?
I have had old film that was worse at the beginning (and outer) end of the roll, more heat or cosmic ray exposure there? But this is nothing like those.

Dr. no · Apr 14, 2025

loccdor said:
The film wasn't in the reel's track, causing it to touch itself, blocking development in the areas that touched. Try reeling in the light to get the hang of it, make sure the two ball bearings in your Paterson reel are present.

BTDT. It doesn't usually cross the strip in a perfect straight line...

dearcomposer · Apr 14, 2025

loccdor said:
The film wasn't in the reel's track, causing it to touch itself, blocking development in the areas that touched. Try reeling in the light to get the hang of it, make sure the two ball bearings in your Paterson reel are present.

My first impression was that loaded the film off its track, but I have never encountered this issue in the 50+ rolls I've developed in this set-up and I didn't notice anything suspicious when I unloaded the film off the reel onto it's drying clips. Though I guess everyone is capable of a new mistake no matter how long they've been at it. I'm not sure if that explains the pink strips going by it though?

Dr. no said:
The dark areas appear to include the edges, and have a fairly sharp delineation that you would see with a light leak of some type, not the feathered edge of a chemical misadventure. They seen too long/far apart for a can felt leak, might your friend have opened the back of the camera a couple of times?
I have had old film that was worse at the beginning (and outer) end of the roll, more heat or cosmic ray exposure there? But this is nothing like those.

I don't think my friend opened the back of the camera considering he didn't even know how to do it. I'm attaching a higher res image of one of the transitory parts of the film

MattKing · Apr 14, 2025

I note that the darker parts of the fogging don't extend into the film rebate.
That leads me to think "shutter problem".

koraks · Apr 15, 2025

I suspect there are several problems going on at the same time here.

Note how on this bit, the b+f between the left sprockets next to the empty bit of image area is lower than in the section below it where there is a partial image. This can only be explained by a lack of development in that area. Note that development did take place on the opposite side, where there are edge codes and higher b+f. A similar pattern here:

What's interesting is how the undeveloped area is offset along the edge of the film, creating a C-shaped form. Also note the width of this band; I have the impression that it gets narrower towards one end of the roll.

dearcomposer said:
There seem to be about 1.5 frames that came out okay, then half a frame is a pink line, then 3 frames greyed out, as if they didn't receive any development chemicals.

Well, none of the frames look OK to me, but the ones that are quite dense may just be badly fogged and underexposed at the same time. The pink line is basically undeveloped (see 'C-shape' above). The lighter frames are developed alright, but less so than the others.

Note that you can use the length of these artifacts (no. of frames/sprockets) to figure out how large the diameter was that the film was rolled up on, which can then help determining at what point it happened. Doing this, I come to a roll diameter of around 70mm, which is in the ballpark for a regular processing reel. I also notice that the diameter is larger on the clipped end and drops away, which means that the clipped end went onto the reel last; I assume this is the end where the film was cut from the cassette during loading it onto the reel.

Then there's e.g. this bit:

Note how there appears to be fogging in particular around the sprocket holes. It's unclear what may have caused this; fogging around sprockets usually points towards problems with light leaks in the camera on the take-up spool area. But this is usually associated with higher degrees of fog in the image area than what we see in this bit.

This is interesting, too:

There's an unprocessed bit on the top edge, left, which you often get on properly spooled film in a hand tank. There also appears to be severe fogging around the sprockets, but interestingly not (or less so) in the image area.

There's also this:

Note the irregular frame spacing. I'd be inclined to check other visible frame spacings to see how much variation there is, and especially if there are overlapping frames. This would suggest camera failure. IDK how this particular camera counts frames, but if it's an optical (IR) system, this could be a hint w.r.t. possible light leaks.

One thing this reminds me of is trying to develop film on a rotary base, with the rotary base not having done its work - i.e. the tank sitting horizontally. This does not quite explain the entirely undeveloped band (I'd have expected to see some very faint development there), but it could explain the alternation between strong development and weak development. The apparent fogging around the sprockets can be explained by the developer remaining stuck there due to capillary forces around the sprockets and the reel slots even on the part of the reel that sat above the processing liquid.

@dearcomposer can you give some details on what kind of processing equipment (tank, reel, and rotary base/machine, if any) you used?

loccdor · Apr 15, 2025

Dr. no said:
BTDT. It doesn't usually cross the strip in a perfect straight line...

You're right, whatever was blocking film development was very uniformly aligned. Koraks is probably onto something with his multiple problems idea. The undeveloped areas do have the same look as to when something is blocking chemicals from soaking into the film.

Dr. no · Apr 15, 2025

Voting for multiple failure modes. The swiss cheese holes lined up...
1. Old film
2. development issues (reel, temp, agitation?)
3. the camera?
4. the user?

We haven't touched on the camera yet. Spacing issues, exposure and light leaks might contribute. And the user could interact a bit with these.
Film touching itself due to improper reeling, for me anyway, looks different: more of a meniscus than a straight line, and usually with wetting actually sticks together enough that here is a fixing defect also, so that there are white areas of untouched emulsion.

dearcomposer · Apr 16, 2025

koraks said:
I suspect there are several problems going on at the same time here.

View attachment 396357
Note how on this bit, the b+f between the left sprockets next to the empty bit of image area is lower than in the section below it where there is a partial image. This can only be explained by a lack of development in that area. Note that development did take place on the opposite side, where there are edge codes and higher b+f. A similar pattern here:
View attachment 396360
What's interesting is how the undeveloped area is offset along the edge of the film, creating a C-shaped form. Also note the width of this band; I have the impression that it gets narrower towards one end of the roll.

Well, none of the frames look OK to me, but the ones that are quite dense may just be badly fogged and underexposed at the same time. The pink line is basically undeveloped (see 'C-shape' above). The lighter frames are developed alright, but less so than the others.

Note that you can use the length of these artifacts (no. of frames/sprockets) to figure out how large the diameter was that the film was rolled up on, which can then help determining at what point it happened. Doing this, I come to a roll diameter of around 70mm, which is in the ballpark for a regular processing reel. I also notice that the diameter is larger on the clipped end and drops away, which means that the clipped end went onto the reel last; I assume this is the end where the film was cut from the cassette during loading it onto the reel.

Then there's e.g. this bit:
View attachment 396358
Note how there appears to be fogging in particular around the sprocket holes. It's unclear what may have caused this; fogging around sprockets usually points towards problems with light leaks in the camera on the take-up spool area. But this is usually associated with higher degrees of fog in the image area than what we see in this bit.

This is interesting, too:
View attachment 396359
There's an unprocessed bit on the top edge, left, which you often get on properly spooled film in a hand tank. There also appears to be severe fogging around the sprockets, but interestingly not (or less so) in the image area.

There's also this:
View attachment 396361
Note the irregular frame spacing. I'd be inclined to check other visible frame spacings to see how much variation there is, and especially if there are overlapping frames. This would suggest camera failure. IDK how this particular camera counts frames, but if it's an optical (IR) system, this could be a hint w.r.t. possible light leaks.

One thing this reminds me of is trying to develop film on a rotary base, with the rotary base not having done its work - i.e. the tank sitting horizontally. This does not quite explain the entirely undeveloped band (I'd have expected to see some very faint development there), but it could explain the alternation between strong development and weak development. The apparent fogging around the sprockets can be explained by the developer remaining stuck there due to capillary forces around the sprockets and the reel slots even on the part of the reel that sat above the processing liquid.

@dearcomposer can you give some details on what kind of processing equipment (tank, reel, and rotary base/machine, if any) you used?

Thank you for such a detailed analysis. I am suspecting multiple systems failing myself. I was using a rotary system, the AGO film processor, and my first initial fear was that there was a failure in the rotation mechanism. There was also user error in the heating of my chemicals: I set my sous vide to 39°C, but removed my developer a little too early and my thermometer read 30°C, however the processor automatically adjusts the processing time for temperature variations.

This roll was processed in a Paterson Tank with the standard white plastic reel. I inspected the reel and the tank and there were no issues, and a few hours later, using the exact same equipment, processed a roll of Rollei Retro 400S that came out perfectly. The roll gave me about 8 well exposed photos, though 7 of them have evidence of a light leak from the lens.

I do think the frame spacing has something to do with the camera. I was informed this was the first time the camera has been used in 8-15 years, along with the film having sat in a drawer for just as many years if not more.

Before I cut the film up and scanned it, I did reroll the film onto the spool to see how long the segments of pink strip to pink strip fit on the reel, and it was about 1.5 loops. Aka, the pink strips did not match up with each other, and the fogged segments did not align either, though there was some slight overlap.

Dr. no · Apr 16, 2025

I have had old film stick in the cassette, and strip the ratchet and have spacing issues too.

koraks · Apr 16, 2025

dearcomposer said:
Before I cut the film up and scanned it, I did reroll the film onto the spool to see how long the segments of pink strip to pink strip fit on the reel, and it was about 1.5 loops. Aka, the pink strips did not match up with each other, and the fogged segments did not align either, though there was some slight overlap.

That's very interesting and smart of you to check. It's quite puzzling though, because I cannot think of any cause for the clear bands that would happen before or after the film was on the development reel. No development took place in those bands, so some kind of processing problem does come to mind.

dearcomposer said:
This roll was processed in a Paterson Tank with the standard white plastic reel.

In my paterson system 4 tank, the center column can rotate quite freely inside the tank. How do you ensure that the reel rotates along with the tank when using this tank for rotary processing?

dearcomposer · Apr 16, 2025

koraks said:
In my paterson system 4 tank, the center column can rotate quite freely inside the tank. How do you ensure that the reel rotates along with the tank when using this tank for rotary processing?

The processor will not form a seal if the center column is not connected at the base to rotate the tank. All the chemicals will simply pour out (I have learned this the hard way). I have not had an issue with this in months though. I will note though that my initial fear was a rotary failure, and it seems like the clearest explanation.

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