What do I do w/ Ilford Delta 100?

[Alan Johnson]

My test of Delta 100 in 4 different developers:
Scans retain developer properties | Photrio.com Photography Forums

 

[hoojammyflip]

My test of Delta 100 in 4 different developers:
Scans retain developer properties | Photrio.com Photography Forums

This is a great piece of objective analysis. In my mind, the differences although they appear to exist are minimal. I seem to remember from Way Beyond Monochrome v1, there was a developer test which was removed from v2.

 

[Kodachromeguy]

Just bought a new camera and quickly shot a test roll of Delta 100 on it, developed in Xtol, exposed on full auto at box speed. With fast lenses it has a lot of what people call "medium format look" to my eye:

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These are superb frames. Well done. I especially like the first one of the straw in an old barn, the type of topic that I like to photograph. I think your exposures, developing, and scanning are Just about right. You have reminded me that I should use Delta 100 again.

 

[DREW WILEY]

I shoot it at 50 in order to get the deep shadows boosted up a little higher onto the straight line section of the curve, and then develop it in PMK pyro. My own interest in experimenting with it was to identify a reasonable replacement for TMax100 in case that ever is in short supply. There are real differences. Like I just hinted, Delta needs a full stop more exposure to get the curve similar to TMX100 (which I shoot at box speed of 100). The spectral sensitivity is also slightly different. Grain is a tad bigger in Delta 100 - a non-issue in sheet sizes, but somewhat a factor in smaller roll formats. Price also obviously differs. But they both respond well to higher contrast development and have excellent quality control; and both get along with a wide selection of developers. It's a fine product, but I still prefer TMax - the original fried chicken, and not "extra crispy". Delta has better edge acutance than TMax100 in pyro; but I have a special developer tweak that equalizes them. TMY400 is superior to both of them in that respect; but it's in a different speed category.

Among medium speed films offered by Ilford, FP4 seems more versatile to me. Delta 100 only has an edge if you need finer grain. But used at full box speed for sake of a longer toe, it does provide a look somewhat reminiscent of old Plus-X, favoring silky upper midtone and highlight gradation, rather than down in the shadows.

 

[Tom Kershaw]

@MatthewDunn There are no benefits to staining or many claimed 'high acutance' developers than cannot be achieved or bettered via the application of pretty basic process controls and conventional developers in the D-76/ Xtol/ Perceptol direction. Many modern emulsions actually benefit from a degree of solvency to maximise real MTF sharpness.

I don't have my notes to hand but I recently did a quick comparison of TMX in DS-10 1+1 (XTOL style developer) and DS-12 ("acutance" type) and didn't see much of an advantage in the latter. DS-10 was finer grained unsurprisingly - this was 35mm onto 16"x20" uncropped. Perhaps results would be different with FP4+, Pan F+, or one of the Foma products...

Edit, I was just reminded of this statement from the Silvergrain website - via the wayback machine. https://tinyurl.com/32fhrvbk

DO NOT USE DS-10 with:

• APX25, APX100
• Pan F Plus
• Lucky 100 speed

(During the testing process, valuable sensitometric data was contributed for some films by Martin Jangowski.)
The problem with DS-10 and many films of box speed 100 or slower is very distorted sensitometric curves, loss of speed, and often with low density. The developer is adjusted to develop slowly, with suitably adjusted level of solvency, so that the developed silver grains consist of compact filaments rather than widely spanning filaments typical of coarse grain developers. However, this strategy doesn't work well with the way slower emulsions are made.

 

[Danner]

X'ed all things.

;^}

 

[Lachlan Young]

I don't have my notes to hand but I recently did a quick comparison of TMX in DS-10 1+1 (XTOL style developer) and DS-12 ("acutance" type) and didn't see much of an advantage in the latter. DS-10 was finer grained unsurprisingly - this was 35mm onto 16"x20" uncropped. Perhaps results would be different with FP4+, Pan F+, or one of the Foma products...

Edit, I was just reminded of this statement from the Silvergrain website - via the wayback machine. https://tinyurl.com/32fhrvbk

DO NOT USE DS-10 with:

• APX25, APX100
• Pan F Plus
• Lucky 100 speed

(During the testing process, valuable sensitometric data was contributed for some films by Martin Jangowski.)
The problem with DS-10 and many films of box speed 100 or slower is very distorted sensitometric curves, loss of speed, and often with low density. The developer is adjusted to develop slowly, with suitably adjusted level of solvency, so that the developed silver grains consist of compact filaments rather than widely spanning filaments typical of coarse grain developers. However, this strategy doesn't work well with the way slower emulsions are made.

There's a whole heap of problems I can see with both those developers (and DS-12 won't produce any edge effects from the Metol because of the presence of the ascorbic acid - metol depends on exhaustion effects for acutance, unlike phenidones which seem to be able to produce inhibition effects). It sounds an awful lot like some strange effect was happening - possibly something like a weak monobath when used on specific grain structures (TEA is also a silver solvent). Neither of them seem terribly well designed, and rather suggest that they were thought up after reading a few journal articles on salicylates and the Fenton reaction.

 

[Tom Kershaw]

Neither of them seem terribly well designed, and rather suggest that they were thought up after reading a few journal articles on salicylates and the Fenton reaction.

In practical terms, at least for TMX and TMY-2, DS-10 works as well as XTOL.