Weird Streaks on Motion Picture Film

[Juan Cruz Le]

Hi! I've been developing motion picture film for a long time without issues. The last 3 times I developed, twice I had this streak problem and nothing changed in my process. This streaks appeared when using the 5reel tank, while it didn't when I used two-reel tank. I regularly and almost always use the 5 reel tank and never had this issue. I did have issues like this in the past, like a year ago, when I didn't use water between developer and bleach and I was using 2 reels tanks, and washing with water fixed it. The weird thing is it just started happening without changing anything in the process. Also tried new chemicals in between but it happend again. Its mostly seen in underexposed photos, but it can also be seen in other places, it depends the frame. Im going mad and ran out of options. Any ideas?

My process:

Constant roller agitation with C41 chemicals.

1. Prewash between 3' and 5' (PreWashing less caused me problems in the past)
2. Remjet removal bath 1'
3. Wash twice and shake to remove remjet
4. Developer
5. Acid Stop bath with vinegar 1' (Fixed some problems that I had when using only water)
6. Water wash 1'
7. Bleach
8. Water wash 1'
9. Fix
10. Manual Remjet removal
11. Ilford rinsing method
12. Stabilizer

First photo is fresh Vision 3 250D, it can be seen in the sky
Second is expired Vision 2 500T

 

[koraks]

Hm, this doesn't ring a bell. It's a rather subtle defect, but having looked at it for a bit, I can at least see what you mean.

On that first frame, I need to boost contrast very far to be able to see it at all. At that point, I'm also starting to see a very minor unevenness in development resulting from the rotation agitation (vertical dark 'flames' a bit like aurora running into the frame from the top).

What's interesting is that there's some kind of circular motion to the defect. Do you have examples of two adjacent frames on the same roll that show the defect? This might contain some clues. Also, the second image (of the sunset) suggests that the problem may be some kind of rogue density formation as it also appears to occur in the unexposed foreground of this image. Can you see the same striations on the unexposed parts of the leader and trailer of the film? You may need to scan those and boost contrast a lot to see what's going on.

One diagnostic you could try is to re-bleach and re-fix an affected strip of negatives and then see if the problem goes away.

 

[Juan Cruz Le]

Hm, this doesn't ring a bell. It's a rather subtle defect, but having looked at it for a bit, I can at least see what you mean.

View attachment 405868

View attachment 405867

On that first frame, I need to boost contrast very far to be able to see it at all. At that point, I'm also starting to see a very minor unevenness in development resulting from the rotation agitation (vertical dark 'flames' a bit like aurora running into the frame from the top).

What's interesting is that there's some kind of circular motion to the defect. Do you have examples of two adjacent frames on the same roll that show the defect? This might contain some clues. Also, the second image (of the sunset) suggests that the problem may be some kind of rogue density formation as it also appears to occur in the unexposed foreground of this image. Can you see the same striations on the unexposed parts of the leader and trailer of the film? You may need to scan those and boost contrast a lot to see what's going on.

One diagnostic you could try is to re-bleach and re-fix an affected strip of negatives and then see if the problem goes away.

I already tried rebleaching and refixing but without success. In the negatives its really difficult to see it, its almost imperceptible, thats why I didn't post photo and posted the scan. Ill show you two adjacent frames!

 

[Samu]

Are we talking about motion picture or ECN-2 film in still lengths? Processing in C-41 sounds like latter.

 

[Juan Cruz Le]

Are we talking about motion picture or ECN-2 film in still lengths? Processing in C-41 sounds like latter.

ECN-2 film in still. I've been processing it in C-41 for a long time without issues. Also, ECN-2 chemistry isn't available in my country, thats why everyone process ECN-2 film in C-41.

 

[koraks]

Thanks for posting the adjacent frames. I've put them side by side similar to how I expect them to be on the film strip (you can verify):

Looking at the patterns, my money is on subtle surge marks caused during the brief moments of filling the tank with developer.

One thing you could try is to skip the remjet removal bath. Instead, perform that at the end of the process. There will be some fouling of the developer; there are a few ways to deal with this (including just accepting it). I'd also do separate experiments with and without a plain water pre-rinse.

 

[Juan Cruz Le]

Thanks for posting the adjacent frames. I've put them side by side similar to how I expect them to be on the film strip (you can verify):
View attachment 405898
Looking at the patterns, my money is on subtle surge marks caused during the brief moments of filling the tank with developer.

One thing you could try is to skip the remjet removal bath. Instead, perform that at the end of the process. There will be some fouling of the developer; there are a few ways to deal with this (including just accepting it). I'd also do separate experiments with and without a plain water pre-rinse.

I managed to fix it by trial and error with small strips ! At first I tried a new stop bath, didn't work, streaks appeared again. Then I made a new remjet prebath and used another developer that I knew was okey (I do have 2 bottles, one that I use to process ECN-2 and the other one to process C-41, used that one) and this fixed it!! Im not sure if it was the prebath or the developer but I inclinate towards the developer, so I'll toss it.

Related to what you said about skipping the remjet removal and permorming it at the end of the process, thats what I did before, but with old vision 1 and vision 2 film, this caused reticulation! (I figured out it was because of the PH shock between the acidic fixer and the alkaline removal bath) That was a problem I fixed in the past by using it as the first step.

Thank you for your comments in order to figure it out!