Pushing Forte 200

I made a mistake today and exposed two sheets of Forte 200 (JC

Classic 200) at 320. 1 sec at f45,1/3 instead of 4 sec pushed 10 sec

for resiprosity at f45,1/3. It was going to developed N-1. I was

also shooting HP5+ wich I rate at EI 320 for PMK, witch is how I

screwed it up. My normal EI for Forte 200 is 80 developed in pmk.

Does anyone have any suggestions on developer/time so that I might

be able to save these negs? Grain size is not important as it's 8x10

and will be contact printed on silver paper.

 

Or is going to just another one that got away?

 

Fixer test strips?

Sounds like an ideal scenario to try your hand at development by inspection. Make your best guess as to an appropriate development time, and then put the old eyeball-o-scope on it before you do anything drastic, like put it in the stop. I'm not familiar with PMK's pushing potential, but it might be worth considering a more energetic dilution. Good luck.

Hi Michael,

 

I also use Forte 200 in 8x10 developed in Pyrocat HD, I rate it at

100 and find that even pushing to EI:200 leaves the shadows

totally empty.

 

Diafine is supposed to be useful in your situation as it

purportedly increases shadow speed whilst maintaining a

degree of highlight compensation. I have no first hand

experience however.

 

Youcould also add some amidol to the pmk to increase speed

( pmk+) but the increase may not be enough.

 

Good Luck

Dear Michael,

 

The maximum true speed increase I have seen from any developer is Paterson FX-50, close enough to a full stop as to make no difference. I've not tried it with Forte so I can't give figures. Next comes Microphen and then DD-X. All these should give +2/3 stop or better in true ISO speed (no loss of shadow detail) as compared with (say) D76 -- I don't know what effect PMK has on film speed.

 

Cheers,

 

Roger

Try some Diafine. With Forte's thick emulsion, you should definitely see a speed increase. I've been itching to try J&C 200 8x10 in Diafine, so if you go this route, please let me know how it turns out.

 

Matt

Thanks everyone, I think I'm going to try a diafine type developer. Diafine, Patterson FX-50 and DD-X are not available in Toronto Canada that i know of, so I'm going to try the formula in the Darkroom Cookbook. First I'll shoot some 4x5's with the same lighting range and develope them to see how it works out. Jay I've played with different dilutions of pmk, constant aggitation and stand development for 1 hour. None of these methods got me much detail in the shadows. Pmk is great in that you can't block up the highlights no matter what you do with it, but if there's not enough exposure for zone III in the shadows, it can't pull them out. Roger, pmk has the effect of lowering the speed of film. Forte 200 at EI 80 FP4+ at EI 80 is what has worked for me. This weekend I was trying HP5 for the first time with idea of developing in pmk. 320 is the suggested EI from The Book of Pyro by Gordon Hutching. My experience has been to rate film slower than suggested in the book, but it's a good place to start. Matt it will take me a couple of weeks to get the chemicals and try it out, I'll post back the results.

 

Thanks again.

 

Michael

A little O.T., but Matthew have you used pmk with Forte and if so what difference do you see between it and Pyrocat HD. Read lots of possitive things about Pyrocat and I'm going to mix some up soon. What development times do you use? What dilution are you using, 1:1:100, 1:2:100? I've even read 1:2:500!

 

Thanks

 

Michael

Michael,

 

I gave up on PMK a couple of years ago because of its tendency

to produce flat highlights in overcast light when printing on VC

paper. This, of course was because of the yellow-green stain

acting like a low contrast filter in the highlights. PMK negs looked

great on graded paper but I find it hard to keep graded paper on

hand all the time. I also found that I was losing more speed than

I would have liked with pmk ( rating hp5 plus @ EI 160 ).

 

I have not used Fortepan 200 with PMK but I have used hp5+

with both developers. Pyrocat hd stains as well as PMK but

produces a much browner stain colour, which seems to have

little or no effect on the contrast filters so highlights are more

brilliant. You still get the same silky smooth tonal quality that the

stain provides.

 

Pyrocat-HD produces up to half a stop more shadow speed than

Pmk and is much easier to use for tray processing as it is a lot

less prone to streaking and uneven staining so you can give

reduced agitation for improved sharpness. Grain also seems

finer.

 

With Fortepan 200 in Pyrocat-HD I use the tray processing

procedure outlined in the film developing cookbook ie: presoak,

then process 4sheets at a time shuffling through the stack once

every minute rocking the tray after each shuffle. My time for ei:

100 @ 20 degrees is around 16 minutes using the 1:1:100

dilution.

 

hope this helps,

 

Matt.

Michael,

 

I believe that you're right about FX-50 not being available in Toronto, and I

know you're right about Diafine, but I saw DD-X at Downtown a few days ago,

if you're interested in it. It was a big bottle, probably a liter. I think Eight Elm

has it too.

 

Peter