Strong Magenta Cast in Fuji Reala, Cause?

Hey all,

 

I'm a lab technition at a local photo lab / camera store. We seem to be

having some issues with Fuji Reala having a strong magenta cast as well as just

general bad color. Contrast is a little strong too.

 

It doesn't appear to be our scanning / printing equipment as I have had some of

my own Reala developed here and scanned at home on my Nikon Coolscan V. I

also develped and scanned a roll of Fuju Superia 400 at the same time and in

the same manner, with completely different results.

 

 

I suspect the film processor is at fault here, but I am unsure as to how to go

about solving this issue.

 

Do you think the cause is the film processor?

If so, how do I correct this?

 

 

The film processor is a Konica CL-KP46UJ-A.

 

 

Thanks!

 

Dan O'Connell

are you running control strips in the C-41 film processor?

Thanks for your response Ellis,

 

We are not running any control strips in the C-41 processor. I just started here about 3 months ago. Apparently, this was the practice a year or two ago, but was stopped for reasons unknown.

 

 

How would running control stips help this situation?

 

What should be done?

 

Thanks,

Dan O.

Also, would not running control stips result in a problem with only 1 type of film, and leave all the others perfectly fine?

 

Thanks again,

Dan O.

Oh God, you're not running control strips anymore? Please tell me what company you work for so I can avoid having anything processed there. It's not your fault. Just a symptom of Zero quality control at labs these days....no wonder the last roll of Reala I had processed at Costco looked overly Magenta.

An analogy;

Not running C-41 control strips and plotting them out is akin to attemping to bake something in an oven with no temperature control or guage.

not running controll strips may be at fault, not runing them in my oppinion is THE single stupidest thing a lab can do. Your lab is probably ruining every roll put through.

Control Strips are a tool which not only tell you if the processor is running fine, but will also help diagnose what is wrong when the strips go out of control. The film on which a C-41 control strip is made is selected to be representative of the vast majority of film types run in C-41 process.

 

Without having a control strip base-line for your process (rear-view mirror), it will be difficult to diagnose what is going wrong or has gone wrong now. But I encourage your lab to resume the practice of running controls!

 

Many things can go wrong in a processor. Temperature control, replenishment control, tank carry-over, tarring/scumming, aeration/oxidation, agitation, and so-on. Each problem has a unique fingerprint which can be diagnosed by analyzing the control strip parameters and color balance, per the manufacturer's instructions and control guide.

 

Some film products are more sensitive to processing anomolies than others. I do not know if Reala is one of them with more process sensitivity. But generally, if one product starts to show a problem, it won't be long before all other film types start to show problems.

 

Good luck!

Thanks all,

 

To my understanding, the problem at hand is that the previous Lab technician had to quit because of health issues leaving the store owner in charge of the lab. The store owner is much more of a camera guy than a lab guy.

 

We did just run a test strip through today, and compared it against the reference strip. If I'm reading these measurements right, then roughly 1/2 of the readings are out of tolerance, with the worst being 50% out of tolerance and the best being almost dead on target. IE, we're all over the map.

 

 

 

The good news is that my last job was as a quality control supervisor, so I do have some experience with this. Had I known about the test strips, I would have started doing this much sooner.

 

 

I believe tomorrow or the next day we will be changing chemistry as we discovered a lot of tarring in the developer tank while unjamming a leader (fortunately it was the leader for a test strip).

 

 

Once that is done, I will resume the practice of running test strips through the machine on a regular basis.

 

Thanks again,

Dan

Dan.... Let us know if the Reala/magenta problem was solved, please?

 

I know that Reala that gets badly overheated before/during/after shooting tends to go magenta worse than some other brands.

Dan,

 

Kudos to you for taking charge and trying to get things back on track. We need more guys like you running the remaining labs out there. Best of luck.

I regularly shoot Reala and Gold 100 in daylight in the high desert. Reviewing the 3089x2048 files on the lab's PhotoCD, in the strongest light Reala is relatively "cool". In diffused light there is often a faint lavender cast, which may or not be objectionable and is easily removed in an image editor. In the slanting rays of the early evening (the "good light") the coolness and the cast are more pronounced. Gold 100's color is more accurate (There is nothing approaching a saturated color in this desert).

 

As it is, I'm going with the flow and using Reala when the light is diffuse having decided that the faint cast is a feature not a bug, and shoot Gold under other conditions.

 

I've not seen anything, though, like a "strong magenta cast".

To Dan:

 

I've got a Konica CL-KP32UJ-A film processor that's driving me nuts. Actually, searching for help online with it led me here.

 

I called Konica before they went out of the business to get "recipes" for fresh working tank starter mixes on C-41 and got 2 different ones. As far as directions, the machine was used, we inherited it, and it came with nothing!

 

At first, we had control strips. Konica control strips are extinct now, though. What strips are you using? Even with either recipe from Konica, Kodak control strips NEVER come out at what the box says they should, and the last box of Konica strips were even worse. It doesn't help that I know NOTHING about this machine, either. I've always had Noritsu film processors with manually mixed chemicals and none of this tablet business.

 

The problem I get so much is that skin tones are too red, and neutrals from medium gray on down to black are too green. This generally results in green hair! This on all films, but very bad on any Fuji, the worst being 160C. Even with freshly mixed chemicals in the tank...

(We're printing on a Noritsu 3011, can't complain about it.)

 

If I may ask, how many rolls a day are you developing? We've got this machine set for "low guard consumption", but it doesn't help. With so little film, the chemistry just won't stay good for more than about 4 weeks at the MOST. The first to go is bleach, which in turn, blows the fixer. The usual sign of this is film that looks like a mirror; but at least that can be "repaired" by another manual fix/stabilizer bath and manual drying.

 

I don't know if the replenishment rates are off in the machine, or what the deal is, but I'm at my wits end on what to do with this thing. With all the fixer and bleach tablets left over, as it doesn't use up the whole kit uniformly, I'm sure something has to be off in the replenishment rates of the machine.

 

I would appreciate any help anyone here can give me.

 

Thank you very much.

 

Keith