What's happened?!

[Will Ridgway]

Developed in rodinal 1:25.
Ilford Rapid fixer (first use of).
Pre washed, and washed extensively.

 

[winger]

What stop bath?
What dilution of fixer?
What temperature for each step?
How long for each step?
"Extensively" equals how long? Running water or Ilford method?

 

[Saganich]

Contaminated reels?

 

[Andrew O'Neill]

Is the film touching each other on the reel during processing?

 

[Will Ridgway]

What stop bath?
What dilution of fixer?
What temperature for each step?
How long for each step?
"Extensively" equals how long? Running water or Ilford method?

No stop bath used, fixer was undiluted, 20 degrees dev and water to wash, fix was room temp. Washed a lot! Ilford method.

 

[Will Ridgway]

Is the film touching each other on the reel during processing?

No I don't think so, but how could they be contaminated? Wash them after each use.

 

[howardpan]

No stop bath used, fixer was undiluted, 20 degrees dev and water to wash, fix was room temp. Washed a lot! Ilford method.

If you don’t use a stop Bath, you should use a water bath to wash out the developer before adding the fixer. This protects the fixer’s life.

Ilford Rapid fixer is used at a 1+4 dilution, by the way.

Do you see the problem across all frames or only on a few frames? Do you see the same problem on another roll?

I am not sure what problem you saw in your negatives. However, based on the questions directed, I assume it’s development related and not exposure related (light leak). Are you sure you have covered the film with enough developer? Are you sure the Rodinal was properly mixed with water?

It would help if you provided as much details as possible.

 

[winger]

No I don't think so, but how could they be contaminated? Wash them after each use.

What he meant was that it's possible film on one ring of the reel could be touching the film on a different ring. This will prevent the chemicals getting to all areas evenly. FWIW, I don't think that's what happened here as it looks like it developed evenly under the remaining pink.

If you used the Ilford wash method of fill, invert 5 times, dump, fill, invert 10 times, dump, then fill, invert 20 times - then that may not be enough. I've always used two at 5, two at 10, etc..

Ditto to what Howard said regarding stop bath and diluting the fixer.

 

[Doremus Scudder]

No stop bath used, fixer was undiluted, 20 degrees dev and water to wash, fix was room temp. Washed a lot! Ilford method.

With such sloppy technique, it's a wonder that you got results as good as you did! Some pointers to help out.

1. Read the directions on your chemicals carefully. This will help avoid mistakes and provide a bit of safety as well.
2. You need something between developer and fix to a) stop the development and b) preserve the fixer. Many use a water bath; I'll recommend a real acid stop bath.
3. Fixer does not work at too strong dilutions. If you used fix straight out of the bottle without diluting, your film is not fixed properly. Mix some fix at the proper dilution and refix your film (and I'll bet your problem will disappear; you seem to have unfixed halides in the film that still needs to be fixed away). Next time, dilute your fixer properly and, more importantly, follow the recommendations regarding capacity and longevity.
4. Bite the bullet and become a bit more precise with your processing; it will save you time and trouble in the long run.

Best,

Doremus

 

[Huub]

Not sure what might have caused this. Especially the difference in colour in the negative astonishes me and this might indicate a problem with the fixing. You could try a refix and see what happens.

And as said by others: Ilford fix should be used at 1+4, stop bath does have its purpose, but should be replaced by a water bath when you don't want to use it and as a last remark: a pre-rinse is not recommanded either.

 

[mnemosyne]

Welcome to Photrio,

like Doremus said, undiluted fixer will not work well at all. Recommendation: refix with properly diluted fixer as soon as possible. For the future, make it a habit to read instructions on bottles/product sheets. Don't forget proper agitation and temperature control during fixing. "Room temperature" guessing is a no no unless you live close to the equator and temperatures are the same year round +/- 0.5 degrees.

If you want quality results, it is crucial to take every single step of the process seriously, starting from loading the reels to hanging the film for drying.

Also, for the future, please don't start different threads on a single topic/problem and please use a meaningful thread title so future users are able to find through a title search.

 

[RattyMouse]

No stop bath used, fixer was undiluted, 20 degrees dev and water to wash, fix was room temp. Washed a lot! Ilford method.

Wow!!! Undiluted fixer?? That's crazy. READ the directions of your chemicals. There is nothing good about fixing with undiluted fixer. There is plenty WRONG with doing so.

 

[RJ-]

I don't come onto this board often. Reading some of the rather unkind comments, I can't help feeling that telling Will off for overfixing a negative on a public forum is unhelpful, nor setting the terms and conditions for how he should frame his dilemma.

It's great to see self-learning and curiosity about film development still taking place. Will won't be repeating the error of locking in the anti-halation layer by using neat fixer and causing the emulsion to contract by a cold unregulated water rinse again. Perhaps you could extend him a little grace.

Welcome Will - we've all made mistakes when starting off developing film. Even when we've mastered developing film.


Kind regards,

RJ

 

[nimajneb]

No stop bath used, fixer was undiluted, 20 degrees dev and water to wash, fix was room temp. Washed a lot! Ilford method.

Ilford method washing is actually a short amount of time, it's based on efficiency and shorter wash time if I'm not mistaken. I wass under continuous water for five minutes for my final wash before photo-flo. I run tap water into the tank then dump it when it's full and repeat for the whole five minutes.

edit: also, sorry some other users are coming off a bit rude :/

 

[MattKing]

I'm not sure that any posts here were rude. There were a couple that were rather blunt though!
The comments about stop bath, temperature control, washing method and, in particular, dilution of fixer were intended as good guidance. I hope that they have been helpful.

 

[Saganich]

a lifetime worth of film development and I never knew undiluted fix wouldn't work! Learned something today.

 

[John Wiegerink]

I make my own TF2 fixer and have used it undiluted several times with film and had absolutely no problems. The only thing I noticed was my negatives cleared faster than diluted TF2. I actually only did this when I was testing cameras I had repaired and wanted results fast. I still have many of those negatives and they look just fine to me. I guess I'm dumb also 'cuz I never knew that undiluted fixer ruins negatives. JohnW