Your thoughts on these developed negs results.

Both the negs below were developed in Caffenol C-L for 42mins @ 23c. I have been getting consistent results with my mixture for a while now so was surprised when I saw the APX400 negs. The weather has been particularly cold here and I feel that I may have kept the APX400 at a consistent 23c for the whole development time (and maybe it got warmer) where as the APX100 possibly cooled more over that time. Also the APX100 was in the Ilford Fixer for 2 mins and the APX400 for 2:30mins.

Would you say that the APX400 has been in the developer too long?
Which negative result do you aim to achieve with your development process?
They both scan okay but the software is adding heaps of Midtone to the APX400 to get a reasonable picture.

I have had a few Rodinal disasters but am going to try it for a while as my only real concern with the Caffenol is the occasional white blotches, which I am to believe is Bromide burn.
Thanks for your interest and input.

Dear Robin,

To my eye, the APX 100 looks both overexposed and overdeveloped. The APX 400 looks a bit underexposed. Having said that, if it had been given more exposure it might also be overdeveloped. You should be able to print both of them.

Good luck,

Neal Wydra

hi robin

my experience with caffneol C( with no print developer added in ) is the negatives
either look extremely THIN ... like weirdly glowingly thin, or like d76 contrast + density.

have you ( or can you ) make a contact sheet or try to do some enlargements ?
you might be surprised that they both print well.
sorry for not being much help !
john

The main issue to me is that the highlights on the APX100 appear to be blocking up.

Chill out - try 20c with the APX100, and go longer with less agitation. Maybe 60 minutes with agitation at 5, 15 and 30 with the final half hour of dev just stand. 23c does seem too hot to me.

APX400 seems just a little underexposed, that's all.

Straightaway...if you develop an ISO 100 film for the same amount of time as an ISO 400 film using the same developer...the developed ISO 100 film will have greater contrast, as is the case here. I would expect the ISO 400 film would require 20-40% more development time to reach the same contrast...though I have never used Caffenol. Also, did you reuse the same developer to process both rolls?

I'll also add that the 400 speed film looks a little underexposed...but the contrast seems ok. The 100 speed film is overdeveloped. So I think reducing your dev time. (I'd say a 25% reduction) for your next batch of APX100 is what you want to do.

One other note - I have experience with AgfaPhoto APX400 - which was only produced in 2004-2005. It is very different than earlier APX400. I find it very grainy and requires a very aggressive S-shaped curve correction in editing software.

After looking at them, to me the 100 film was probably developed for too long. Exposure-wise, it looks okay. The 400 (inherently lower contrast film) looks fine to me, albeit, a tad flat...but still very printable. Exposure looks fine.

The comments above are excellent answers. I find the illustration on the following website to be helpful when I'm trying to help people assess their negatives:
https://www.ephotozine.com/article/assessing-negatives-4682
Here is the graphic from that article.




As may be clear from that graphic, a good negative tends to look a bit less contrasty and a bit less dark than most newer film photographers expect.

MattKing said:

The comments above are excellent answers. I find the illustration on the following website to be helpful when I'm trying to help people assess their negatives:
https://www.ephotozine.com/article/assessing-negatives-4682
As may be clear from that graphic, a good negative tends to look a bit less contrasty and a bit less dark than most newer film photographers expect.

Click to expand...

Thanks Matt and other members. That article is very helpful particularly this piece......
"An underdeveloped film can easily be confused with an underexposed negative because both are thin, but the underdeveloped version will still have some detail in shadow areas. A correctly developed film will produce negatives with plenty of tonal range and punchy prints. An overdeveloped film produces rich black negatives that print with too much contrast and increased grain."
I've been tending to think that the thicker neg was correct but can now see that somewhere in between the these two would be better. I will switch back to 20c water and try a proven 1:50 Rodinal mix to see if I can get better consistency.
I just randomly grabbed two film strips and hung them on the computer screen without choosing the best ones with correct exposures and reasonable subject matter but all the exposure comments are appreciated.

aldevo said:

Straightaway...if you develop an ISO 100 film for the same amount of time as an ISO 400 film using the same developer...the developed ISO 100 film will have greater contrast, as is the case here. I would expect the ISO 400 film would require 20-40% more development time to reach the same contrast...though I have never used Caffenol. Also, did you reuse the same developer to process both rolls?

Click to expand...

Thanks Aldevo, The developer was a fresh batch for both rolls and done separately. I think this might be my first try of APX400. I should stick to some brands and get my consistency sorted out and give Rodinal a go for a while.

I see a fair number of people here and elsewhere who achieve results they are happy with from non-standard developers like caffenol and/or non-standard procedures like stand or semi-stand. And I never want to discourage people from the fun of experimentation. But I'm always concerned when I see people who haven't yet achieved reliable results from the more usual methods striking out at the beginning by experimenting with non-standard stuff.
Those early experimenters seem to frequently end up struggling with assessing the results - so I whole-heartily support your decision to step back slightly to something more standard like Rodinal - preferably with standard agitation.

MattKing said:

............
Those early experimenters seem to frequently end up struggling with assessing the results - so I whole-heartily support your decision to step back slightly to something more standard like Rodinal - preferably with standard agitation.

Click to expand...

Your so right Matt. But my first year with film has been all about buying way too many classic cameras, fixing & tinkering, experimenting with too many film brands and going way off the beaten track with developer mixes. Some spectacular failures with both cameras and film, but then some remarkable results with both. Wrapping up the first year in film what a fair dinkum awesome time I have had with it. Darkroom coming soon - then we will really see some great stuff ups.

Robin Guymer said:

Thanks Aldevo, The developer was a fresh batch for both rolls and done separately. I think this might be my first try of APX400. I should stick to some brands and get my consistency sorted out and give Rodinal a go for a while.

Click to expand...

I took a look at my AgfaPhoto APX 400 negs. The "closest-to-normal" contrast (as I said, AgfaPhoto APX400 is kind of weird in how it builds contrast) was obtained with:

- Rodinial 1:200 with 900 ml working solution used to process 1 36 exposure roll @ 20C
- Stand development (no agitation after 60 seconds of initial, gentle inversions) for 48 minutes. I had exposed those negs at EI 200 (light was very contrasty).

Negs are still slightly flat...but very printable. Mind you, this was back in 2010 and I had refrigerated all my AgfaPhoto APX 400 immediately after purchasing it. So don't be surprised if you need to revise that development time upwards by a bit (film loses a bit of contrast as it fogs with age due to exposure by cosmic rays and the like).

Hope this is useful as a starting point.