Diafine tri x @ 100 and 1250

J

jasperamsterdam

Established
Local time
9:05 AM
Joined
Apr 23, 2008
Messages
74
Hi all,
just got back in film with the arrival of a used m6 and 40 summi-c. I'm looking into what film to use and i have my eye on the following.
Please note that i want to do develop myself, and scan the negs to photoshop, and i'm new to developing (not film) and i ordered my first batch of Diafine.

Option 1. Bring only Tri-x rated at 1250. Buy a 39mm nd filter to switch during sunny times.
There is a lot of praise for this combination online, giving results like or better than tri x rated at 400 in a regular developer.
http://figitalrevolution.com/2008/03/20/processing-black-and-white-film-for-scanning-diafine-and-tx/

Option 2. Bring only tri-x and rate it at 100 for sunny days, and rated at 1250 when the light is leaving. Develop the 100 as cooksey talbott does;
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AFBa9UDA3wk&feature=related

Or trix rated at 1250 for dusk and dawn. Plus fuji acros rated 200 for daytime.

Any thoughts?
 
JeffGreene said:
Bill:

I agree! 10 minutes in solution A??? That's the first I've heard. Clearly, he's operating according to a different physics! :D
Click to expand...

Diafine, as you know, works by first absorbing into the gelatin of the film emulsion like a sponge, until the film can hold no more. This is supposedly done by 3 minutes. Longer times in Solution A would do no harm (as long as the gelatin did not begin to break down or soften) but it would do no good, either. A sponge simply cannot hold more than it can hold.

Solution B works by combining with the Solution A that it finds in the emulsion of the film. It stops when there is no more Solution A, which is what is meant when one says that Diafine 'develops to exhaustion'. Once again - a longer time in Solution B should not make any difference at all - if it has acted on all the Solution A within the film emulsion, that's it - it's done.

I have heard people propose removing film from Solution B before the 3 minutes developing time is up - in order to stop it from completely developing - and perhaps keep the film from the normal 'push' in exposure index that it would otherwise get (Tri-X being somewhere between EI 1000 and 1250 in Diafine normally). I don't recommend this, since 3 minutes is a very short time indeed, and stopping short of that would be tricky to do the same way twice.

I have also heard reports from people who have claimed to have gone away and forgotten their film (easy to do with Diafine, since it is such a 'no worries' pan-thermic and time-insensitive developer) and left it in Solution B overnight - with no ill effects. Not that I'd recommend that.

And, I have heard of people taking their film back through Solution A and then B a second time before fixing, to gain even more speed. I do not think that's very wise, either, as the film emulsion would have to be quite 'dry' to reabsorb Solution A a second time. Like a sponge, you can wring it out, but it still has moisture in it. Only time will dry it out completely. So that seems incorrect to me, but I believe people who say they have done it.

This fellow though, I don't know. He speaks with seeming authority, but his words make me think either he knows something profound that I do not, or he's a gibbering idiot. He definitely has a very odd vibe to him. I vote weirdo, but that's just my opinion based on seeing a couple of his very strange videos.
 
Hello- new here on Rangefinder. The post I made on Figital Revolution (many posts on Diafine Developer) all are for scanning purposes and are IMHO very accurate....I am refereing to the first link on the this page and NOT the second.... This link:
http://figitalrevolution.com/2008/03...iafine-and-tx/

When you "over" process in diafine it DOES change the negative by increasing the toe and compressing the highlights even more. I did a test (many tests) of TX at 1250 for 6+6 and 2 minutes additional standing water development and while the grain was fine and the shadow detail was amazing the highlights were just so compressed that no seperation was possible even on our Imacon. I feel that Diafine has a lot of flexibility with regards to EXACT procssing time but too much is too much.

On the Acros I'd rate it at 160 and not 200 and run it for 4.5+4.5 or 5+5.

Also, do not use a pre wet with diafine I...I posted a note to this on later FR articles.
My favorite films in Diafine for Scanning are...
TX 3+3
125PX 3+3
Acros 5+5

All at 70-75F

Cheers-
Stephen Schaub
 
stephenschaub said:
Hello- new here on Rangefinder. The post I made on Figital Revolution (many posts on Diafine Developer) all are for scanning purposes and are IMHO very accurate....I am refereing to the first link on the this page and NOT the second.... This link:
http://figitalrevolution.com/2008/03...iafine-and-tx/

When you "over" process in diafine it DOES change the negative by increasing the toe and compressing the highlights even more. I did a test (many tests) of TX at 1250 for 6+6 and 2 minutes additional standing water development and while the grain was fine and the shadow detail was amazing the highlights were just so compressed that no seperation was possible even on our Imacon. I feel that Diafine has a lot of flexibility with regards to EXACT procssing time but too much is too much.

On the Acros I'd rate it at 160 and not 200 and run it for 4.5+4.5 or 5+5.

Also, do not use a pre wet with diafine I...I posted a note to this on later FR articles.
My favorite films in Diafine for Scanning are...
TX 3+3
125PX 3+3
Acros 5+5

All at 70-75F

Cheers-
Stephen Schaub
Click to expand...

You cannot overprocess Diafine. It develops to exhaustion. Extra time will not change this. I agree that you should not presoak Diafine. It depends upon being able to absorb Solution A into the gelatin and it will not do that if it has already absorbed water.

I'm sorry, Stephen. Welcome to RFF and thanks for posting, I'm not trying to run you off or be mean, but this is incorrect information to the best of my knowledge. Diafine just doesn't work in the manner you describe.

FYI, I went to your website, and noted that you also seem to think that Diafine is temperature-sensitive. It is panthermic.

All of these things would be true (time, temperature) in a normal one-part developer. Not in Diafine.
 
Hello- overprocessing diafine does not have the issues associated with say Xtol or D76 overprocessed but it can be overprocessed in terms of best results for scanning.

Run TX at 3+3 at 70F and then run it at 6+6 at 80F ....it is a very different looking negative and it prints/ scans differently. I agree that diafine is panthermic but the gelatin in your film is sensitive to different temps with regards to how fast it (diafine) will absorb into the gelatin....it reacts diferent at 68 than at 80. Most films will be completely saturated at 5 min max but this is not necessary and in some cases bad...the exception is Acros which IMHO needs the full 5 min in a+b.

I have been testing this developer for the distrubitor BKA and have found the sugestions on the box to be a fine starting point but a slight tweak can help extract a bit more out of the negatives with cleaner highlights and better shadow seperation. I have run over 100 tests using different variables and the post on FR are the result....but in the end they are my tests and my results and I always encourage others to do their own tests for their specific needs. Great conversation.

Cheers-
Stephen Schaub
 
One more note: the reason I do not do a prewet with Diafine is not because the water will prevent A from being absorbed into the gelatin as it would not but rather overtime you will dillute your A solution and also risk contamination unless you are using distilled throughout (variability is always a killer). I ran over 20 rolls with a prewet with no problems...I just added around 30 seconds to the time and presto perfect. In a conversation I had with Sandy King for a future article we decided to get rid of the pre wet because of the reason I mentioned above.

Cheers-
Stephen Schaub
 
Forgive me, but none of what you are saying makes any sense whatsoever. The product simply does not work the way you say it does. I am also in contact with the fine folks at BKA from time to time, and we've never discussed using Diafine in the ways you mention; primarly, I suppose, because it makes no sense at all.

Diafine has a purpose and a place in the world of developers - like all divided developers, it is a compensating developer. It was designed to work as I have described - part A soaks into the film, and part B accelerates the part A developer, causing development action to proceed at a rapid pace until there is no more part A left to combine with and no more exposed silver halide to react with. It develops to exhaustion. A stop bath is neither needed nor desirable, as the processing action has stopped - there is nothing left to 'stop' at that point.

Many people have posed questions about altering the action of Diafine, by changing temp or developing time, etc to achieve less of a 'native push' than a given film might otherwise receive in Diafine. It can be done, with great effort and little satisfaction, but there is no point to it - it is very difficult to control and works against the very nature of the product.

Diafine is not made for tweaking. That is its strength and its weakness. Any divided developer would be similar. Single-solution developers can be, and are, tweaked and experimented upon to give all sorts of useful results. Diafine is not made of secret sauce - it is simply a divided developer made of the same stuff as many single-solutions developers - just held apart until processing time.

So there is no point to tweaking it, it would be difficult indeed to control such tweaking, and in the end, the question would be WHY? It serves no purpose. If you need the speed and other effects that Diafine and similar developers provide (such as lowering contrast) then use it. If not, another developer would be far more appropriate.

So I have to say - first, I disagree with all of your statements, and second - even if they were true, they serve no purpose.
 
Last edited:
I'm very new at this home developing lark and I chose Diafine for it's ease of use. I've only processed three films so far, each one different. A roll of Acros @ 160, one HP5 @400 and the last one a roll of Tri-X @ 640. The Tri-X was shot on a very sunny day with pretty much all shots being at f16 but the results were good.
Take a look at my shots here

http://www.flickr.com/photos/kuvvy/tags/trix640/
 
Hello - new to this site. The method that Cooksey Talbott uses seems weird, but remember he was using part A as an alternative to using D-23, which is a very weak developer having no accelerant except for the preservative. Everyone is assuming that part A is totally inactive, but is it? Or is it like D-23. I would be curious to know if you can get an image using just part A for a long time.
 
bmattock said:
And, I have heard of people taking their film back through Solution A and then B a second time before fixing, to gain even more speed. I do not think that's very wise, either, as the film emulsion would have to be quite 'dry' to reabsorb Solution A a second time. Like a sponge, you can wring it out, but it still has moisture in it. Only time will dry it out completely. So that seems incorrect to me, but I believe people who say they have done it.
Click to expand...
Bill, i agree with the rest but not with this.
After sol B bath, the film is soaked with sol B, not water.
And even if it is soaked with water. When u put it into sol A, the chemistry slowly, but exchanges with the water in the film.

A sponge soaked with water and dropped in ink will get ink coloured.
 
jasper: if u want to use diafine exclusively, i still would advise you to get a slower film as well. Maybe neopan ss or fp4+ or something similar cheaper and good; you get it up to iso 200 in diafine. Tri-x in diafine at 1250-1600 looks fine, but it is grainy.
The advantage is, you can even develop the films together, almost any film.
 
kuvvy said:
I'm very new at this home developing lark and I chose Diafine for it's ease of use. I've only processed three films so far, each one different. A roll of Acros @ 160, one HP5 @400 and the last one a roll of Tri-X @ 640. The Tri-X was shot on a very sunny day with pretty much all shots being at f16 but the results were good.
Take a look at my shots here

http://www.flickr.com/photos/kuvvy/tags/trix640/
Click to expand...

Yes, they would be different. They are different films. Diafine does not treat all films exactly the same way, but it develops each to exhaustion.

With Kodak Tri-X, Diafine typically produces an effective speed (EI) of 1000 to 1250 (listed as 1600 on the box, but I have always disagreed with that). The difference between Tri-X rated at EI 640 and 1250 is one stop. Quite acceptable, and I'd expect you to get good results.

I do not know what effective speeds one would get with Acros or HP5, but I presume the box said something about it, didn't it? I no longer have mine, as I only process Tri-X in Diafine.

Understand this. When you place an exposed film in a tank with developer, typically it begins to process silver halide that has been exposed to light. How fast it does this depends upon temperature, dilution, and other variables. If you take the film out 'early' or 'late' according to processing times listed for that particular film and dilution and temperature, you are said to be 'pulling' or 'pushing' the film. This is quite acceptable, and is a well-known, well-understood, and often-used means of controlling your final product, the negative.

Diafine, and indeed all two-part developers, were made differently. They consist of the same basic components; one or more developing agents, a restrainer, an accelerant, and a buffer. The first solution contains at the very least a developing agent. This is designed to soak into the film's emulsion like a sponge. And like a sponge, once it is saturated, it is saturated. More or less time (or temperature) is not going to make it soak up more developer. Does this make sense so far?

Now, when you pour the first solution back into your jug, the developer that has absorbed into the film's emulsion remains there. Does it begin to process the film? Yes, a little. But the developing action is quite slow - it needs an accelerant to really get cracking. And that is what is in the second solution.

When the second solution hits the film, it finds the first developer lurking in the film's emulsion, combines with it, and begins chomping down light-exposed silver halide like a hungry fat boy at a free hot dog stand. However, it needs two things for this to continue to happen. One, it needs solution A developer to be present, and second, it needs light-exposed silver halide to operate upon.

Now, if you leave typical one-part developer in your tank for a very long time, it will eventually convert all the silver halide to metallic silver and you will end up with a nice blank film strip, having poured all the silver down the drain with your fixer. And Diafine would do that too - if it had an unlimited supply of solution A. But it doesn't - it only has what is absorbed into the film's emulsion. When that is gone, it stops developing action.

We call that 'developing to exhaustion.' It's a good thing, because you cannot overdevelop your film. It's a bad thing because overdevelopment is another word for 'pushing' film. You can't 'push' film in two-part developers like Diafine. It is a good thing because when you shoot 'available light', you typically are taking photos of high-contrast scenes - and Diafine has the effect of lowering contrast. In a high-contrast scene, that can be good.

Diafine is a good developer, and being panthermic and time-insensitive, it is an 'easy to use' developer as you said.

However, it is not an 'all-purpose' developer. It seems to 'like' some film quite a bit more than others. It gives a different effective speed to different films, and unless you have some idea of what speed your film should be exposed at for Diafine, you might be at risk of crappy exposures. It almost always gives a film speed increase, so shooting in very bright light might be bothersome - unless you fancy using very fast shutter speeds, stopping down like a mad thing, or using neutral density filtration on your lens. It also does not - I repeat, does not - allow for pushing or pulling film speeds. It is what it is.

The term is TANSTAAFL - There Aint No Such Thing As A Free Lunch. Diafine is very good at what it is good at - available light, lowering contrast, easy to use, time and temperature insensitive. But it is not the be-all developer, and it cannot be effectively tweaked to make it behave differently that I am aware of.

Youtube videos to the contrary.
 
Pherdinand said:
Bill, i agree with the rest but not with this.
After sol B bath, the film is soaked with sol B, not water.
And even if it is soaked with water. When u put it into sol A, the chemistry slowly, but exchanges with the water in the film.

A sponge soaked with water and dropped in ink will get ink coloured.
Click to expand...

The defining factors in moving chemistry out and in of film emulsion are probably more than I can grasp - I'm not a chemical engineer, and my analogy is simple because that's the limit of my understanding.

However, it is my understanding that it takes more time for a solution to exchange places with another solution in the film emulsion than it would take for a solution to soak into a dry emulsion. Would you not agree?

So a presoak with water before using Diafine would cause the first solution to be absorbed much more slowly, I would think, than if the film were dry.

Once the first solution is poured out and the second poured in, it does not soak into the emulsion so much as combine with the first solution as it finds it - from the outside going in, so to speak, acting with superaddivity on exposed silver halide and 'eating its way in', again, so to speak.

Once the processing has completed itself, then yes, I would expect that the emulsion would be full of the second solution - or some combination of expended a and b.

Diafine recommends against a presoak right on the box, as I recall, as well as recommending against a stop bath. I would presume the first is for the reasons I imagined above, and the second is because it just isn't necessary - processing is done, kaput, finished, genu.

Those are my thoughts on it, anyway.
 
ebauman said:
Hello - new to this site. The method that Cooksey Talbott uses seems weird, but remember he was using part A as an alternative to using D-23, which is a very weak developer having no accelerant except for the preservative. Everyone is assuming that part A is totally inactive, but is it? Or is it like D-23. I would be curious to know if you can get an image using just part A for a long time.
Click to expand...

A is not inactive, but it is very very slow. B contains the accelerant. I would imagine that with enough time, you could get an image using A only. How much time would be interesting to find out, but I'd guess on the order of days if not weeks.

D-23 is made with metol, which is quite capable of developing film on its own.

Diafine's formula is not published - as far as I know, but part A may be phenidone, which is much less active when not in contact with metol or other accelerants.

That's a guess on my part.
 
I do agree, Bill. On one hand, with this:"it takes more time for a solution to exchange places with another solution in the film emulsion than it would take for a solution to soak into a dry emulsion" and on the other hand, that once it is developed, it is developed.

The question was however, what happens if you put the film, soaked with sol.B, back into sol.A. Chemically it should be more or less the same - you get A and B mixed in the emulsion. The difference is, that the film was already developed once. Would the highlights get overdeveloped? i don't know, but the major "difficult to blow highlights" advantage of Diafine is based on the exhaustion of the sol A in the emulsion during the second step, so if you put it back into sol A - what happens?

Of course this is BAD for the developer itself. You mess up the sol A if you put the filn back into it after you soaked it in sol B, so you can practically throw out the sol A after this little experiment...
 
Pherdinand said:
I do agree, Bill. On one hand, with this:"it takes more time for a solution to exchange places with another solution in the film emulsion than it would take for a solution to soak into a dry emulsion" and on the other hand, that once it is developed, it is developed.

The question was however, what happens if you put the film, soaked with sol.B, back into sol.A. Chemically it should be more or less the same - you get A and B mixed in the emulsion. The difference is, that the film was already developed once. Would the highlights get overdeveloped? i don't know, but the major "difficult to blow highlights" advantage of Diafine is based on the exhaustion of the sol A in the emulsion during the second step, so if you put it back into sol A - what happens?

Of course this is BAD for the developer itself. You mess up the sol A if you put the filn back into it after you soaked it in sol B, so you can practically throw out the sol A after this little experiment...
Click to expand...

Yes, I do not know what would happen, but I doubt it would be pretty. I just mentioned because someone here not long ago said they routinely did this to get even more effective speed out of their film, thus making Diafine into a makeshift 'push' processing developer. Frankly, I would not try it. But that's me.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom