What Am I doing Wrong?

[jsolanzo]

Hello all,

I recently just developed my first B&W film w/ TMAX 400. I used Ilfosol 3 1+14 dilution for it. I agitated gently every minute and the development time was 10 minutes as followed. I used tap water as a stop bath. Then Rapid Fixer 1+4 for 4 minutes agitation every minute. Can anyone tell me what could have happened wrong? The picture wasn't so sharp either 🙁
My scanner is Minolta Dimage SD 2

It's going to be my only TMAX 400 roll as I'm gonna be using Acros 100 from now on.

Here is the picture.

 

[Chris101]

Perhaps it was not exposed correctly?

 

[Brian Legge]

The cow(?) looks totally black. I'd expect a little default there unless the photo was underexposed to the point where there was no detail there. Similar deal with your shadow. There are no gradients - its either black or noise.

How long did you develop for? Another possibility is over developing - pushing - which would result in losing shadow detail as your highlights get blown out.

I think sharpness looks okay here - its just lost in the grain.

 

[jsolanzo]

Thanks for the comments. After analyzing the photo, it does look underexposed. Was relying to a crappy meter(beecam for android) at that time and I realized the light sensor for the android is pretty bad. Upgraded to the $2 tiny light meter. It's pretty accurate.

I developed about 10:15
Stop bath w/ tap 1 minute ish
Rapid Fixer 4 minutes.

 

[250swb]

Other than you don't say what you think the problem is, so putting my mind reading hat on I would imagine the main part of the problem is in the scanning process.

Look at the top left sky, just starting to posterize, the image is over processed which would make me think you aren't paying attention to getting tonal information properly inside the histogram with the blacks in the right place on the left and the highlights set at the other end of the graph. The middle tones should be used to give some contrast in the image, but don't scrunch them up, better a flat scan that you can manipulate in Photoshop than a contrasty one that is unworkable. In terms of post processing the image lacks some punch but you should do all that in Photoshop, add some mid tone contrast that will sharpen the grain up as well, and don't sharpen or try dust removal (especially with B&W) with the scanner software, use Photoshop, it is more sophisticated and easier to control.

Steve

 

[jsolanzo]

I used light room to fix it up a little. I turned off all of the unnecessary settings on Vuescan.

 

[raydm6]

I actually kinda' like it!

 

[starless]

It looks like it has been over-developed and/or the scan didn't come out well.

 

[sojournerphoto]

Bit hard to tell, but I'm with 250SWB and think the scan is a problem. TMY2 should look that grainy at that size. Could be underexposed as well

 

[jsolanzo]

I was reading other sites about developing. The chart I followed was somewhat wrong. Instead of 20C, it said 27C. So in conclusion, over development.

 

[canetsbe]

If your scanner is anything like my Minolta Dimage scan dual IV, it's pretty horrible for black and white scanning. I pretty much just gave up on it after trying to extract any meaningful tonality from the negatives whatsoever.

 

[Ezzie]

Look at the rebate. What do the Kodak markings look like? Are they black yet sharp and crisp, or are the very black and fat? If the latter its certainly overdeveloped unless you pushed the film.

You don't say how proficient you are at scanning. Forgive me if I'm telling you how to suck eggs. Scanning accentuates grain. Overdevelopment will often result in more grain in the lighter parts of the image, and the scanner can often make it even worse.

To be honest I would say this is not really that bad. It takes a bit of practice to get good scans. I never use standard settings, I scan each and every frame separately and with settings adapted for each. Never let the scanner SW perform sharpening for instance, nor accept the contrast levels it recommends, do these things in post processing where you have much more control.