Murder in the Darkroom... my Pan F+ is all snowy :(

[TheForestMan]

Hi There!

Here goes the story of a newbie to darkrooms... yesterday, I decided to process one of the Pan F+ I shot last weekend, only to find out with horror that it was filled with dark dots all over the place. Therefore, in desperation and before I decide to process the other rolls of Pan F I shot, I am begging for your advice and wish anyone can identify what went wrong.

Background story and details of the processing:

I processed T-Max 400 before and never had a problem (therefore I am not 100% newbie... but still am not sure what I am doing sometime)
For this roll, I processed with the following chemicals and process:

Processing for EI 50 (no push/pull)

Prewash: tapwater for 2 min
Developper: D-76(stock) at 22c for 5:30 min
Stop Bath: Ilfostop at 22c for 1:00 min
Fixer: Ilford RapidFixer at 22c for 5:00 min
Hypo clearing agent: Kodak at 22c for 2:00 min
Rinsing: tapwater for 5:30 min
PhotoFlo: Kodak PhotoFlo 200 for 1 min with tapwater


agitation for developper: 1 min roll and inversions, 10 seconds every min afterwards

The fineprint and suspect : The tap water?
I live in Hong Kong, and the tapwater is not the best and quite hard and is now at 27c without heating.
I believe I made a newbie mistake in handling the whole operation. I did the prewash before I cooled down the chemicals to 22c and therefore, the development tank was left with the dry film inside for about 10 min on the side of the sink (I use one sink for the whole draining/cooling, etc... apartments in Hong Kong are small... not a lot of sinks ).
I suspect the water is so hard here that some chemicals in the tap water started the development of the film way before I poured the D-76 in the tank.

This is all newbie mistake but I would like to know if my assumption above is correct and if I can safely proceed without prewash for the other rolls of Pan F+

Now if I am totally wrong with the above assumption, here are some details about the pic itself:
Exposure time: 4 mins (taking into account reciprocity failure)
taken at night with some annoying stay light and no lens hood on my planar 80mm (on hasselblad 503 CXi - irrelevant here but some may ask :0)

Is it too long for the Pan F+ to handle (I doubt it and am sure it is the development that went wrong but I never know).

Here is the picture scanned: advert your eyes... it hurts... :0)

Note that it looks like snow... in Hong Kong it would a first :0)

Hope you guys an help me pinpoint the problem here.

Thanks in advance!

 

[unpopular]

I am really unsure what to make of this. The pattern is interesting, and it appears that the dots are vertically aligned.

It might be tap water, my initial thought was if the developer was old, improperly mixed or kept in a cold place, such that the hydroxide might precipitate out and force spots to develop rapidly. If the water was extremely hard, so hard that there are these tiny pieces of alkali material, scale is usually calcium or sodium carbonate, you'd get the same kind of situation. Does any of your faucets have any scale buildup?

My only advice would be to use distilled or, at least filtered, water. If that doesn't work, blame the film itself.

FYI, I usually do 10 fill-agitate-dump rinses after fix and before hypo.

 

[TheForestMan]

Thanks for your quick answer!
I will use distilled water next time.
The developer was only used for one other film (a tmax 400) and I had no problem with the first film. However, I did not mix the whole batch of d-76 powder and only used enough to make 500ml.

Would the fact that u used the developer for a Tmax affect the development of a Pan F because of contamination? I dint think so but again I am a newbie

thanks again!

 

[compur]

I did not mix the whole batch of d-76 powder and only used enough to make 500ml.

There's your problem.

Powdered developers must be mixed completely -- the whole package at once. The package contents consists of a number of different ingredients and there's no way to divide it up and keep all ingredients in proper proportion.

If you need smaller amounts of developer use liquid concentrates which can be mixed up a little at a time like HC-110 for example.

 

[unpopular]

^^ Maybe. It's possible that you have a high concentration of hydroxide that din't mix, especially if you prepared it at temperature. And with only 500ml stock, it's very plausible that it didn't dissolve properly.

I don't know much about the film you are using, but provided you aren't doing something way out of line and the film is a B/W film, then no, you could develop it in lemonaide and baking soda and you'd get similar results as if you had used TMAX.

Just make sure the lemonaid is mixed properly.

 

[TheForestMan]

I heard some people use coffee to develop... :0)

Compur: This makes total sense. Thanks for clarifying this. I will be more careful with the mixing of the D76 (or any other powders) in the future and disolve the whole batch at once. The curious thing though is that I had no problem with the first roll of Tmax 400 I processed with this batch. I guess I was lucky

Unpopular: Thanks again. I will drink lemonade and keep it away from my negatives in the future. Last night I read the part on developers in the "Darkroom Cookbook" which enlightened me on the components of the magic powder I used.


Thanks again guys!

 

[compur]

The curious thing though is that I had no problem with the first roll of Tmax 400 I processed with this batch. I guess I was lucky

Mixing part of a package of a powdered developer will sometimes develop film OK and may even give decent results sometimes but it won't give consistent results for obvious reasons -- you're essentially using a different formula every time you do it and it will never really be D76.

D76 has 4 basic ingredients plus a few more added by Kodak to address water hardness and shelf-life issues. Two of those ingredients will develop film by themselves (but at a very slow rate without the other ingredients) and the others won't develop at all. And, those two ingredients make up only a small percentage of the total contents of the package. So, it can easily cause major problems to only mix a portion of the whole package.

TMax is also a very different film than Pan F+ with a lower silver content.

 

[unpopular]

Yep. Those ingredients are Metol, Hydroquinone, Potassium Bromide and Potassium or Sodium Hydroxide. The Metol and Hydroquinone are the reducers that make the image, the bromide prevents fogging and improves contrast and the hydroxide is the alkali which accelerates the reduction, which must be basic in order to take place. Hydroquinone and Metol are both relatively basic (IIRC) and will develop alone, but not sufficiently so.

You can develop using a variety of chemicals, including coffee due to gallic acid(?) and ascorbic acid (i.e. lemonaide) provided that the pH is suitable. I started, but never completed research into tobacco-derived phenols.

I'd actually imagine that coffee or ascorbic acid might make for decent developers provided you use bromide. The problem I've seen has always been fog.

 

[Derrel]

I think it might be bubbles on the film. Did you vigorously "rap-rap-rap" the developing tank to eliminate bubbles that were clinging to the film?

Not a big fan of your time and temperature...especially paired with your 1 minute agitation intervals...22 degrees C is a tad bit too warm, and the 5 min 30 second development time with 1 minute agitation cycles is TOO BRIEF of a time, with very little agitation. Any bubbles that are allowed to form will be there for a relatively long percentage of the total time, and for at least ONE of the only four agitation cycles.

Short, warm development times are a recipe for disasters.

 

[Sw1tchFX]

Hmm, those don't really look like bubbles to me..I think it's a combination of not mixing the power correctly and deposits in the tap water. Either use distilled water (if you can get the temperature right), or get yourself a serious filter than you can attach to your tap to keep deposits out.

 

[TheForestMan]

Hello all!

Thanks for all the info. This is really useful.

Derrel: Thanks for the critique. This is what I need to learn the agitation methods. I did tap the tank before every agitation but I think it was a lost cause here.
I have heard of "tropical" developer for high temperature countries (Hong Kong in the summer is average 35 celcius 90% humidity all the time... tapwater is a pain to cool down and I am dealing with ice cubes to cool down which requires both time and painful check of the temperature), is there any of these tropical developer still on the market? I am not lazy but perhaps this would be a "cool" solution
I will look into a cooler temperature and longer development time with better agitation.

Sw1tchFX: Thanks for your comment. Would you recommend the rinsing to be with distilled water as well? Hope not since this is a lot of water :0) I will look into a good filter to minimize the risks.

By the way: Would you recommend a pre-wash for the Ilford Pan F+ (50 Iso) or BW film in general. I do it this way since this is the way I learned back in highschool 20 years ago but we had a full chemistry lab and probably filtered water (cant remember if it was filtered... getting old :0).

Thanks again!

 

[compur]

There are tropical developers that exist as formulas which you must mix yourself from scratch.

The closest developer which is available commercially is Diafine. It is a 2-part developer which can be used at any temperature from 70-85 degrees F without any change in development times. This makes it very easy to use. It is also a push-developer. It increases film speed by nearly a full stop so you can, for example, shoot 35mm Pan F+ at ISO 80. Diafine has been around a long time and has many happy users.

There is also this developer which states that it can be used with temperatures up to 90F by varying development times. I haven't used it and have heard mixed reviews about it.

There's no need to pre-soak film unless the developer directions call for it or unless you are doing it to solve a particular problem.

 

[unpopular]

If for some reason you really, really have to increase development temperature, you could - maybe - increase the pH by adding acetic acid (stop) to the developer, or if compounding your own developer decrease the amount of hydroxide, but never decrease development time. These kind of experimental techniques might work, but a small shift in pH will have HUGE effects, so make sure you have a good pH meter. It'd probobly be easier just to get the water temperature right

I'd suggest just use glass beakers and graduates and metal developer canisters, use a heavy plastic tub as a water bath. Put some chilled water in the tub, and apply hot water to reach proper temperature. Fill the canister with at temperature water from the tub, next get your developer to as close to the proper temperature as possible and place the beaker into the water bath and start stirring. In a few moments, the developer will be the right temperature. Do all your work from this water bath.

If you're a technical sort of chap, then you could fashion some kind of themostatically controlled water block using PC overclocking gear. This would work, and would work very well. You could also find a laboratory recirculating chiller on ebay, older models, if you can find them, go for about $200-400.

Bubbles would not develop, and would be black on the print, and not white. The pattern looks like bubbles, but this is why I'd susect some kind of solid deposit.

Pre-wetting/pre-rinsing removes antihalation layers found in select films, such as TMAX. This rinse process doesn't take long, and there isn't really any need to forgo it. It doesn't do any harm, and may have some other benefit.

Also, the initial wetting may get the film itself to temperature. This might be a good idea if it is very warm, or if you stored the film in the refridgerator before processing. I am not sure which, if either, would have more of an effect. Obviously though, if the temperature of the film itself is 95° it will develop the hilights very rapidly until the film is at proper temperature, though I'd think that the film will reach proper temperature very, very soon after developer is applied.

I also could see how pre-wetting could help bring the gelatin to maximum swell such that the development is carried out in a more controlled fashion. Again, I don't know how much effect this would actually have in practice.

This might be splitting hairs, but there really isn't any reason not to pre-rinse. It won't do any harm. I always found pre-rinsing helped me get into the right mindset prior to actually doing anything permanent to the film.

 

[TheForestMan]

Excellent! I love this forum. Thanks for all the details and special thanks to Compur and Unpopular for all the good technical info. This is really helpful.
I am reviewing all my chemistry to gain more control of all this

 

[orlovphoto]

well, aside from you using every possible chemical on this thing, I think you did everything right. (I personally have used only developer and fixer with a quick water rinse between them for the past 10 years and so far with excellent results)

In any case - I'm a strong believer in Kimwipes as the means of getting all the water off the film before drying - it is a lintless tissue designed for chemical labs. Fold it lengthwise a few times into a 1-2cm wide strip, fold it over the hanging film and gently run it down the film (usually use two strips because toward the bottom of the film the tissue gets soaked and is no longer doing any good). I know, I know, folks here are going to jump and shout about how you're not supposed to touch wet emulsion and all that - I swear I have never, NEVER seen a single scratch or scuff on my film and I think I'm well beyond 2000 rolls using this technique. Check out | Orlov Photo to see examples.

Cheers.