Developing black and white film without using stop bath?

[SilverInversion]

I know what it looks like; I meant it in the sense of seeing if anyone ever gets it. Dichroic fog is green when viewed by reflected light and red with transmitted light. I don't doubt that this might be dichroic fog, but it doesn't look like it to me. The easiest way to generate dichroic fog is to develop in very old Rodinal at 1+25 and try to fix it immediately with no rinse in exhausted superfix. That was how Kodak's training materials were generated.

It is dichroic fog. It's fine metallic silver deposited on the film and it's removed by the swab that gets black (--> silver).

 

[Valkir1987]

If a fixer is exhausted, you don't get dichroic fog and you don't ruin the picture as you can always refix in fresh fix as long as it has not been exposed to light.

I got this fog using expired Rollei Supergrain. Someone with a lot of experience in developing and chemistry looked at the ingredients and said the developer contained chemicals that are usually found in fixer.

Still, whether you use a stop bath or not; depends on your personal experience and preference. Some manufacturers do, others don't. Amaloco once recommended it for short developing times. I start doing so in combination with a neutral fixer which works great for me. Fresh chemistry is always recommended.

 

[SilverInversion]

I got this fog using expired Rollei Supergrain. Someone with a lot of experience in developing and chemistry looked at the ingredients and said the developer contained chemicals that are usually found in fixer.

Still, whether you use a stop bath or not; depends on your personal experience and preference. Some manufacturers do, others don't. Amaloco once recommended it for short developing times. I start doing so in combination with a neutral fixer which works great for me. Fresh chemistry is always recommended.

Supergrain contains thiocyanate if I remember well.
Thiocyanate WAS used in fixer long long time ago since it's an halide solvent. Now it's use is confined only in first developers for b&w slides.
It causes dichroic fog under certain circumstances.

 

[Freakscene]

I got this fog using expired Rollei Supergrain. Someone with a lot of experience in developing and chemistry looked at the ingredients and said the developer contained chemicals that are usually found in fixer.

Still, whether you use a stop bath or not; depends on your personal experience and preference. Some manufacturers do, others don't. Amaloco once recommended it for short developing times. I start doing so in combination with a neutral fixer which works great for me. Fresh chemistry is always recommended.

Supergrain contains potassium thiocyanate. Super fine grain developers that contain silver solvents like this were popular up to the 1950s. They aren’t really necessary anymore, but the effect can be nice. Rollei (and Spur, who I am fairly sure makes these) don’t recommend fresh fix, even though irrespective of an acid stop bath, these developers need fresh fix. You can stop the film, wash it, and then fix it, but fresh fix is the usual recommendation.

 

[Godfrey]

I don't know what all the fuss is about. I've been processing my B&W film without stop bath for over thirty years, never saw any weird "dichroic fog" or any other problems.

I'm not a commercial processing lab with machines that do a hundred rolls a week ... I process a few rolls of film a few times a month, max, and I toss all my chemistry, mix fresh, after processing three to four rolls of film.

I use stop bath only for print development, but since I no longer print in a wet lab, there's no need for it.

G

 

[SilverInversion]

I don't know what all the fuss is about. I've been processing my B&W film without stop bath for over thirty years, never saw any weird "dichroic fog" or any other problems.

This doesn't mean that it can't happen, being the video posted a proof that dichroic fog exists and happens even in a home developing setting...

 

[Godfrey]

This doesn't mean that it can't happen, being the video posted a proof that dichroic fog exists and happens even in a home developing setting...

My house could collapse in a minor earthquake too, although it's stood here happily through the past 62 years of minor earthquakes. That doesn't mean I should spend my life worrying about it...

I've never seen "dichroic fog" in my negatives, not once in 30 some years and several thousand rolls of film. I'm not going to worry about it either.

G

 

[wlewisiii]

My house could collapse in a minor earthquake too, although it's stood here happily through the past 62 years of minor earthquakes. That doesn't mean I should spend my life worrying about it...

I've never seen "dichroic fog" in my negatives, not once in 30 some years and several thousand rolls of film. I'm not going to worry about it either.

G

Exactly. Made myself lots and lots of mistakes over the years, yet somehow I've never managed that one. I don't think I'm I going to worry about it.

Ever.

 

[Bingley]

The “Stop bath.. How important” thread will probably never die. I have at least one entry in there, but quit following it long ago.

FWIW, I’ve used a water stop for film successfully for many decades, but I have adopted some of Ron’s suggestions for using water from that thread, i.e. constant agitation, and multiple rinses. I don’t use an alkaline fix. I probably would switch to acid, if I ever went back to TF-5.

FWIW, the late Roger Hicks, a longtime member here, in his primer on photography, opined that a stop bath was not strictly necessary and that water would do. I used to do three water rinses to stop development, but now use a stop bath (Ilfostop). I made the switch after taking a workshop with one of Ansel Adams' last lab assistants, figuring if a stop bath was good enough for Ansel it was good enough for me. I wonder whether the use of a stop bath is more important when dealing with short development times, insofar as it enables one to stop development more quickly. What do others think?

 

[DownUnder]

I nowadays process very few films, but when I do I use a highly diluted stop bath. Only because I have a still half full litter bottle of Kodak Indicator SB, which I've kept since the 1990s. It's the second bottle of the stuff I've owned in my lifetime, and I set up my first darkroom in 1962. KISB goes a long, long way.

All the older photographers (now sadly no longer with us) I've known said stop bath was an unnecessary luxury. They used only water rinse or a few rinses to wash the developer off their films. One or two admitted to putting a scant teaspoon of household vinegar in the first rinse water, but none of the latter knew if it did anything or not. Probably only from habit.

Anecdotal, photo urban myths, whatever. But if it works...

 

[Freakscene]

FWIW, the late Roger Hicks, a longtime member here, in his primer on photography, opined that a stop bath was not strictly necessary and that water would do. I used to do three water rinses to stop development, but now use a stop bath (Ilfostop). I made the switch after taking a workshop with one of Ansel Adams' last lab assistants, figuring if a stop bath was good enough for Ansel it was good enough for me. I wonder whether the use of a stop bath is more important when dealing with short development times, insofar as it enables one to stop development more quickly. What do others think?

It is more important for short developing times and for concentrated developers. There is more carry-over to the fixer and more development happens after the development time has reached for those conditions.

Photography is ultimately a visual medium. If you are developing for yourself, do it how you like, and if the results work/are good enough for you, you are doing it right.

 

[jay1155234]

I pefer look of my negs without stop bath.. water rinse.

 

[Freakscene]

I pefer look of my negs without stop bath.. water rinse.

Unless you use very dilute developer it definitely alters the tonality. If you prefer it, great.

 

[Bingley]

It is more important for short developing times and for concentrated developers. There is more carry-over to the fixer and more development happens after the development time has reached for those conditions.

Photography is ultimately a visual medium. If you are developing for yourself, do it how you like, and if the results work/are good enough for you, you are doing it right.

Thanks, Marty. This is what I thought.

 

[Freakscene]

Thanks, Marty. This is what I thought.

The only qualifier I would add is to encourage film photographers to fix and wash properly. If you go to the effort of making negatives, you owe them at least the chance of lasting.

 

[wlewisiii]

Eh, they only need to last long enough to scan... 😱

(grinning ducking & running... 🤣 )

 

[Freakscene]

Eh, they only need to last long enough to scan... 😱
(grinning ducking & running... 🤣 )

Then get a digital camera.

 

[brusby]

Has anyone done or seen any controlled testing of plain water vs. stop bath?

I would expect some slight differences based solely upon the different lengths of time the negative is in contact with active developer, 'cause it's always gonna be longer when using just water -- even though the developer is significantly weakened -- as opposed to an almost instantaneous termination when using stop bath.

 

[Freakscene]

Has anyone done or seen any controlled testing of plain water vs. stop bath?

I would expect some slight differences based solely upon the different lengths of time the negative is in contact with active developer, 'cause it's always gonna be longer when using just water -- even though the developer is significantly weakened -- as opposed to an almost instantaneous termination when using stop bath.

Yes, I did a lot about 30 years ago. I was living on an island and had to transport all my used solutions off, but rinse water could be disposed of locally. So the less the better. The main differences are that if you use water the negatives are slightly more dense for the same development time, and if you use concentrated developer there is a slightly different highlight-shadow tonal relationship, because the water, particularly if it is slightly alkaline, you get a water bath effect where highlights stop developing slightly sooner than the shadows. It’s pretty mild, but I did see some extra sharpness and an additional crispness of tones in films where a stop bath was used. It makes a lot more difference with 35mm film than larger formats.

 

[Godfrey]

Eh, they only need to last long enough to scan... 😱

(grinning ducking & running... 🤣 )

Then get a digital camera.

Not very helpful. The reason to make photographs using film as the recording mechanism is to obtain the look, feel, and defects of photosensitive film + processing, which cannot be wholly replicated by image processing of digital captures. It can, however, be captured and visible in digitized (scanned) film images.

This is why I've put a lot of time and money into restoring some favorite film cameras, and refining my digital capture technique, over the past 30 years. I feel confident now that I can pick up any of my cameras, film or digital, make my exposures, and achieve the look and feel that I expected in my printed and web-display photographs.

I've been scanning film for over thirty years now. I re-scanned all the film that I exposed in the first half of that time with my current techniques and found some excellent improvements in representing the film image with high fidelity, but anything scanned since about 2010 shows little to no improvements ... That tells me my scanning technique is as good as I'm ever going to need.

G