Alternative to Xtol

I need to develop some 4x5 Tri-X that was a little underexposed. It was a low contrast subject (copies of old b+w prints). I was planning to use Xtol, but i'm nervous about the failures that have occurred. I have ready access to Microphen, Acufine and Rodinal, or I could buy something else. What would be a good alternative to Xtol for this purpose?

D-76

What you need is a developer than can build up contrast and can

achieve high densities. D76 is relatively soft working. The developer

I really can recommend, because the contrast buildup is immense,

before the shadows are affected (every developer has a max density

and when this is reached only the shadows will be affectes, thus

giving you less contrast), is Calbe A49. This is traditional Agfa

Atomal FF modified with colour developer. For your purpose use it

straight. Atomal achieves finer grain than D76, higher accutance and

superior tonal values.

Use the Microphen.

I've used Microphen to rescue underexposed negs. It gives a true speed boost of 1/3 to 2/3 stop with most films for "normal" contrast.

 

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Acufine should be fairly similar but it's been ages since I used it so have no recent information and can't rely on my faulty memory.

Microphene unfortunately does not give any speed increase. My

measurements with a densitometer show that it is hardly possible to

change effective film speed with different developer formulations.

With a few exeptions the speed will stay about the same when the negs

are developed to an equal gamma. That some developers increase

effective speed is one of the big urban myths fostered by the

manufacturers of photo chemicals obviously to improve sales. In most

standard developers the effective speed of most films is about half

the speed that is printed on the box, often even less (exception is

Efke, which is very close). Especially high speed films are "off"

quite a bit. The manufacuters deliberately accept loss of shadow

detail and many photographers accept this loss as desired "look" of a

specific film. Examples for this are Ilford HP5, which -- according to

ISO specifications -- would have to be rated around ISO 320 in many

developers. Microphene will not alter this speed rating at all. The

higher the film speed, the more "off" films are as a rule of thumb.

The developing times stated on the box take this into account and what

you do when you develop the film is already push processing in many

instances: The developing times were adjusted according to midtones,

not according to overal contrast and not according to shadow

densities, which affect film speed. Since high speed films are

generally softer than low and medium speed films they take a little

more abuse in exposure but still the overal contrast rendition will

suffer from this. The film will generally be "harder" than it ought

to.

This brings us back to underexposed negs. If the film was shot --

lets say -- with ISO 800, although the box says ISO 400 than we have

an effective underexposure of 2 f-stops, not one. There is no way of

compensating for this with maintaining full shadow detail. Shadows

inevitably will have to go when the midrange contrast is being built

up. There are two differing strategies now: (1) Active developer that

can achieve high densities. I had suggested A49 for this before. A49

will easily push the midrange densities back into place, but the

contrast will (as always in push processing) be much higher. People

often underestimate this phenomenon. If the gamma was 0.7 using

"normal" development (to use this as example), than a one f-stop push

will get you into the 0.8s or 0.9s and a two stop will get you in a

gamma range of 1.x and higher. There is no paper grade that will print

this neg with full spectrum if a scene with average contrast was

recorded. If the scene recorded was low contrast A49 still is an

excellent solution. (2) The second strategy is to build up midtone

contrast and somehow restrict the overal contrast buildup especially

in the highlights. 2-part developers can limit the highlight contrast

effectivly. There are better and worse products and published formulas

out there. The best I have used so far is Tetenal Emofin, a widely

used developer in Europe. This developer is based on colour chemistry

and will achive extremely fine grain without rendering the overal

tonal rendition too soft, which often is the case with very dilute

developers. Unfortunately this product, which has been extremely

popular with professionals in Europe for decades, is not available in

shops in the US, but it can be ordered easily through mail order

companies such as Fotoimpex. Emofin is more expensive than some other

developers (around $8 per quart), but it will develop 17 films or

more, which makes it very economical. In comparison with Acufine the

grain is finer and the acutance -- usually a problem with 2part

developers -- is not bad at all. The base fog, which necessarily is

higher with 2part developers, is no problem. It is only minimally

higher and you just print through it. Although even in this super fine

grain formulation the grain will noticably get higher with push

processing, but a compensation of up to 2 f-stops underexposure are

possible without too much contrast buildup.

I based my statment about "true speed boost" on EIs obtained for HP5+ in D-76H 1:1 and 1:3 vs Microphen 1:1. The EIs were determined by the usual .10 DU above fb&f for a "Zone I" exposure using a Wallace Expo-Disc (18% transmission), and the films were developed to pretty much the same CIs.

 

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My normal speed for HP5+ in D-76H 1:1 or 1:3 is EI 400, in Rodinal 1:50 it's EI 250 and in Microphen 1:1 it's EI 640. Of course film developed to significantly lower or higher CIs will have different EIs.

 

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TXP should respond fairly similarly to HP5+, although it's been so long since I've used any sort of Tri-X I certainly can't say that for sure.

 

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The reason I recommended Microphen specifically for this is that recently I managed to underexpose a sheet of 8x10 HP5+ about a stop and the resulting neg was a bit thin; for the second neg I used Microphen 1:1 with development time extended by about 10% and got the expected shadow density plus a little more contrast to accomodate the somewhat low-contrast scene.

 

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Considering developer claims, though, wild speed claims have certainly been made by many manufacturers but invariably any speed increase obtained with a PQ developer as opposed to a "standard" developer is only about 1/3 to 2/3 stop especially if development time has to be reduced to obtain "normal" contrast.

 

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Before using any new developer for important film I'd strongly suggest shooting a test film to find out for sure if the developer will do what you want and if the recommended development time is valid.

I am surprised about the speed you get. A very recent test with HP5

plus showed that there is no way to get close to a true ISO 400. Even

the ISO 320 are a little optimistic in many respects, since --

obviously due to the sensitation -- the film is problematic with green

rendition.

How do you evaluate your tests? which densitometer do you use? Which

camera (how do you determine that your shutter is correct before

testing)?

If you read Ilford literature carefully you will notice some telling

statements. They write that their speed ratings are most often not

based on the ISO system, but on an evaluation of print quality! This

says nothing else but that they sacrifice shadow rendition for film

speed, which makes the film better to sell. When the first Deltas came

to the market this was particularly obvious. Delta 400 had a true

speed of only around ISO 100. This made it understandable that this

film claimed to have "medium speed" characteristics.

Off course I have not tested all films on the market, but I have run

thorough tests on all films that I use on a regular basis, which

includes -- among other things -- determining film speed and

developing time for my specific paper grade. Occasionally I will

include a test shot in my films to be sure that film characterstics do

not change (they usually are very stable) and that my testing system

is all right. A comparison with the test results of a friend also

gives me some "safety" that I am not off.

To sum up: I am fairly convinced that I can prove my statements about

film speed with the test I made.

I just saw another part in your statement: Developing to a different

contrast level only marginally affects film speed -- again differing

what is commonly published. This is particularaly true if you develop

longer. The increase certainly is not 2/3rd and even with a marginal

better relativ speed output you will hardly reach the "published"

speed on the box. You will -- at least according to my experience --

also stay under this. In fact you will find out that after some time

you will lose effective film speed. Every developer and film

combination has a Dmax it can achieve. After this only the base fog

will be affected and the overall contrast spectrum will decrease.

Without a densitometer it is difficult to judge shadow densities.

Many PQ claims originated in the publications of Goeff Crawley in the

1960s when PQ developers were claimed to change film developing. In

recent publications Goeff Crawley strongly advocates using a lower

determining point for fim speed. Crawley always had differing

perceptions about the look of prints. Off course the industry was only

too oblidged to use Crawleys statements for advertising their own PQ

developers. It has become silent out there when the topic PQ is

mentioned today, especially sind phenidone seems to have poor keeping

qualities in solution and due to the low acutance in comparison to MQ

formulations.

> How do you evaluate your tests? which densitometer do you use? Which camera (how do you determine that your shutter is correct before testing)?

 

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I start by calibrating all meters to "Sunny f16" using a Wallace Expo-Disc. I believe "sunny f16" or, 1/EI @f16 for an exposure in direct sunshine with the sun high in the sky, to be valid for my area; tropical residents may need "sunny f22" or thereabouts while residents of the far north may need "sunny f11."

 

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"Sunny f16" exposures result in the expected densities with a variety of film types including traditional b&w, C-41, E-6 and K-14.

 

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So...why calibrate to "sunny f16" and not something else? The short answer is that there isn't anything else. There is no "industry standard." So I use what's consistent and consistently available.

 

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The Expo-Disc is a dense diffusion disc that transmits 18%. Although the "standard" such as it is is 13%, trying to achieve a 13% reflectance by holding a Kodak grey card at the specified angle to the light, not shade it or not get glare off it, creates more potential errors. Someone with more knowledge of mathematics than me could calculate the difference between 13% and 18% reflectance/transmission, but I believe it to be no more than 1/3 stop.

 

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For shooting test strips, I use a camera that has an electronically-timed shutter that I tested with a Calumet shutter tester a while back; it turned out to be consistently within 1/3 stop of the set speeds throughout the range I use for testing. I always use the same lens, beginning two stops down from wide open to avoid losses due to vignetting or falloff at wide apertures.

 

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I shoot a series of test exposures through a range of 14 to 15 stops.

 

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Developing the film is straightforward, either in a Jobo machine or using hand inversion tanks. BTW, I've gotten consistent changes in EI for the same CI with a couple of films on the order of +/- 1/3 stop when comparing continuous rotary agitation with intermittent inversion agitation.

 

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I read the negs with an Eseco TR-90 densitometer, which is regularly calibrated to a step wedge, and plot the curves on paper. Not particularly automated. ;-)

 

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For several years I've occasionally compared my results with three people who also do the same sort of testing as a "reality check" and we've usually agreed sufficiently well.

 

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> sacrifice shadow rendition for film speed, which makes the film better to sell.

 

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While I'll agree that it's easier to sell a film that's labeled EI 400 than EI 250, I don't think it's a valid assumption that shadow rendition is somehow being sacrificed. I believe it would be much more confusing to customers and users if the film needed to be labeled several speeds according to which developer is used; for HP5+ for example this could be anywhere from around EI 100 (PMK+) to EI 640 (Microphen).

 

> To sum up: I am fairly convinced that I can prove my statements about film speed with the test I made.

 

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I don't think it's a matter of proving anything; it's necessary to recognize that equipment, materials and methods vary and the results one person obtains may be somewhat different than the results another person obtains, all caused by variations and tolerances in manufacturing, calibration, procedures and above all, what constitutes a "good image."

> It has become silent out there when the topic PQ is

mentioned today, especially sind phenidone seems to have poor keeping

qualities in solution and due to the low acutance in comparison to MQ

formulations.

 

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Hmm...in the past five or so years we've seen four new Phenidone developers; Paterson FX-39 (Crawley) and Ilford DD-X are PQ types while Ilfosol-S is PQ/ascorbate and Kodak Xtol is P/ascorbate. FX-39 and Xtol are commonly noted for higher acutance than MQ developers; otoh in my experience the increased graininess of FX-39, Xtol and DD-X may not be a worthwhile tradeoff.

 

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Gone, however, as you've noted, are the wild speed claims that used to accompany PQ developers; at most the manufacturers now claim only the film's rated speeds.

Off course there is an industry standard. They call it ISO and they

even put in on the box. In fact the testing procedures are more or

less a copy of the Deutsche Industrienorm (DIN). I do not think it a

very good idea to say that this is only a "relative" number on the

box. The test is standardize and testers all over the world use it and

also publish their results.

I must admit that the tests both of us run do not comply 100% to the

ISO test, which is described in detail in the ISO regulations (film

manufacuters use a transparent step wedge and a standardized

exposure), but the results should be the same and also the ISO rating

should be comparable. This can be seen when film speed is published by

independent sources. Somehow I see then that my tests results are not

bad after all, when someone performs tests under ISO conditions, such

as with colour films and finds that almost all ISO 400 speed negative

film are in fact much closer to ISO 200. When there is no standard,

why do the manufacuters claim there is? And there are manufacuteres

that put different speeds on the box. Efke for example says their film

has ISO 50 (true ISO speed). In the box you will find a list of

different developers and the speed they recommend you rate them, all

of which are higher than the ISO rating. Why does Ilford and the rest

not do this? Quick answer: Because it would not look good -- they feel

-- on the marketplace. Honesty ist not always honoured by consumer. If

you have the choice between two films, one advertised as 400, but has

only ISO 200, the other one advertised as 200, and it has 200, which

one would you buy if you look for an ISO 400 film? Also I have to

repeat myself: Different developers do not affect film speed in a

significant way. My perception is that the speed obviously is more or

less determined by the film itself and that the developers only affect

speed to a lesser extent.

> Off course there is an industry standard. They call it ISO and they

even put in on the box.

 

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My statement regarded any "industry standard" for the calibration of light meters and the reflectance, transmission or luminance used to calibrate them. Not film speed.

 

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> The test is standardize and testers all over the world use it and

also publish their results.

 

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Things have changed; the specific developer and development procecure is no longer standardized. Perhaps this is in recognition of the fact that the ISO speed rating for traditional b&w films had very little to do with the reality of what exposure was needed when the film was developed in a "normal" developer to CIs appropriate for pictorial usage.

 

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Actually Ilford followed Kodak's lead in rating film by EI rather than ISO; Kodak never published an ISO rating for TMZ but simply rated it by EI depending on developer used and the CI the film would be developed to.

 

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I think we're actually in agreement overall; when developed to CIs appropriate for most uses b&w films have usually needed more exposure than their ISO ratings indicate, sometimes quite a bit more.

Isn't the EI (and therefore the film speed) the point where you

get .1 over film base + fog for a zone I negative? I know I am

testing lots of different films now and all are coming is slow, slow,

slow. Heck, in rodinal 1:50 neopan 1600 came it at EI 160! The only

film I've found so far with any speed is TMZ which was EI 800 in

emofin.<br>Anyway, I am interested in the argument here because if I

cannot infulence the real film speed with the developer then that

changes my search for a good film/developer combo...

Dear Russell,

you can influence speed with different developers and developing to

different contrast levels, but according to my experience in testing

the influce is minimal, certainly far below what you would expect or

what the manufactuer may say. Even Tetenal Emofin, which I like

particularly, has its limitations and I never get close to the stated

speed gains of 3-6 DIN. You are right about very high speed films: The

true speed often is far, far below what the manufacuter states. The

sacrifice of shadow detail is obviously built into the "system". I can

only urge every serious photographer to find out HIS effective speed

himself by running the standard tests with controlled underexposure.

These test will take the whole system into account: Shutter, exposure

meter, lens etc.

Johh, I hope this answer doesn't come too late to help. I don't

believe that any of the three developers you list will accomplish

what you want. Suggest that you go and ahead and use the XTOL, but

be sure and do a clip test with a small piece of film immediately

before developing your 4x5s, to assure that it's gonna work. Bill

Russel,

I forgot this. There are very effective ways to increase true

filmspeed. Mercury vapor � no forget it, you do not want to poison

yourself. All vapor methods work best with low speed films. There you

can get huge increases. Well, mercury is obviously the exception. It

seems to work with all sorts of films and speeds, but again I can only

urge everyone not to use it. It also has some side effects such as

very noticeable grain. Raising the latent fog level is the other

method. I once took several rolls of TMAX 100 on an airtrip (at the

time when I did not know there also were decent B&W films on the

market). It was bulk loaded and I had run tests before on the same

batch. At that time I used D76 1:1 made from scratch and the speed

rating was around ISO 50. After returning my redone tests showed a

speed increase of 100% due to what must have been the Xray security

checks at the airport. Try to get this speed increase with pushing or

"effective" developers! I would judge that putting a film through the

machine 6 times (that was about the amount it must have had due to

changing planes) will raise the toe of the film that much. In the

literatue there are many other descriptions of how to "preflash" film,

all of which are tedious at least: Unrolling film, pinning to the wall

(off course in total darkness), taking a flashgun, using the auto

setting and setting it off at a very close distance to the opposite

wall. Nothing for me. Also rewinding film in a 35mm camera quickly in

the darkroom with open shutter and in front of a red safelight does

not sound very repeatable. A trip to the airport with a bag full of

film and getting acquainted with the security personnel might solve

some of your problems � and it would be extremely cheap despite the

beers you hight have to buy. Flashing or Xraying by the way also works

after taking pictures! You could also take exposed films to the

airport. Only make sure that you select a "film safe" machine. Some

experimenting may bring even higher speed ratings, depending how often

you put the film through the machine before visible fogging occurs.

With high speed films you probably should put it through the machine

less often, since the threshold for visible fog obviously is lower

than with a medium speed film. Also the effective speed increase also

will be lower than in the case of low speed films. According to what

heard and read it should be fairly easy to increase the effective

speed of an ISO 25 film to ISO 100 with flashing. Additionally you

would have the benefit of softer tonal rendition. I have not tried it

though.

I live downstream on the Columbia River, from the now inoperative

Trojan Nuclear Plant. since it shutdown, I have noticed a 100%

decrease in film speed. should I seek out the rod repository and

decent radiation levels, or simply start concentrating more on my

photography.

 

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and my hair feels so much thicker now ...

 

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John, try Ilford's Ilfosol S as an Xtol substitute. it seems closer

to, and almost as refined as Xtol, without the mystery of random

failure. one-shot, cheap, easy to store.

> Isn't the EI (and therefore the film speed) the point where you

get .1 over film base + fog for a zone I negative? I know I am

testing lots of different films now and all are coming is slow, slow,

slow.

 

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That's the "traditional" speedpoint and perhaps the easiest to determine. There are other methods but the resulting EI should be pretty close to what you're using.

 

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Now...why are you getting really slow speeds? While you should expect to find EIs perhaps a stop different than the film manufacturers' ratings, if you're getting several stops difference, you're using a "standard" developer and you're not developing to a very high or low CI then it's time to start looking for an error and checking calibration.

 

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If we examine high-speed films in particular, we find that the manufacturers' ratings are actually push-development ratings; this is almost kept a secret, buried in spec sheets etc. For the films you mentioned, EI 800-1000 is the "real" speed of TMZ (and Delta 3200) and I believe EI 400 is the "real" speed of Fuji 1600. That may be the "error" that's causing what appears to be very low EIs with those films. If you go for push development, which is essentially underexposure and overdevelopment, you can expose those films at the speeds rated on the boxes and get usable negs; not necessarily good because shadow density will be low and contrast will be high, but usable.

 

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When pushing, though, you can't go by the usual .10DU to obtain the EI because you're intentionally underexposing. You have to use another standard; I think it's personal and I've never seen any recommended standard to be used other than "does it print reasonably well?"

 

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I start by plotting a curve for normal exposure and normal development, then for the pushed film look for the EI that causes its curve plot to cross the normal curve at Zone IV. If you want more shadow density use a lower crossing point or if you can tolerate less shadow density use a higher crossing point. That's just getting into the ballpark; what really counts of course is how the negs print.

 

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Now..back to "normal" film and normal development. The first step imho is calibration of light meters. Calibrate to what? In a big debate in another forum between Ctein and George Wallace (Expo-Disc inventor) Ctein pretty thoroughly showed that there is no industry standard for the calibration of light meters, that manufacturers use their own standards, and that what passes for a standard, the Kodak 18% grey card, if used as intended actually provides 13% reflectance.

 

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So you really ought to calibrate your meters to your own personal standard. It really doesn't matter what that standard is as long as it's consistent, but to make things easier it probably should be reasonably close to the default standard of 1/EI @f16 with a Kodak grey card in sunshine.

 

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So, if you meter the grey card, meter an Expo-Disc or use an incident-light meter, in full sunshine that meter should indicate 1/EI @f16. If it doesn't, adjust the EI you set until it does; the amount of that adjustment becomes a correction factor to be applied to all EI settings applied to that meter, and only that meter. Another meter may be, and probably will be, different.

 

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The next step is checking shutter speeds. Timing tolerances have to be accepted, but I think that in most cases an electronically-controlled shutter can be assumed to be fairly accurate while a mechanically-time shutter should be assumed to be rather inaccurate and non-linear. If you're using mechanical shutters you could have a local shop prepare a speed chart that'll show what the shutter's really doing or you could buy or borrow a shutter-speed tester (Calumet's is relatively inexpensive).

 

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> cannot infulence the real film speed with the developer then that

changes my search for a good film/developer combo...

 

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You _can_ influence the real speed, but not by much. Compared to a standard MQ developer such as D-76 and film developed to the same CI, a developer that contains Phenidone such as Microphen, DD-X or Xtol will usually give a little more real speed but it's only on the order of 1/3 to 2/3 stop. Some developers give less speed; these include Rodinal and straight Microdol-X. Some developers also give more speed with dilution or to put it differently, give less speed loss; a couple of them are Microdol-X 1:3 vs straight and Xtol at a variety of dilutions vs straight.

 

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Also, in my experience, high-speed films (EI 400 and faster) respond more to speed-increasing or speed-decreasing developers than slow films (EI 100 or slower).

 

This may sound petty, but: The slower the film speed the more

effective are all methods to alter film speed -- chemical and

physical. The opposite is true for high speed films. The effect can be

seen in astro photography. The film speed of the extreme low speed

emulsions is greatly affected by gas hypering. Several articles in the

past have shown that these methods show by far not as great success on

higher speed films, also due to the fact that some films already

incoroporate preexposed silver halides.

Daniel, even if you make fun of me: Physical methods to alter the toe

of the rendition curve of films have been effective strategies often

used by professional photographers, because -- different from pushing

-- they do not have any negative side effects, such as increased grain

and contrast. This was particularly true decades ago when films were

used for press work that are today considered as medium speed.

There is no difference in which way you create the additional

latent fogging: Radiation is radiation, if visible (light) or

invisible (Xray, gamma, neutrons etc.) The power plant will work off

course, if you can get close enough to the rods, but I fear that

calibration will be the problem and it might affect your hair in a

rather adverse way. The nice thing about the airport security system

seems a high degree of repeatability if you checked it out once and

calibrated your "system" of run throughs. I was totally serious about

this. Since I had some films left over from the trip I off course used

them with the higher film speed. But this experience also showed me,

that there is always some effect of airport Xray on the film, even if

you do not see it on the developed film. From then on I insisted on

manual checks when I transported exposed material.

Volker,

 

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I didn't mean to poke fun at you. your findings are sound. I was

attempting to express the idea that we can take things to a level

that our endeavours no longer resemble photography. I do appreciate

that there are those interested at the molecular level, and those

that empirically discover what works well and manage to make

outstanding photographs. room for both extremes, but I do wonder

sometimes if we don't needlessly entangle ourselves.

No problem,

although I thought that these findings were rather empirical, although

more or less accidental. Honestly: I do not know why no manufacuter

has come up with an easy to use device to "pre-" or "postflash" film

to a preset level. The Xray machine would be one, but due to its price

nothing to everyone. In the past many "cazy" things worked extremely

well in photography, what did not work well at all was pushing film.

There is one other way to increase film speed. An overall light

exposure DURING the image exposure. Concurrent photon amplification.

There was an article in the June 1976 issue of Popular Photograpy

about a company that modified 35mm SLR's. They put tiny light bulbs

in the mirror box. The upshot was that it took much less exposure

than pre or post flashing to get a stop or more of shadow speed

increase. They claimed no fogging or contrast reduction like with

pre/post flashing. It seems to me white LED's would be perfect for

this today.

Tim,

LED is a good idea, since you can finetune them in accordance with the

sensitation gaps of the emulsion and it would even work on colour

nicely that way. On the other hand: Pre- postflash does not fog a film

if done correctly, since the exposure stays under the threshold. It

also does not affect overal contrast rendition, only shadow

rendition. Highlights and midtones are virtually unaffected. The

opposite is true for positive flashing: Only highlights are

affected, midtones and shadows stay more or less the same. The method

you describe is just a very clever way to apply this flashing, a way

that should be pursued further. I do not see why manufacturers of SLR

cameras should not incorporate this. Flashing is for example used in

slide duplicating. Bowens uses a glass sheet to creat flare (= fog),

Multiblitz uses a fiber optics to channel light into the bellows. You

see, there are various ways to do it, but someone has to find workable

ways to use it. The xray machine may be a little extreme, but if

someone has easy access to one, this certainly is a more than

practicable way. A friend of mine for example is working in a building

were he has to go through a security check every day. If I should need

high speed film (which I rarely do for my work) then I would surely

send him a parcel of film to take through several times. Other people

may have to find different solutions.