3 questions about Pushing and Pulling

Most of this discussion has been about black and white, but colour slide film can be pushed and pulled as well. I often push Provia 400F to 800 in low light. Provia 400F pushed to 1250 and developed as a 1600 film gives a nice grainy effect for misty mornings. I also occasionally push Provia 100 to 200 if I need a slightly faster speed to capture action- it is almost indistinguishable from exposure at 100 apart from a very slight increase in contrast and blue cast in the shadows. I also pushed it once to 500 (developed as 400 speed film) by mistake- the result was rather too contrasty!
 
I'm finding this discussion very interesting & informative. I always appreciate the info bmattock imparts here (as well as the emailed info I received from him a couple months ago. I failed to give proper thanks there and am hopefully doign so now. Thanks very much for the battery info bill. I have recently put it to use & now have a metered Petri Racer in my arsenal).

I'm about to delve into home developing for the first time & the only developer that was reasonable for me to get that day was xtol. How good is it for pushing? Is it better for pushing at 1+1 or is diluting at 1+3 (the max dilution) better? Any ideas or opinions here?
 
bmattock said:
Most 35mm film has 'DX' encoding on the side of the cartridge. This tells some cameras and some film processing machines what speed film is inside.
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Sorry about the misunderstanding the jocularity you and finder were engaged in. I am just quite sensitive to overt personal attacks (and yes, Finder, if all above was not meant for fun, then I guess you would be right in saying that the use of "nonsense" can be understood personal attack).

But on to another point. I was under the impression that C-41 film is processed in the same chemicals at the same time regardless of its speed. Isn't that correct? In other words if I have 100 speed film and 1600 speed film, they could be developed in the same chemicals at the same time. Now to push or pull you need to make adjustment in time and chemical, but again, it would be the same for what ever film you used (ie. The time and chemical used for a 2 stop push of Fuji Reala 100 would be the exact same as a 2 stop push for Fuji Press 800).

From what I understand (and please correct me if I am wrong) color film is pretty much completely standardized for developing. It is only Black and white film that has the great variation of time and chemical between brands and even speeds.
 
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Well, I'm no expert on C-41 processing (being color-blind, I've never had a yen to try it myself), but I have asked for push or pull many times when handing in a C-41 (or E-6) roll of film at the lab, and no one has gasped or told me that it could not be done.

I found this:

http://www.e-sixlab.com/C41FilmOrder.pdf

In it, the lab in question says:

C-41
Push/Pull
E-Six Lab can push all film formats
to +3 stops and pull all film -1
stops in 1/4 and 1/3 stop
increments.

If the temperatures are the same chemicals at the same temperature, then I suppose the delta would be how long they are in the soup - faster films requiring less time than slower films, perhaps.

As to the 'personal attacks' things - I tend to be too deadpan - many think I am being outrageously insulting, when in fact, I am only rageously insulting.

I don't hate everyone, just everyone I've met so far. Heh, heh. That was a joke.
 
The guy at the lab (c41 that is) I use says that if it’s not a regular customer they just smile and say “plus one stop? Certainly sir” then put it through the standard process; he then smiled and assured me they would actually alter the timing if I wanted to push or pull anything as I was a “valued customer”. I’m going in tomorrow I’ll question them again and see if I can get the truth of it.

I knew you were joking Bill……………….as soon as you said handsome
 
I just push film to allow me to shoot what I want with the film I have, I haven't really got into the complexities of tonal range yet.

Attached a pic from the RAF Museum in Hendon. First time I went there I had a big slr with flash attached, very cumbersome, shot colour, wasn't very impressed with my efforts. Next time just had my XA with Delta 400 rated at 800 and dev'd in DD-X. I was getting shutter speeds of 1/15th or 1/30th at F2.8. Much happier with these.
 

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Back to Jeremy's question - which I assume was referring to Black and white film based on other postsI read of his, I think the best advice that was given to you is to read Ansel Adam's three book series: "The Camera," "The Negative." and "The Print."

In "The Negative", Ansel Adams has a more thorough explanation of the purpose of pushing and pulling film than any of us could give on this forum. Check it out from your school or public Library and read chapters 2-4 for a very good explanation: Chapter 2 - "Light and Film" Chapter 3 - "Exposure" and Chapter 4 "The Zone System."
 
One of the lecturers at collage, who could produced some stunning prints, would take great delight when asked what special tricks of pushing/pulling/developing/exposing he used to achieve that result would say “I read the instructions on the box……….then follow them” it still makes me think twice#

PS I'm talking 135, not the Adams LF stuff
 
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Sparrow said:
One of the lecturers at collage, who could produced some stunning prints, would take great delight when asked what special tricks of pushing/pulling/developing/exposing he used to achieve that result would say “I read the instructions on the box……….then follow them” it still makes me think twice#

PS I'm talking 135, not the Adams LF stuff
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I tend to agree with you. I believe it is the work of a lifetime, if one is not a truly dedicated darkroom specialist, to simply master one film and one developer. It is fun to experiment with different films and developers, and to play around with times, temperatures, dilutions, and the like, but I cannot claim that my fiddling about amount to mastery or even journey-level work.

On the other hand...

If I had but one film and one developer, it would be Kodak Tri-X and D-76, and I truly believe that not much else is needed for the majority of situations - if you become the master of all that can be done with these two components. Naturally, this would involve taking the film and developer significantly beyond simply what is on the inside of the Tri-X box.

To the side-issue about films not being what they rated at - I disagree, this is untrue - in the sense that manufacturers spend a great deal of time selecting the ISO value of a film they create, the less to annoy photographers by intentionally steering them towards wonky exposures. However, it can also be fairly said by anyone who understands exposure ratings that they are, for the most part, utter crap. Film has no 'speed' in the sense that it cannot correctly expose every portion of every possible scene which a camera meter says it can. There is no 'speed' as an absolute, only as a relative measurement of overall sensitivity to light. However, we accept this and use a very general meaning for film speed. Generally, an ISO 400 speed film will behave thusly for this sort of indicated exposure, and etc.

But again back to the point - I generally do not push or pull intentionally if there is a known film I can easily obtain that is already rated at the speed I wish to be exposing. If I find myself without the necessary film rated at the speed I need, then pushing or pulling become the manner in which I might make an acceptable exposure where otherwise I could not.
 
bmattock said:
I tend to agree with you. I believe it is the work of a lifetime, if one is not a truly dedicated darkroom specialist, to simply master one film and one developer. It is fun to experiment with different films and developers, and to play around with times, temperatures, dilutions, and the like, but I cannot claim that my fiddling about amount to mastery or even journey-level work.

On the other hand...

If I had but one film and one developer, it would be Kodak Tri-X and D-76, and I truly believe that not much else is needed for the majority of situations - if you become the master of all that can be done with these two components. Naturally, this would involve taking the film and developer significantly beyond simply what is on the inside of the Tri-X box.

To the side-issue about films not being what they rated at - I disagree, this is untrue - in the sense that manufacturers spend a great deal of time selecting the ISO value of a film they create, the less to annoy photographers by intentionally steering them towards wonky exposures. However, it can also be fairly said by anyone who understands exposure ratings that they are, for the most part, utter crap. Film has no 'speed' in the sense that it cannot correctly expose every portion of every possible scene which a camera meter says it can. There is no 'speed' as an absolute, only as a relative measurement of overall sensitivity to light. However, we accept this and use a very general meaning for film speed. Generally, an ISO 400 speed film will behave thusly for this sort of indicated exposure, and etc.

But again back to the point - I generally do not push or pull intentionally if there is a known film I can easily obtain that is already rated at the speed I wish to be exposing. If I find myself without the necessary film rated at the speed I need, then pushing or pulling become the manner in which I might make an acceptable exposure where otherwise I could not.
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I think that’s what I meant, I enjoyed and had some success with gaf 500 in 70’s the pushed to a then incredible 2000asa, and I’ve been playing with Fuji 400 s for monochrome recently, but I always have HP5 in id11 as a fall back position if/when the experiments fail.
Sort of walk before you run thing, not in a pompous old guy way just a practical easiest way to do it way, but then I’m talking as an artistic choice not in terms of documentation if that’s what your talking about, then it’s whatever it takes to get something on film or sensor.
 
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