Advice: BW film/dev combo in the 100 & 400 range?

Hey there!

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I'd like your recommendations on a B&W film / dev combo (non C-41) both in the 100 and 400 speed category. Please be specific --

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1. Film / Speed / What you rate it at

2. Developer / Temp / Time / Agitation

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All in all I'm looking for the best you've seen - latitude, sharpness, and lack of grain are the targets here.

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So far I've heared good things about TMX and TMY in rodinal, which is the developer I already use.

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Thanks in Advance!

Idan

It all depends what you are looking for. There are no "general"

solutions to your problems: If you are looking for very fine grain,

than a tabular grain film is o.k, but these films were fine tuned for

this and have pretty mediocre acutance and tonal scale. If you are

looking for tonality and good acutance than go for a more traditional

silver rich emulsion. Also some modern emulsions are more balanced in

general quality, such as AGFA APX. Unfortunately there is absolutely

no way to combine both. I -- for my work -- think tonality and

acutance is more important than grain and therefore use emulsions that

give me a good combination of characteristics, with excellent

tonatlity as main point: Fomapan T200 and Efke 50. The best way for

you to find your film - developer is to experiment. It is the specific

"look" of a combination you like that counts. Othe people may have

rather different preferces and it is hardly possible to discuss what

is better and worse in term of the rather subjective "look".

Since sharpness is usually achieved at the expense of additional

apparent grain, it would help to have more information about your

camera (film size) and degree of enlargement required, to balance an

acceptable tradeoff. "Please be specific -- ".

Idan, the emulsion/developer combination is only half the equasion,

the other half is the paper/paper developer combination. At this

point, you're basically asking us to give you opinions about buying a

nice car - 100 people will give you 100 different answers based on

their own personal preferences.

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Ultimately the only way you are going to find YOUR personal favorite

is by methodically trying emulsion/developer combinations then

paper/dev combinations. I started with 400 ASA emulsions (in 120/220)

and found I liked both HP5+ and TX in PMK. Then I went through the

paper/dev combination with both and narrowed my choices to a cold

toned fiber paper - Forte Polycontrast V, a neutral tone fiber paper -

Bergger, and a warm toned fiber paper - Agfa MC111. I tried these 3

papers in several developers: Photograper's Formulary 130 and BW65,

and Sprint. For my industrial landscapes (rail, heavy industry, etc)

I use TX in PMK (and rarely Rodinal) and print on the Forte

Polycontrast V - just a real nice rendition. For portraits, I use

HP5+ in PMK and print on the Agfa MC111 in the PF130 (nice creamy

warm tone rendition). So I have several tools at my disposal.

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As for personal exposure index, there are several places you can get

the information on how to do this. Barry Thornton's website has a

nice description that you might look at. My personal EI's for TX is

200-250 and HP5+ 250-320 both in PMK. I haven't done a careful

analysis of any other films yet so I generally swag it 1/3 to 2/3

stop over exposure for PMK. My next choice of film will be Ilford's

PanF in PMK. I developed a roll this summer at the beach and the

tonal range was just marvelous. So I will probably choose the PanF

for my low speed emulsion and then use either the TX or HP5+ as my

fast emulsions with perhaps a little effort to try the Ilford 3200

film as a high end alternative.

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Not sure if that helps you narrow your choice. I found that the

testing was a real joy but I still have a long ways to go before I

feel I've mastered a particular film/dev/paper/dev combo. If no one

has mentioned this yet, Ansel Adams book, "The Negative" is a classic

text to help you understand this process.

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John

Charlie, Idan asked that you include the following information. Many

of us would at least like to know which developer you use.

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1. Film / Speed / What you rate it at 2. Developer / Temp / Time /

Agitation

Wow! Overwhelmed by the response.

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Well, as for my setup: I'm shooting 35mm exclusively (unless I

suddenly inherit a medium-format camera from somewhere),

and my main target is scanning, since I don't really have

anywhere to print (no darkroom or enlarger). I had access to a

very very nice konica film scanner and a flextight at work (no

more :<( ). My experience was that even with slower films like

TMX and FP4 (that's the 125, correct?) I'd still have visible grain

showing in the scan, very apparent. Grr!

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So, my target is scanning and not any form of paper - I guess you

could say I'm looking for film/dev combos that "scan well". I figure

that anything I shoot is going to need all sorts of fixing with

photoshop since I won't have the ability or the money to pay

some B&W lab for test prints and then have them dodge/burn to

my specifications. I do have an epson photo printer and will

probably purchase a good film scanner soon if I don't get access

to one somewhere.

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Does this info help anything? Honestly, guys and gals, 100

different answers is fine! I'm just an amateur and I am looking for

experienced opinion. Whatever you've experienced to be a good

combination will go into my cookbook instead of me wasting $'s I

don't have and chemically destroying films I like the pictures on

in the process.

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Thanks again....

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Idan

I think films like Kodak TMax 100 & 400, Ilford Delta 100 & 400 and

Fuji Acros scan better than older style films.You can make great thin

negatives with full information available to your scanner. The smaller

grain particles of these films result in less aliasing. "Bullet proof"

negatives and chunky grain are the bain of scanners. The slower films

listed will be finer grained and finer detailed. I suggest you pick one

and concentrate your efforts there before trying a bunch of different

films. Any of the above will scan well if developed as if they were to

be used in a condensor enlarger - (develop for lower contrast) Pick the

one thats easiest to buy where you are located. If you pick one and

tell about it here I'm sure you will get many good suggestions on how

to develop that particular film. Then you can test and adjust for your

needs.

Idan, The reason for wanting to know about your camera is that any

recommendation has to take into account the negative size. Since you

are working with 35mm, then you definitely want to choose carefully

to minimize grain and maximize sharpness. I think many people would

say that TMX and Delta 100 are good choices for your requirements.

Rodinal does not produce the finest grain possible, but has excellent

sharpness. To minimize grain with Rodinal, try 1:75 or 1:100

dilutions. You might also want to try another developer such as XTOL

1:1 or higher dilution. I personally like FP4+ with Rodinal, but that

may be too much grain for 35mm.

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The following web site has various development times:

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http://unblinkingeye.com/Articles/Times/times.html

On the other hand Rodinal may not be terribly fine grained, although

grain improves with higher dilutions, but it gives increadible

tonality and very high information content on a negative that is going

ot be scanned. I would recommend "classic Rodinal" Calbe R09

(also sold as Classic F09) which is superior to Agfa Rodinal. The

correct dilution for 35mm would be 1:100 to 1:200 (roughly equivalent

to Agfa Rodinal 1:75 to 1:100). It gives finer grain in comparison to

AGFA Rodinal, higher acutance and an excellent tonal balance.

Your second mail got us closer to a possible answer: It may have

nothing to do with film grain after all. I do quite a bit of neg and

slide scanning. I noticed the problem you describe too. I first

thought they were due to film grain but in fact it is "noise" created

by the scanner. You definitly should check this possibility. It really

looks like noticable film grain at first, but a lupe will tell you the

difference. The limiting factor most often is not a medium speed

film in 35mm, but the scanner, even if the hardware data sounds

impressive. The good news: Most imaging programs will remove noise

very effectively. Just find a button labelled "denoise" or something

similar and see what you get. My Jenscan slide scanner definitly needs

"denoising" and the results I have seen from other scanners also give

me the impression that this ought to be a standard in post processing.

This takes us to another point: Noise was not the main problem I

encountered with scanned negs. It often is missing acutance, which is

often amplified by using low acutance films such as TMAX etc. If you

are going to scan negs you should try to get as much visible acutance

as possible. For this reason I cannot recommend using super fine grain

developer formulations, but decend acutance enhancing developers, such

as R09 (as mentioned above).

Michael Feldman asked that I include developer & processing info--

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I did not do so primarily because I think much of this is moot for

the following reasons.

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1. As it turns out, Idan isn't doing anything remotely similar to

what I do--he's scanning, and I'm printing, and he isn't using MF.

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2. I don't do much in 120 these days (so I don't have a standard

process for VP), but in that format Verichrome Pan is my favorite.

(Why do you think in the days long ago, it was Kodak's standard

amateur film?--'cause it gives such good images!)

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3. There is so much variability in processing, equipment, and water

that you can't just take anyone's formula for success and copy it.

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Charlie

Just curious: Why did you rule out C41's? If you're only going to be

scanning, the chromogenics rated at about ISO 200-250 work very well,

some would say better than any traditional b&w films. Many one-hour

labs will develop them (no prints) for $3-4 per roll, relieving you of

the least interesting part of darkroom work and freeing you to spend

your time on printing. Just a thought.

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......

Well...

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I tried c-41 process negs and they always seem to come out with an

annoying "sepia" feel to them. They also fail (perhaps I fail) to

please me tonally, I never am able to get a good exposure latitude

from chromogenic films the way I'm able to with "standard" b&w films.

Yes, they're cheaper -- I agree :) If they acted like regular b&w in

terms of tonality and latitude I'd be happy to use them.

If you are not against C41 process B&W films for some other reason I

suggest you try them, especially Ilford XP2. It will scan better than

any conventional 400 speed film. XP2 can capture more scene range than

any other 35mm film that exists. It is extremely fine "grained". I

shoot it at 320 for most uses.You can adjust tones in your scanning or

image editing software. As to the "annoying sepia feel" I don't know

what that feels (?) like. If you scan in grayscale you won't see any

colors. Go shoot some XP2 and scan it and work with it. I've shot and

scanned a bazillion rolls of XP2 and I assure you it is a VERY capable

film.

try

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http://www.digitaltruth.com

Advice : find the right combo and stick with it !

For 10 years now I use Ilford HP5 film at 400 ISO. I always develop in D-76 13.5 mn at 20?C. It's a standart combo which works really good. I tried many other films and developers during these years, always got back to this one.

In the low sensibilities I use pan F at 25 ISO.

In the 100 ISO range, I can't give any advice because I never find a satisfied combo. Anyway, in order to concentrate on creativity and reach very stable results I don't like use more than 1 or 2 combos.