Delta 400 with Rodinol

[OurManInTangier]

I usually use Ilford Delta 100 but as we're getting less and less sun here in the UK at the moment I've recently switched to Delta 400. I run it through Rodinol as you can use it so sparingly and am generally happy with the results for 100 - trouble is my 400 films are coming out just a bit too grainy for my liking.Does anyone have any tips for reducing the grain. I tend to dev at 20 degrees for 18 minutes ( at 1:50 ) as recommended on the box - I'm happy to experiment but if anyone has a good starting point I'd appreciate the headstart. I should mention that I tend to invert for the first minute and then give three inversions every minute thereafter.I also scan with a Nikon Coolscan IV which I've heard can increase the look of the grain.Thanks

 

[Freakscene]

4g/L sodium ascorbate makes Rodinal more active, finer grained and partly addresses some of the tonal issues it creates with epitaxial emulsions like Delta. Don't use ascorbic acid - it will decrease the pH enough to kill the developer. If all you can get is ascorbic acid, mix 2 parts ascorbic acid with 1 part sodium bicarbonate (bicarbonate of soda) in some water and wait until the fizzing stops to convert it to ascorbate. Adding ascorbate sometimes causes significant fog - this figures since the pH of Rodinal is high enough to allow the ascorbate to initiate development on its own (rather than acting in synergy with p-aminophenol). If you experience fogging, 1g/L borax buffers the pH enough to prevent fogging. 1g/L borax in plain Rodinal also decreases grain and fog.

Xtol is a generally better developer for epitaxial emulsions than Rodinal.

You could also try using a noise reduction program like Niose Ninja on your scans (probably easier) particularly if you're otherwise happy with your negs.

Marty

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

Freakscene, what's an epitaxial emulsion?

 

[photogdave]

I used to have the Coolscan IV and agree that it did appear to add grain. With absolutely no scientific evidence to support this, I believe it is caused by the LED bulb as opposed to fluorescent bulbs found in other scanners.
I switched to a Minolta Scan Multi II with fluorescent bulb and don't have the same problem. I used to scan my B&W negs at lower resolution on the Nikon, which seemed to reduce the overly grainly look somewhat.

 

[OurManInTangier]

Marty - Thanks for such a comprehensive answer, I now know alot more about the film and dev combination I'm using than I did before. If it comes to it I'll try the sodium ascorbate but it may be worth trying the Xtol first, I've never used it before so who knows...I could be missing out on the ultimate combination for me. I try to avoid the software side as much as possible as its better to solve a problem than disguise one, though its another possibility I was unaware of.

Photogdave - I'm very happy with my scanner apart from that one exception. The 100 Delta negs don't seem too bad, but then I'm not averse to a bit of grain, it's just the faster films to suffer a bit. I may try the lower res and see how low I have to go before I'm happy with the grain appearance, thanks for that tip. I suppose that when my Coolscan is on its last legs I'll look at spending out on a decent new scanner. In the meantime I'm in need of some new lenses and a Leica M8....all because I've seen Gabriel M.A's gallery photos with them and I want, I want!!!

 

[photogdave]

Marty - Thanks for such a comprehensive answer, I now know alot more about the film and dev combination I'm using than I did before. If it comes to it I'll try the sodium ascorbate but it may be worth trying the Xtol first, I've never used it before so who knows...I could be missing out on the ultimate combination for me. I try to avoid the software side as much as possible as its better to solve a problem than disguise one, though its another possibility I was unaware of.

Photogdave - I'm very happy with my scanner apart from that one exception. The 100 Delta negs don't seem too bad, but then I'm not averse to a bit of grain, it's just the faster films to suffer a bit. I may try the lower res and see how low I have to go before I'm happy with the grain appearance, thanks for that tip. I suppose that when my Coolscan is on its last legs I'll look at spending out on a decent new scanner. In the meantime I'm in need of some new lenses and a Leica M8....all because I've seen Gabriel M.A's gallery photos with them and I want, I want!!!

Ah, M8 lust - don't get me started!
It is capable of amazing images as Gabriel and others have proven. Ergonomically I find it a bit frustrating. The grip is too slippery and I don't like the frame line combos. The shutter cocking sound is far too loud and the image review is too slow. I think the camera has a ways to come before I could justify the cost. But if I had an extra $5000 that I absolutely had no other use for then, oh yeah, I'd buy an M8!

 

[MartinP]

Pardon me for asking the obvious question, but why not try one of the Ilford recommended developers for the film ? That would be DDX (for concentrate) or ID11 (for powder). I can certainly recommend the DDX, and you get easy mixing in a range of possible dilutions if you wanted to experiment a bit.

 

[rich815]

As much as I can appreciate your desire for convenience I have found the same as you: Delta 100 in Rodinal pretty good, Delta 400 in Rodinal AWFUL. Use D-76 or HC-110. Much better.

Attached is my son in a Delta 400 shot with a Canonet and developed in HC-110 dilution B. Still a little grainy but not excessively so (since you like Rodinal I'm assuming some grain is tolerable).

 

[rich815]

Oh, I should mention, that neg was scanned with a Nikon LS-4000.

 

[lushd]

I am big fan of both Rodinal and Delta 400, but not together. Too much grain. I like to process it in Aculux 3 - no grain really and lovely smooth tones:

 

[Freakscene]

>Freakscene, what's an epitaxial emulsion?

The silver grains in film emulsions grow during development in a variety of ways. In old technology films, they grow cuboidally and are a mixture of sizes. Modern technology films have a much more even spread of grain sizes - these are called 'monosize' emulsions. The next advances from there were in making monosize emulsions with flat grains (like Kodak's T-Grain emulsions) or in epitaxial emulsions like Ilford's Delta emulsions - epitaxial crystals grow in a flat trapezoidal shape - deeper than a 'flat' grain like in Kodak's films but flatter than cuboidal ones. I have also read that Acros is an epitaxial emulsion - I've not had this confirmed by Fuji but it wouldn't be hard to assess with appropriate microscopy.

The aim of all these technologies is to minimise the grain size in the plane of projection or scanning to decrease apparent grain size.

In practice, epitaxial emulsions provide development characteristics about halfway between cuboidal and flat-grain films. Some people find T-Max either not to their liking tonally or difficult to process. Epitaxial emulsions offer advantages in grain size but are generally less fussy to develop.

Whatever you like best, of course, is the right film for you.

Marty

 

[Freakscene]

it may be worth trying the Xtol first, I've never used it before so who knows...I could be missing out on the ultimate combination for me.

If you decide to try Xtol - take a few precautions; mix it with distilled water, store it in FULL glass bottles in the dark and use it quickly. Delta films with either Xtol 1+1 or 1+3 are great, but also use distilled water for diluting the developer. Otherwise it can oxidise or be contaminated by metal ions in tapwater.

It is easy to describe why, from a chemical perspective, Xtol is better than other developers, including the ones Ilford makes and recommends for use with its films. It comes down to moderate pH, highly active superadditive developers (which means it works at high dilutions) and ascorbate - which has acidic development by-products, creating significant compensating effect. For a long rant about why Xtol is better than other developers, look here:
http://leica-users.org/v35/msg07982.html

I'm in need of some new lenses and a Leica M8....all because I've seen Gabriel M.A's gallery photos with them and I want, I want!!!

I love my M8, but for B&W the highlight tonality available from well-processed film is not there unless you use an HDR program to blend two different exposures.

Marty

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

Freakscene, Thanks for the definition. I knew the difference between cubic grain, T-Grain, and the Ilford flat but thicker grains already but had never seen the word epitaxial. I used to love Tmax 100 in rodinal but after they moved production to a new factory it got a lot grainier than it had been before. Same with Tmax 400, which I developed in Tmax Developer. I am using Tri-X in D76 now and getting nice results. I haven't really found anything comparable to Tmax 100 though. I may try Acros again, I remember not liking its tonality in Rodinal but maybe I'd like it in D76...I remember its grain was finer than the old Tmax 100 so assuming Fuji never changed it (I haven't used Acros in 5 yrs!) it may be the ticket.

 

[OurManInTangier]

Pardon me for asking the obvious question, but why not try one of the Ilford recommended developers for the film ? That would be DDX (for concentrate) or ID11 (for powder). I can certainly recommend the DDX, and you get easy mixing in a range of possible dilutions if you wanted to experiment a bit.

I used to use DDX all the time and did quite like it, moving to Rodinol was on the advice of Mark ( MarkInLondon,) who was always good for advice on such matters. Of course he wasn't talking about developing Delta 400 in Rodinol - that's just me going back to an old favourite film.

To be honest I think I simply need to experiment more and hone my, very poor, developing skills. I got into developing and printing my photographs about ten years ago, just as I became professional...that was just around the time that everyone in my line of work went digital and I had to follow suit. I'm now ten years older but with no better processing skills!

Ah, M8 lust - don't get me started!
It is capable of amazing images as Gabriel and others have proven. Ergonomically I find it a bit frustrating. The grip is too slippery and I don't like the frame line combos. The shutter cocking sound is far too loud and the image review is too slow. I think the camera has a ways to come before I could justify the cost. But if I had an extra $5000 that I absolutely had no other use for then, oh yeah, I'd buy an M8!

I haven't even had a play with one or seen it in the 'flesh.' Whilst I'd very much like to use one for a while I'm more than happy, which is just as well, waiting for a while - in which time hopefully those Leica boffins will have ironed out any irritating glitches and I'll have put some money aside for one. More importantly I need to save up for some proper Leica glass to make the most of my M6. I dream of the day I can put down my heavy Nikon DSLR and use a little digital Leica, though I doubt that will ever happen in my line of work...maybe I should change the type of photography I do?! Now there's an idea!


Thanks for the help on this everyone. Its interesting to hear what combinations work for other people. Also, as I said I've little experience in processing my own films, its really helpful to hear all of the suggestions and have a link that I can come back to when I want to try something new...its always good to have the benefit of others wisdom.

 

[Ronald M]

The latest Delta 400 likes Xtol and DD X. Unlike the original Delta 400, it makes grainy images with D76 and ID11.

Rodinal works well with slow films. It is not great for faster emulsions of any kind.

 

[Chuck Albertson]

You might try a 1:25 dilution and thereby decrease the development time---you tend to get more prominent grain the longer you soup the film.