Neopan 1600 problems: advice

[kaiyen]

Anand,
Keep in mind that you might not have agitated too _often_ but perhaps too violently. If you just agitated too often, the contrast would be up (which it is, of course, but that's a different issue and solution). If you agitate too violently, the dev will surge through the sprocket holes.

allan

 

[P C Headland]

Paul,
What kind of lighting were you dealing with in those photos? Alternatively, what shutter/aperture did you use (roughly)?

allan

The shots were taken in the carport late in the day, with heavy cloud cover.

I can't remember exactly, but I think the exposure indications were around 1/60 @ f4, except for the bottle shot was a couple of stops slower. I was testing the lens wide open, so they would have been shot at f2.8 or f1.7.

Most of the rest of the roll was of our 4 month old, taken indoors using natural light. I shot those arounf 1/250s @f 2.8 since it was quite bright outside.

Paul

 

[Silva Lining]

Hi Anand,

Reading through the responses to your problem I am reminded of once trying to develop some 9x12 sheet film in a rollfilm tank. Parts of the the film touched the side of the tank and remained underdeveloped. With the film I used, the effect was a milky - greenish patch, with the rest of the sheet deeloping as expected. Personally I think this looks most likely here, although another possible cause might be a light leak in your changing bag or even in your developing tank.

Silva

 

[Jordan W.]

In one of your earlier posts you made a comment to the effect that you thought the temperature was 74F. You probably know this, but B&W development times are temperature-sensitive and even a 2F difference in temperature can require a 20% change in developing time, in some situations. You need to be sure you have an accurate temperature and use the correct time for it (or extrapolate).

A second comment I have is that it's easy to overexpose fast film at the beach. I don't know what camera you used, but consider that on a sunny day the "Sunny f/16" principle applies -- the correct exposure will probably be f/16 at 1/1000th for a film rated at EI 1000. Can your camera handle exposures this short?

Thirdly, your streaks look like fogging to me. Did you load or unload this film in bright light? Are you sure there are no leaks in your camera back or in your developing tank?

Finally -- to PC Headland -- those sample pictures are incredible. Are these scanned from prints or negs? I wouldn't have thought it possible to get those kinds of results with Neopan 1600 in Rodinal. I've got a 100-ft roll of Neopan 1600 on the way and will try out this combination.

 

[Jordan W.]

Something else I would recommend -- as another poster suggested -- is using your own developer and fix. Consider buying your own stash of Kodak HC-110 -- it's a liquid-concentrate that can be diluted just before use and used one-shot. It works well with pretty much everything. More info at http://www.covingtoninnovations.com/hc110/ Send me a note if you want more info.

 

[P C Headland]

Finally -- to PC Headland -- those sample pictures are incredible. Are these scanned from prints or negs? I wouldn't have thought it possible to get those kinds of results with Neopan 1600 in Rodinal. I've got a 100-ft roll of Neopan 1600 on the way and will try out this combination.

They were scanned from negatives on an Epson 3170. They were subjected to my usual process - being off a flatbed, a fair bit of USM was obviously required. No noise reduction was used. I was very impressed, especially the combination of high speed film, 35mm and Rodinal.

I've done a few different films at box speed and pushed in Rodinal, despite (or probably because of) not knowing you can't do that 😀 I stick to 1+100 or occassionaly 1+50, keep to 20C and don't agitate as much as many people seem to. I've had consistently good results, even with so called grainy films like APX400 (it must be said though that I tend to shoot 6x6 or 6x9, so grain is less of an issue anyway).

Paul

 

[Little Prince]

Glad to see so many responses here. I'm afraid I am unable to address everything properly. I haven't even checked the negatives again for milkiness. They're at home and I'm swamped with work 🙁 .

The possibility of fogging exists but I have no way of telling if that is what happened. I just don't think it did. I hope to dunk the negatives in fixer again and see what happens. Unfortunately that will have to wait a few weeks as I will be traveing. I will report again once I do that.

Jordan, short exposure time should not be a problem. The camera could handle f/16 @ 1000. Anyway I didn't pay attention to metering when I took some shots on the beach. As for HC-110, I'll eventually try it too but probably not just yet. I bought some FX-39 and alternate between that and the D76 supplied by the darkroom facility. Even so, I have a lot of developer left as I don't get enough volume of shooting done. So maybe I'll exhaust my current supply before springing for another developer.

One more thing... I have another roll of the same film sitting around that I need to develop soon (like in the next 2 days). This was shot at 1250. Can someone please suggest a development regime (in either D76 or FX-39)? I'm not sure the method I followed was a good one.

Finally, Jordan when I said I was not sure of the temperature I meant I didn't remember what it was. I did know the temperature of the developer when I actually processed the film. I was just trying to be brief. Sometimes I get so long-winded 😀.

 

[kaiyen]

If you're going to try FX-39, I highly recommend checking out Mike Scarpitti's contribution to the MDC. it's at:

http://www.digitaltruth.com/chart/scarpitti-paterson.html

It doesn't look like EI 1250 is in there (MS is a ZS fanatic, so EI 1250 doesn't "exist" for him), but it does have 800. That'll get you close. I recommend going for 1+19 dilution rather than the 1+9 on the bottle.

allan

 

[Kin Lau]

It doesn't look like EI 1250 is in there (MS is a ZS fanatic, so EI 1250 doesn't "exist" for him), but it does have 800. That'll get you close. I recommend going for 1+19 dilution rather than the 1+9 on the bottle.

allan

I get the impression that Scarpitti is an _anti_ZS fanatic. He's said that he considers the ZS to be a fraud.... unless he's had a major heart transplant in the last 2 years 🙂

 

[kaiyen]

I get the impression that Scarpitti is an _anti_ZS fanatic. He's said that he considers the ZS to be a fraud.... unless he's had a major heart transplant in the last 2 years 🙂

Kin,
good point - I used the wrong term. MS is obsessed with film speed - there is only one film speed, and there is no such thing as pushing. He browbeat people on PN about how rating the film at any speed other than what is measured by a densitometer.

allan

 

[Kin Lau]

Kin,
good point - I used the wrong term. MS is obsessed with film speed - there is only one film speed, and there is no such thing as pushing. He browbeat people on PN about how rating the film at any speed other than what is measured by a densitometer.

allan

No kidding.. then he tried to come back as Hans Eckert or something. You should have seen him rec.photo.equipment.35mm on Usenet. Lots of knowledge, but he sure knew how to rub you the wrong way. Of course that meant the ZS guys went after him mercilessly.