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B&W with a Leica M6

Mark Pope said:
Haddock,
Thanks, but I've tried it and wasted many hours!
No joy with Vuescan here I'm afraid :-(
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Mark,

Oh dear! Maybe that is due to the vagaries of Windows 7. Vuescan has been a spectacularly successful application for us Mac users; unbelievable value for money. I used it to drive my old Minolta Scan Dual IV as well as my current Dimage Elite 5400 - no problems. Mind you, it’s not as good as wet printing!

Charlie
www.charlie-chan.co.uk
 
MickP,

The key to successful B&W film development is to choose one film and one developer and stick with that for some time. Choose your film according to what sort of photography you do. If you only shoot on nice sunny days, then buy something like ASA100 eg FP4, Neopan 400 etc. If you shoot any evening/low light/night stuff, then buy ASA400 eg Tri-X, HP5, Neopan 400 etc (you can push develop it and rate it higher at 800/1600 by adjusting the development time later).
Buy a developer that is easy to get hold of and that suits your film/style of shooting. Rodinal is easy to use, lasts forever, but gets very grainy at 400ASA or higher. XTOL comes as a powder which you just mix up with 5 L of water; but XTOL is very flexible and can cover films of all speeds inc push development with minimal grain.

Charlie
www.charlie-chan.co.uk
 
vuk said:
but what about printing the B&W work?


anyone here made contact negatives with ink-jet on overhead sheets/film?


vuk.
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I did it with some 5x4 negs I wanted to salt print as 8x10s. Worked OK for that application. It's an expensive thing to do though, good OHP paper, good printer, good ink, they all cost quite a lot of money. I wouldn't bother for ordinary b&w printing, just get an enlarger.
 
Chaps

Thanks for the replies, all good stuff.

I just cannot be bothered with developing so after reading through all this, the Ilford seems a good option.

Thanks

Mick
 
Developing, once you get used to it, is very quick and simple and certainly less effort than sending the film off and waiting for it to come back. All you need is a closet or cipboard that is light-tight, or can be if you do it at night, to load the film into a developing tank. The rest you do with light because the developing tank is light-tight.
I's suggest starting off with some Ilford FP4, a bottle of Rodinal developer which these days is called RO9, some acetic acid for the stop bath and any commercial fixer. Do some reading on the subject, everything you need to know you can read up on.
 
PaulMB said:
Developing, once you get used to it, is very quick and simple and certainly less effort than sending the film off and waiting for it to come back. All you need is a closet or cipboard that is light-tight, or can be if you do it at night, to load the film into a developing tank. The rest you do with light because the developing tank is light-tight.
I's suggest starting off with some Ilford FP4, a bottle of Rodinal developer which these days is called RO9, some acetic acid for the stop bath and any commercial fixer. Do some reading on the subject, everything you need to know you can read up on.
Click to expand...



Paul is right. B&W developing is really easy once you have run a few rolls. You just need toput an hour aside in the eening.

I'd change Paul's recipe though to HP5 or TriX and D76 or Xtol. Mixing developer from powder is no biggie and I only really like rodinal with Adox CHS films.

In the end, have a go and see how you like it.

Mike
 
topoxforddoc said:
Mark,

Oh dear! Maybe that is due to the vagaries of Windows 7. Vuescan has been a spectacularly successful application for us Mac users; unbelievable value for money. I used it to drive my old Minolta Scan Dual IV as well as my current Dimage Elite 5400 - no problems. Mind you, it’s not as good as wet printing!

Charlie
www.charlie-chan.co.uk
Click to expand...

Hi Charlie,
Yes it was a painful process and I don't give up easily! I'm not sure if it's the operating system, the USB ports on the motherboard or a combination of the two. As far as scanning is concerned, I basically have three options: 1) get a new scanner; 2) use my old Windows XP machine (which is in the garage) or 3) try vuescan on my macbook, after tidying up the hdd somewhat...I think option 3 is looking attractive!
I have to be honest and say that I don't really miss the darkroom.
 
mick.

a guy who can't learn to develop his own film is beneath a person on welfare.


vuk.
 
sojourner said:
Paul is right. B&W developing is really easy once you have run a few rolls. You just need toput an hour aside in the eening.

I'd change Paul's recipe though to HP5 or TriX and D76 or Xtol. Mixing developer from powder is no biggie and I only really like rodinal with Adox CHS films.

In the end, have a go and see how you like it.

Mike
Click to expand...

I've been using Rodinal with FP4 for many years with 4x5 film, and it works very nicely especially if you dilute it 1:50, 1:75 (my favourite) or 1:100. One has to be careful not to over-develop.
On 4x5, Rodinal does not like HP4, the negative, in my experience, produces rather murky, muddy shadows. D-76 gives a much smoother, clearer negative.
With 35 mm HP4 has pretty big grain, at least in my experience, and FP4 a much finer grain.
I would agree with you completely on the classic Tri-X + D-76 combination. Trouble is that Kodak may not be making it any more and mixing up D-76 (if its still available???) or ID-11 (same stuff by Ilford) would be an added complication for someone starting out and a bit baffled by the whole thing.
So I thought FP4 and Rodinal would be easy and simple to begin with. Anyway, If he wants to do it, he'll do it. If he finds it too difficult it means he really can't be bothered.
By the way, how did you get on with X-Tol? I've never tried it and have been frightened by Internet legends of inexplicable "X-Tol failure".
 
I've exclusively used Xtol for years, and the internet stories are very overplayed, I've never had a failure. But if you like Rodinal it may not be the best choice, it's much smoother, lower grain, ideal for push processing. I never liked the classic Rodinal + Tri-X combo, especially with 35mm. Too rough around the edges for me.
 
sideshowbob said:
I've exclusively used Xtol for years, and the internet stories are very overplayed, I've never had a failure. But if you like Rodinal it may not be the best choice, it's much smoother, lower grain, ideal for push processing. I never liked the classic Rodinal + Tri-X combo, especially with 35mm. Too rough around the edges for me.
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Yes, agree completely. 35mm and 6x6 Tri-X did not work well with Rodinal, a bit "brutal" compared to D-76 used 1:1 (for 12-13 minutes). Instead I quite liked the Rodinal with 4x5 Tri-X, probably with a bigger neg the edge "roughness" translates into "sharpness."

Must try Xtol one of these days. I'm a bit worried by anything Kodak these days, I might love it to death and then 3 months later it disappears....
 
sideshowbob said:
Vuk, digital b&w is just wrong. You know this :)
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hey, it's all for private experimentation at home.

who knows, i may be able to establish the possibility of something half decent (just like naim did with CD playing).


vuk.
 
PaulMB said:
I've been using Rodinal with FP4 for many years with 4x5 film, and it works very nicely especially if you dilute it 1:50, 1:75 (my favourite) or 1:100. One has to be careful not to over-develop.
On 4x5, Rodinal does not like HP4, the negative, in my experience, produces rather murky, muddy shadows. D-76 gives a much smoother, clearer negative.
With 35 mm HP4 has pretty big grain, at least in my experience, and FP4 a much finer grain.
I would agree with you completely on the classic Tri-X + D-76 combination. Trouble is that Kodak may not be making it any more and mixing up D-76 (if its still available???) or ID-11 (same stuff by Ilford) would be an added complication for someone starting out and a bit baffled by the whole thing.
So I thought FP4 and Rodinal would be easy and simple to begin with. Anyway, If he wants to do it, he'll do it. If he finds it too difficult it means he really can't be bothered.
By the way, how did you get on with X-Tol? I've never tried it and have been frightened by Internet legends of inexplicable "X-Tol failure".
Click to expand...

I have to admit my concern over rodinal/fp4 is in 35mm, where I prefer 1+25 to 1+50 and even then don't really feel it's particularly kind to the film. Nice punchy tonality, but the grain isn't quite right - particularly scanned, wet print is better.

Xtol is my favourite developer. I've not found it unreliable over quite long keeping and it's flexible in dilution. I mostly use 1+1, which is brilliant for HP5 in 35mm up. It is sharper than d76 I think, but with well controlled grain. It also works well with lots of films. It's harder to mix than d76 as the last bits can take a day or two to dissolve.

One story - I've been playing with Rollei 80s in 35mm and 120 and had a lot of very high contrast negs with rodinal. Apparently the combination has exaggerated s-curve. d76 at 1+3 gives lovely negs, but a bit soft. xtol at 1+2 or 3 give the sharpness back.

Mike
 
sojourner said:
I have to admit my concern over rodinal/fp4 is in 35mm, where I prefer 1+25 to 1+50 and even then don't really feel it's particularly kind to the film. Nice punchy tonality, but the grain isn't quite right - particularly scanned, wet print is better.

Xtol is my favourite developer. I've not found it unreliable over quite long keeping and it's flexible in dilution. I mostly use 1+1, which is brilliant for HP5 in 35mm up. It is sharper than d76 I think, but with well controlled grain. It also works well with lots of films. It's harder to mix than d76 as the last bits can take a day or two to dissolve.

One story - I've been playing with Rollei 80s in 35mm and 120 and had a lot of very high contrast negs with rodinal. Apparently the combination has exaggerated s-curve. d76 at 1+3 gives lovely negs, but a bit soft. xtol at 1+2 or 3 give the sharpness back.

Mike
Click to expand...

Thanks for the information. I've been meaning to try Xtol for years, but Rodinal is so convenient that I've been lazy about it. Developing 4x5 negs is so labour-intensive anyway, that I've drifted away from the extra work of mixing developer from powder. ("A day or 2 to dissolve", shit!) But now I promise I'll try it!
 
PaulMB said:
Thanks for the information. I've been meaning to try Xtol for years, but Rodinal is so convenient that I've been lazy about it. Developing 4x5 negs is so labour-intensive anyway, that I've drifted away from the extra work of mixing developer from powder. ("A day or 2 to dissolve", shit!) But now I promise I'll try it!
Click to expand...

Xtol part A can be a bit of a pain to get to dissolve, you want the water at the hot end of what they recommend, and I find good aggitation with a wooden spoon gets things moving. It takes something like 3-5 minutes to get it to dissolve. Part B goes fine though.

Water temp, I think that's what people get wrong.

I'd recommend DDX as a liquid instead of Xtol - to me the results are pretty similar, and DDX would be my recommendation for people who don't want to store 5L of mixed up chemistry. Old xtol seems to be pretty benign, the chemistry just underdevelops with no other artifacts. The same as paper developer.

Cesare
 
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