Diafine and Tri-X

[ivan_dzo]

Bought some Diafine to try with 400TX. The box said you get iso1600

from it, so I assessed it with my usual densitometer set up. At the

recommended 3+3 minutes at 20c I got a speed of iso320 at N-2!.

Surprised by this I repeated the test but with 5+5 minutes again at

20c. Still only 320 but only N-1 this time. I mainly use Xtol 1+2

which gives me about the box speed for 400TX and perhaps half a stop

more in the real world with flare included. Certainly the 1600 negs

are useless and the 800 are lacking in shadow detail. The 400 are

great and Diafine is very easy and economic to use. I'm sure however

that I'd get much better speed from slightly pushing with Xtol 1+2.

I've read all the posts on Diafine and people seem to rave about it

and get at least iso1000 from it. What's going on?

[aeiffel]

Try a very gentle agitation in bath B. If you don't do so most of the part A in the emulsion will go away before it reacts with bath B.<br>

I found that I get more consistent results with 4/4, or more, than the suggested 3/3 times. BTW my ISO for Tri-x in Diafine is more around 1000-1250.

[ivan_dzo]

"very gentle agitation" in B? I usually do five inversions in 5 secs per minute. Is this too much? I suspect it barely needs agitating in B really.

[randall ellis]

I rate it at 1250, 4 minutes in each, with 5 very soft inversions each minute. Agitation in bath A is not that big of a deal since it is just soaking up the fluid into the emulsion. Bath B need very little agitation or, as someone previously mentioned, you will wash out the bath A. I don't think you can do too little agitation in bath B, but you can certainly do too much.

 

- Randy

[ivan_dzo]

Thanks, both of you. I'll try it again, with minimal agitation and let you know the speed I get.

Ivan

[frank.schifano]

Admittedly, I haven't done any densitometer tests with Tri-X and Diafine or, for that matter, any other film/developer combination. The way I look at it, if the negative can print well then it's good. I can usually tell if a negative will print well on the papers I normally use simply by examining it closely. My best results with the Tri-X/Diafine combination have been with an EI of around 1250. Film that has been accidentally exposed at a lower EI are quite printable as well. They are a bit dense and require longer than usual printing times but other than that, they're pretty good. If I can live with an EI of 800, then I'm usually better off using XTOL for a one stop push. If I need more speed than that, Diafine gives me an easier to print negative.

 

Diafine, while not terrlbly sensitive to temperature and time, is quite sensitive to agitation. Like it says on the package, optimal temperatures are between 70 and 80 deg. F.; and I haven't noticed any difference in activity as long as the temperatures are kept in that range. Agitation in part "A" has almost no bearing on the final result. All you need is a bit to make sure there are no air bubbles attached to the film and that's good enough. Three minutes is the recommended time, though I usually leave it for 4. Call it cheap insurance that the film is completely soaked through. Obviously, you don't want to do a pre-soak with water, nor do you want to rinse it between parts A and B. That will remove some of the developing agent from the film. Part B is just as simple. It contains no developing agents, but serves as the activator for the agents introduced in part A. One or two inversions at the start of the cycle with a repetition about halfway through is all you need. Too much will wash the developing agent out of the emulsion with the resulting loss of film speed.

 

One other characteristic of this developer is that it's impossible to over develop the film. By the end of 3 to 4 minutes in part B, the developing agents left behind from part A are completely exhausted.

 

This is not the developer to use if you need "fine art" critical control. Use it when you absolutely need to get the shot, and you exposures are all over the map. Think of newpaper photographs back in the day before they started doing everything digitally and even before they did color spreads and you'll get the idea.

[mattalofs]

After months of wondering why I saw such wide variations from roll to roll when using diafine, I decided to treat diafine like any other developer; control the temp, time and agitation closely. 3 minutes each batch, 20 degrees, 1 slow inversion per minute.

 

As others have suggested, I suspect you are over agitating. Diafine also takes some getting used. The negs are flatter and probably better suited to scanning than traditional printing.

[aeiffel]

<i>I usually do five inversions in 5 secs per minute. Is this too much? I suspect it barely needs agitating in B really.</i><br><br>

Yep, that's too much. 1 or 2/mn for 4mn is enough.

[silent1]

The big thing in bath B is that too much agitation can wash out the developer that was carried over in the gelatin, which will stop development in areas where this has occurred. This can result in anything from general underdevelopment (which seems to be what you have) to streaking or mottling. Diafine tends to flatten contrast a bit anyway, because it exhausts in the highlights before the shadows have finished developing, but if it gets washed out, you'll get very flat negatives because they're severely underdeveloped.

 

FWIW, when I develop 35 mm Tri-X in Diafine I agitate more or less normally in Bath A, then give five inversions after filling and five gentle inversions (taking about 10 seconds for each five inversions) at one and two minutes before pouring out at three minutes. Very consistent, and I get good shadow detail when metering at EI 1600.<div></div>

[leo c]

Has anyone tryed Diafine in a Jobo processing? I am wondering since this is constant agitation and many feel Diafine needs less rather than more agitation.

 

leo

[kin_lau]

I use _zero_ agitation.. bump the container a few times to get rid of the bubbles and soup for around 3-5min's. I usually rate for 800-1250 depending on how much contrast I want.

[todd_phillips1]

I love the combination of Tri-X and Diafine. I've used it for a lot of blues performances and it works great. Rate it anywhere from 1000 to 1600 (I usually shoot it at 1250) and enjoy. Great grain for a 2stop push. I invert once every minute in part B.

[andrew_hull]

"The negs are flatter and probably better suited to scanning than traditional printing"

 

Actually flat negatives are better for printing too! Best 35mm negative is the thinnest

negative that still has detail in the darks where you want it. This means shorter exposure

for the print and sharper prints with less grain.

[randall ellis]

I agree with Andrew on this one. Flater negatives print easier. It is far easier to get a good print from a flat negative on harder paper than it is to attempt to tame contrast with 0 grade paper. Diafine is a compensating developer, meaning that it is designed to flatten the negative to keep contrast under control.

 

- Randy

[lex_jenkins]

Using a densitometer we'd probably all get a true speed of roughly ISO 400 with Tri-X in Diafine.

 

But that's not why most of us use Diafine. It raises only the *effective* speed, from low midtones to highlights, making it possible to expose the film as for roughly 1600 and still get good and unique results.

 

If you want more shadow detail and more conventional looking negatives you should choose another developer and, probably, rerate Tri-X to 250 or 320.

 

Diafine's strength is for photojournalism and low light photography in general. That's what the developer was designed for in the first place. It can also produce very interesting results with other films, such as Delta 3200 at 1600, for unique artistic results.

 

In my opinion, tho', Tri-X looks unpleasant when exposed at 400 and developed in Diafine. This particular combination actually benefits from a little underexposure.

[frank.schifano]

"Has anyone tryed Diafine in a Jobo processing? I am wondering since this is constant agitation and many feel Diafine needs less rather than more agitation."

 

Never even considered it. Knowing how this developer works makes that idea a complete non-starter.

[john bond]

A couple of weeks ago, I had asked a question about characteristic curves of

films developed in Diafine and Acufine and no one responded. Knowing the

characteristic curve of TriX 400 in Diafine might answer a lot of your

questions. In theory, Diafine appears to over- develop the shadows and

under- develop the highlights. This should be like dragging a middle point to

the left in curves in Photo Shop. The result is a greater ?effective? film speed

with flatter contrast in the lighter areas of the photograph. I have found that

this produces wonderful tonal range in high contrast situations such as night

photography. If you over- expose a photo (using a lower ISO), you may be

shifting the values onto the longer, flatter shoulder of the curve giving it a very

low contrast appearance.

 

In any case, does anyone have data on the characteristic curves of TriX and

Diafine?

[al_kaplan1]

When Harold Bauman first formulated and marketed Diafine in the 1960's it was supposed to give an EI of 2400 with 2 minutes in each bath. They were accurate claims at the time. A few years later this was changed to 1600 and 3 minutes in each bath. Consider, though, how many versions of "New Improved" Tri-X have been made over that 40+ years! The Tri-X of the 60's was much grainier and had a much thicker emulsion, which likely soaked up more developer.

 

Also consider that back then other than your 50mm lens at f/2, or just maybe f/1.4, you were stuck with a 35/2.8 and 105/2.5 on your Nikon F so fast film was a blessing.

 

I can give Tri-X a one stop push in D-76 1:1 and be within half a stop of Diafine speed, and I prefer the D-76 negatives. I recently printed some 40 year old Diafine negatives and was amazed at how thin they were compared to what I like now, but they got the shots and the editor was happy.