C-41 at Home: Residue on Negatives

[Baipin]

Hello everyone,

I recently bought the Argentix C-41 kit (a relabeled Unicolor kit) and gave it a spin this morning. I followed the mixing instructions precisely and I used distilled water for mixing. The negatives turned out fabulously, from a development perspective. Despite this, the stabilizer (aqueous hexamine) is leaving marks on my film after it dries. I suspect this is since the stabilizer does not contain an additional wetting agent/Photo Flo like that of minilab C-41; it's just hexamine dissolved in water.

This is where the dilemma starts. Experimenting with some garbage/test negatives from the batch, I found that Photo Flo does indeed get rid of these marks when used as a final step. But of course, that means I lose the stabilizer's anti-bacterial and archival properties. Now, I don't have a squeegee, but I'd be open to buying one and giving it a try if it has worked for others.

Presently, I'm stuck with the following workflow: washing, developing, blixing, washing, stabilizing, drying, Photo-Flo'ing, scanning/printing, restabilizing. This is not ideal, and I've noticed that the negatives do curl considerably due to the last few steps, but it's the only thing I can think of that will get rid of these annoying marks on my film. Thoughts?

 

[David Murphy]

I dabble in C41 and don't claim to be an expert. One thing to be certain of is that the film never touch other film surface when developing (the only exception might sometimes be home processed cine film, but that's a another story). Be sure your film is spooled onto your reels cleanly with air gaps (I used Paterson or Job plastic reels, but that's my preference).

Also I use distilled (not mineral water) when mixing chemicals.

I've never heard of photoflowing with C41 or any color film, but perhaps I'm too much of a novice (I always do it for B&W). I follow my C41 kit instructions to the letter: developer, blix, then stabilizer and don't try to second guess chemists much better than me! Sometimes I still get some defects, and that's where Gimp and other image tools can clean up the scanned negatives.

The main thing I do now that I did not do in the past is use a Jobo processor for temperature control, which really nails the development stage - and the agitation ability is great too. Temperature control has more to do with avoiding color cast issues rather than residue.

 

[JeffL]

I can only tell you what I do with the Jobo press kit. (Similar or the same as the unicolour)
I put a touch of photoflo in with the stabilizer and use a yankee photo sponge to clear excess stabilizer off negs.

 

[mwoenv]

I've used the Unicolor kits for the last 6 years (and used Rollei Digibase with separate bleach and fix once). I found the remedy for water drying marks is to add 1/2 teaspoon of PhotoFlo concentrate to 1 liter of stabilizer, and repeat after every 8 rolls developed (I typically develop 14-16 rolls of 135-36 or 120 per 1-liter Unicolor kit within a few days or one week). No more water drying marks. Great results.

 

[zauhar]

I always use photoflo after the 'stabilizer' for the very reason you indicate. It leaves a gummy residue (not just drying marks) that I had to remove with negative cleaner to be able to do anything with the negatives.

I have not tried mwoeny's idea of putting photoflo in the stabilizer, that sounds promising.

Randy

 

[Baipin]

Thank you for the replies everyone! I'll give that a try, mwoenv.

 

[Mablo]

I spray normally diluted wetting agent on the negatives while they are drying but still wet. I learned this trick from someone with many years of professional experience. Haven't seen any gooey smutch ever since.

 

[joeswe]

I always use photoflo after the 'stabilizer' for the very reason you indicate. It leaves a gummy residue (not just drying marks) that I had to remove with negative cleaner to be able to do anything with the negatives.

I have not tried mwoeny's idea of putting photoflo in the stabilizer, that sounds promising.

Randy

In C41, do NOT use any kind of bath/rinse after stabilizer, as it will impair dye permanence. Stabilizer has to be the last thing in contact with the film before drying.

 

[nukecoke]

In C41, do NOT use any kind of bath/rinse after stabilizer, as it will impair dye permanence. Stabilizer has to be the last thing in contact with the film before drying.

It depends. At least the Tetenal C41 kit stabilizer sometimes leave white-ish marks. I simply flush it with very slow tap water stream to get rid of them - making use of the water surface tension, no water marks are left.

 

[joeswe]

It depends. At least the Tetenal C41 kit stabilizer sometimes leave white-ish marks. I simply flush it with very slow tap water stream to get rid of them - making use of the water surface tension, no water marks are left.

As said, rinsing the film with water after the stab renders the stab part of processing useless, so you could as well just leave it out and simply use demin water with a wetting agent as final bath. This is a matter of fact and does not "depend" on anything.

OTOH, some very faint drying marks that will not show in prints or scans are normal and can be observed also on film processed by professional labs. Of course, there should not be any amount of residue that shows in the final pictures.

Quite a number of people appear to have problems with the stabilizer solutions (and sometimes also other parts of the chemistry) as sold in the C41 amateur kits from Tetenal, Rollei/Digibase etc. I read about this frequently. OTOH, I rarely if ever hear or read of problems from people who use the Kodak or Fuji chemistry, myself included (I use the Fuji Hunt X-Press kit). Also, I do not re-use stabilizer (the Fuji kit contains plenty of volume to use it one-shot).

 

[brbo]

Quite a number of people appear to have problems with the stabilizer solutions (and sometimes also other parts of the chemistry) as sold in the C41 amateur kits from Tetenal, Rollei/Digibase etc. I read about this frequently. OTOH, I rarely if ever hear or read of problems from people who use the Kodak or Fuji chemistry, myself included (I use the Fuji Hunt X-Press kit). Also, I do not re-use stabilizer (the Fuji kit contains plenty of volume to use it one-shot).

FujiHunt X-Press kit does not have enough stabilizer for one-shot (unless you are OK with processing only 1/10th of the nominal capacity of the kit).

I've had good results with FujiHunt and Digibase stabilizer. Less so with Tetenal (but it was some 10-years-old powder based kit).

I know that a lot of people will tell you that you should never put your plastic reels in the stabilizer, but I do it anyway and I'm yet to experience any ill effects (contamination or reels getting harder to load). I do wash the reels with the toothbrush immediately.

My way of getting clean film:
- never let emulsion side come in contact with anything (not even base side of the film), hence stab bath on the reel
- stab bath is at room temp.
- hang the film fully wet, no shaking or wiping the film
- distilled water

 

[Fraser]

I was having trouble with the stabiliser Rollei Digibase kit before moving back to tetenal and read somewhere on the internet the stabiliser is too strong and should be half the strength also when stabilising don't agitate much at all you really don't want any foam.