Buying Thornton's Two Bath premade?

[jmooney]

Hi All,

Does anyone manufacture Thornton's Two Bath developer for off the shelf purchase? I know it's easy to make and cheaper, etc. but for various reasons it just isn't possible for me to do this now but I'd really like to ease of use of the two bath.

Thanks for any info,

Jim

 

[charjohncarter]

I don't know of a two bath pre-made, but I have used Barry Thornton's teaspoon two bath:

The Teaspoonful Two Bath
As far as I know nobody has mentioned another technique which I have evolved and which works really well to give different tonal characteristics and very similar automatic contrast control, and to avoid having to mix anything but an approximate Bath B – two heaped teaspoons of sodium metaborate in 1 litre of water. It dissolves almost instantly and is cheap enough to use once then throw away, though it would handle 15 roll filmsif re-used. Simply use your normal standard developer (T-Max, ID11, llfotech, HC110, Econotol, Perceptol etc.) for half to two thirds of the maker’s stated time as Bath A, drain it off, and use the teaspoon-measured Bath B for 3 minutes at the same temperature as Bath A. You may have to fine tune Bath A time by experience. For all 2 baths stop and fix afterwards in the usual way after Bath B, but not between the two baths

It is from this site:

http://www.awh-imaging.co.uk/barrythornton/2bath2.htm

I personally like it, I'm not using it right now but if my newest experiment proves nothing, I will go back to it. I used Twenty Mule Teams Borax. I have my borax measurements if you are interested.

 

[Freakscene]

I don't know of a two bath pre-made, but I have used Barry Thornton's teaspoon two bath:
The Teaspoonful Two Bath
As far as I know nobody has mentioned another technique which I have evolved It is from this site:
http://www.awh-imaging.co.uk/barrythornton/2bath2.htm
I personally like it, I'm not using it right now but if my newest experiment proves nothing, I will go back to it. I used Twenty Mule Teams Borax. I have my borax measurements if you are interested.

Thornton might have thought of this independently but he wasn't the first. photographers have used this method since the 1950s. You can use straight D76 or Xtol or any other developer at ~3 minutes with a ~3 minute B bath of 2 teaspoons of borax, metaborate, or carbonate. You may get a very minor change in contrast increasing from borax<metaborate<carbonate as the pH rises (becomes more alkaline) but I could only tell the difference with a densitometer.

The longer you use the developer proportional to the B bath the more it just looks like the film has been developed in straight developer. Ansel Adams claimed that with D-23 this method gives the equivalent of an N-2 contraction. The actual effect is a more interesting if you do it well: you get a negative which has very good local contrast but a slightly compressed overall tonal scale. These negs are easier to print, especially from negs shot in contrasty light, and have beautiful tonality, and retain detail in highlights that would burn out in another developer. They print very well on silver paper, but in some ways are best for scanning where the slight loss of sharpness inherent in the process (in comparison to something like Beutler or dilute Xtol) can be fixed with software.

The big difference from standard N-1 or N-2 contractions is in the shadow values, which have greater density and tonality. If you get it right it is almost as though the highlights get an N-2 development and the shadows an N development. You need to tailor your exposure and method to the film. Thin emulsions, including flat-grain and epitaxial emulsions tend not to work well with this method.

It's a great technique but overall I prefer dilute Xtol.

Marty

 

[naruto]

Marty: Thanks for that explanation. I need to do more experiments with my Thornton Two Bath. I have had great results with 2 bath and TriX.

 

[rodt16s]

I only looked Monday to see if Silverprint still had it available, but they don't show it anymore. You might want to try here http://www.monochromephotography.com/section233148_83767.html hopefully it's an upto date www.