A few confusing matters

[ryunin]

I am about to develop my first BW film, well, tomorrow a friend is coming an going to help me do it, but before he comes I am trying to learn as much as possible from different tutorials and youtube videos. As usual, a clumsy and technically retarded person I am always has some strange questions. Here are the few things that I cannot figure out:

Opening the film casette. The salesman in photo shop refused (laughed and said "not necessary at all" ) to sell me one of those film casette openers and said it is easy to open them with bare hands. Yeah, I almost broke my wrist and opened nothing... Youtube videos show a simple move with a can opener. I used all can openers I found at home without a success, I tried all can openers my swiss army knife has to no avail. In the end I used all my force to somehow tear off the metal lid from the casette with a pointed part of a can opener. Gosh, is there a better way?

Messing up with the film with bare hands in the dark. The videos show the guys use bare hands without gloves to touch and hold the film to reel it. The reeling part seems easy, I just don't know how much I can touch the film or not.

The quality of distilled water. My friend says that I must get top quality distilled water sold only in some special shops. He says the usual distilled water you can get at gas stations is not good enough.

Kodak D76 developer - once I make the stock, the salesman told me that I have to use it by the next day or it will be useless. My friend says that as long as I keep the stock in the fridge and tightly closed, I can use it for weeks. Whom would you trust?

The temperature in my (toilet) darkroom. It is about 12 degrees Celsius only there, it is too far away from heater and I am afraid once I bring the stock there, the temperature will rapidly go down. Maybe from the desired 20 degrees to 15 degrees but maybe it won't go that quickly. Don't know.

That's about all my weird questions for now.

 

[compur]

Opening the film casette. The salesman in photo shop refused (laughed and said "not necessary at all" ) to sell me one of those film casette openers and said it is easy to open them with bare hands. Yeah, I almost broke my wrist and opened nothing... Youtube videos show a simple move with a can opener. I used all can openers I found at home without a success, I tried all can openers my swiss army knife has to no avail. In the end I used all my force to somehow tear off the metal lid from the casette with a pointed part of a can opener. Gosh, is there a better way?

Yes. The easiest way is to not re-wind the film all the way back into the
cassette in the first place. Leave a little hanging out and then feed it
onto your reel for developing.

But, if you do rewind it all the way back in an very inexpensive tool
for retrieving it called a film leader retriever. If you can't find one locally it
is available from Freestyle. They also have the proper "can openers" that
will work on film cassettes if you can't find one locally.

The quality of distilled water. My friend says that I must get top quality distilled water sold only in some special shops. He says the usual distilled water you can get at gas stations is not good enough.

Many people use ordinary tap water which should be OK unless it is
unusually polluted. I use distilled water that I buy at low cost from
local grocers. There is no need to spend lots of money on specialty
waters.

Kodak D76 developer - once I make the stock, the salesman told me that I have to use it by the next day or it will be useless. My friend says that as long as I keep the stock in the fridge and tightly closed, I can use it for weeks. Whom would you trust?

I trust Kodak. Their information is quite different than what that salesman
told you. Stock D-76 should last weeks to months depending on fullness
of the container. Always go by the manufacturer's data first. Here is
Kodak's data sheet on D-76 which includes data on this point:
http://www.kodak.com/global/en/professional/support/techPubs/j78/j78.pdf

The temperature in my (toilet) darkroom. It is about 12 degrees Celsius only there, it is too far away from heater and I am afraid once I bring the stock there, the temperature will rapidly go down. Maybe from the desired 20 degrees to 15 degrees but maybe it won't go that quickly. Don't know.

Temperature of developer is important. You will need a good thermometer.
Test with plain water first if necessary but it is important. You can adjust
developing times for slightly higher or lower temperatures but you must
be aware of what the temperature is so you can adjust properly.

Oh, and I suggest you find another salesman.

 

[ann]

find an old fashion "church key" it works the easiest on the film cansister.

unless your water has a high iron content, tap should be fine. Iron can add contrast.

and i would get another sales person, sounds as if he/she is using scare methods to increase sales.

once you mix the ratio , you can't keep that around very long, but the stock solution should be fine for awhile especially if there is little air in the container. Some folks suggest using marbles to raise the level to decrease the amount of air left in the bottle. This will all depend on how many rolls you develop on a reqular basis.

WIthout getting into a war, a one shot developer is very handly for those who don't develop film on a regular basis.

just keep your fingers on the edge of the film,

 

[Paul Ron]

Use a regualr bottle cap opener. On the short plastic spindle side, grip the lip with the opener, leaning the opener now on the short spindle, lever it right off. The cap will come off and then you just have to take the spool out and wind it onto the reel. At the end of the roll will be a piece of tape that you cut to free the film of the spool.

If you local water is lousey, stinks of sulfa or is hard, the regular bottled water is fine. No specail nothing is needed.

 

[ryunin]

Thank you guys. I will just filter my tap water with water filter. My question about the cold toilet is silly, as I will come out of the toilet back to the kitchen before filling the tank with the developer, so that is no problem. I hope I will find a way how to open the casette tonight with the tips you gave me.

My biggest worry is now something else and scary. After developing the first film at my place with my friend who basically did everything and showed me how to do it, we let the film dry and then he left. After about one or two hours I took one strip of the film from the plastic file to see what the scans will be like. My goodness!!! Even more mess than from the lab. There are little white dots everywhere all over the image and ugly straight scratches, just like I had from the lab on some images. Not all the film is like that but a couple of images are scratched in a similar way and the white stuff is everywhere. With the dirt I am not so worried, I hope next time I could try to use my dust air filter all day prior to developing, I hang the film in the bathroom and there should not be so much dust. But the scratches are what worries me most and nobody knows the answer where they come from. They are on two or three images on each film I had developed so far and from both my film cameras and both on TriX and Delta 3200 which are the two films I have tried so far. I sent my friend the scanned image with the dust and scratches and am waiting for his answer.

I can't believe that every single Kodak film casette spoils at least two images with scratches. And if they come from my cameras, would they be on all images and would they look the same? I can post the image later here.

 

[ryunin]

I'd like to close this thread now and start a new thread concerning the scratches problem. Thanks

 

[Sjixxxy]

Messing up with the film with bare hands in the dark. The videos show the guys use bare hands without gloves to touch and hold the film to reel it. The reeling part seems easy, I just don't know how much I can touch the film or not.

Be gentle, but don't fret about it too much. Fingerprints left on the film after exposure harmlessly wash away during development.

 

[ryunin]

Messing up with the film with bare hands in the dark. The videos show the guys use bare hands without gloves to touch and hold the film to reel it. The reeling part seems easy, I just don't know how much I can touch the film or not.

Be gentle, but don't fret about it too much. Fingerprints left on the film after exposure harmlessly wash away during development.

thats good news

 

[djacobox372]

You may want to consider a liquid concentrate developer like hc-110... the full strength solution will last for many months (or years) on the shelf, and you can mix up the working strength each time you use it--no need for a "stock" solution.