Switching from tray to drum developing

[chuck_k]

I've recently purchased a Unicolor drum and motor base and have done some 4x5 and 8x10 film in it. I had been using Ilfosol-S and doing one agitation every 30 seconds in a tray. The first films that come out of the drum were overdeveloped. I took that to be a factor of the drums constant agitation. So I knocked off about 20% of the time. This seems to be doing the trick.. but the contrast is very high. If I take more time off the developing, I lose some to the shadow detail.

 

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so... Is there a something else I should be doing? I'm thinking my next move is dilute the developer more. Whats the deal with the time then? Am I into a bunch of experiments? What are the storys of people who have gone down this same path.

 

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Thanks for your help,

 

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chuck k

[john_hicks]

I usually reduce development time by 10%, which has almost always been close enough to not need any adjustment. TMX wants around 5%.

 

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I can't tell you anything about Ilfosol.

 

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Generally, if you're developing film to the same CI in the same developer you'll get the same EI no matter how you agitate it; if you want to find out what's going on you'll need to do some carefully controlled test rather than using pictorial negs.

 

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One thing to consider is that if a film/developer combination has some shouldering when using intermittent agitation, that shoulder may straighten up entirely when using continuous agitation. That _may_ be what you're seeing but with modern films the shoulder us usually _way_ above (higher density) than the range you'd actually be able to print.

 

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Increasing dilution may help. Don't try to sneak up on it; use your original development time but double the dilution for a test. If that's ok then you're all set; if it's too flat then try 1.5X the original dilution.

 

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Usually if you double dilution 1.5X the original time is a good starting point if the goal is to obtain about the same CI.

 

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I often use D-76H 1:3 for a strong contraction using the 1:1 development time; HP5+ and TMX lose 2/3 stop and Delta 100 loses only 1/3 stop, but this is a _strong_ contraction, at least N-3.

[trevor_crone]

Chuck I've used Ilfosol-S and the Ilfotech developers like LC-29. They are quite energetic like Kodak's HC110. You could try a pyro dev. but do wear gloves if your tray developing as it's quite toxic. Pyro responds well to the more frequent agitation of tray developing. And I feel is better suited to N-1, N-2 development without loss of shadow detail that hovers around zone II. However I have had good results with Ilfosol-S and 4x5 Delta 100 by diluting the dev. 1:14 with a N dev. time of 7min. Also you may like to consider Ilford's DDX dil. 1:4, again 7min. for N dev.

Good luck,

[doremus_scudder1]

Chuck,

 

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When using high-accutance developers, i.e. anything not advertised

as "fine grain", you need to take advantage of the compensating

effect to get full emulsion speed. Compensation occurs when the

developer exhausts itself in the highlight (dense) portions of the

negative, but keeps working in the shadow (less dense) portions. This

effectively gives the shadows more development thus increasing

effective speed.

 

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Two things contribute to this: 1) a rather weak developer dilution,

which delivers less developer concentration to the film thus allowing

the highlights to use up all the available develper more quickly, and

2) minimum agitation, which keeps the exhausted developer in the

highlighs from being replaced while the developer continues to work

in the shadows. You can surmise from this that the effect is

proportional to density: The less dense, the more actual development

takes place, which allows fuller development of the shadows without

excessive contrast. Since film speed is based on low-density areas of

the negative, this increases emulsion speed while keeping contrast in

check.

All this means that developing in a drum with constatnt agitation and

normal dilutions(thereby reducing the compensating effect) will

reduce film speed and increase contrast accordingly. To get the

greatest film speed and accutance without too much contrast, process

in trays with long developing times and minimum agitation. I would

recommend a return to tray processing. Hope this helps, ;^D)

[james___]

Give your negative more exposure and then dilute your developer by 50%

and give shorter development time in the drum. Because you are giving

maximum agitation, which causes density to rise accordingly, you must

give more exposure to the neg which raises shadow density. Then dilute

your developer "and" cut down on your development time. This will

bring down the density in the highlights (relative to the shadows) and

still allow the shadows full density. You need to test for EI and

development time because you are changing processes. Constant rotory

agitation produces a very smooth negative with lots of specular

detail throughout but can be problematic if you don't calibrate the

system from camera exposure to development time and developer

concentration. We can give you all sorts of off the wall answers but

only calibrating the system will get you where you need to be. If you

were getting good results from tray developing, why are you changing?

I've used all the methods out there and like rotory processing best

for what I shoot and how I like my negs but that for you might be

different. James

[tony_j._mastres]

First off let me say hooray that you're using the Unicolr drums. There

are a lot of people out there doing rotary processing but few of us

still use the Unicolor drums. You've already got some great answers to

your question and all I can add is to re-iterate the use of a more

dilute developer to control the contrast. You diddnt mention the type

of film you are using so I cant give any specific recomentdations but I

can tell you that I use T-max 100 and I use t-max RS at a 1:9 dilution

@ 75 deg F. for 11 min for an N process. This combo, other than the

time, is pretty common and has been popularized by John Sexton. (that

doesnt make it good or bad but it does give some starting points). A

word of warning, the rotary agitation of a JOBO unit is NOT the same as

that of our Unicolors! Dev times that people use for their JOBOs will

usually not be similar enough to those of people with Unicolor drums to

simply adopt without testing. In my experience the JOBOs are more

vigorous even at the lowest setting that are the Unicolors. It almost

seems like the Unicolor is halfway between tray processing and the JOBO

rotary. Hope this helps!