still / stand with Rodinal?

[jtk]

I want to process some Acros with still/stand Rodinal technique tomorrow. I want

maximum edge-effect and sharpest resolution.

 

I've been using 1:50 with conventional gentle agitation but I want to see what's

possible with still/stand.

 

Questions:

 

1) What's your timing / methodology @ 1:100 or 1:200? Have you done this with

Acros, and how have you rated it?

 

2) Does this method assume film is "developed to completion" no matter how it's

rated...would Acros @100 be processed identically to Acros @ 50 or 200?... would

all B&W films (Acros, TriX, XP2 etc) involve same development times?

[randall ellis]

I use Rodinal 1:200 with stand development and FP4+ regularly. I've used this same method with other films as well (Hp5+, Tri-X, and Pan F+), all with the 1 hour time. I give 30 seconds initial agitation then let it sit there for an hour. The time seems OK to about 1.5 hours, but after that seems to be the borderline for development of fog.

 

- Randy

[mitchell_kirschner]

I don't have any Rodinal stand experience...

 

...but if format has any bearing on answers, do you have in mind 35mm?

[Alan Johnson]

I did this using studio strobes rating Acros EI 64 developing in Rodinal 1:200 68F.Agitate 1min then stand till 90 minutes.The film is not developed to completion,120min stand gives more contrasty negs.I did not try it but would guess Acros at EI 200 would be underexposed.I have stand developed several other films exposed at about half box speed for 90 min 68F and they printed OK on variable contrast paper.

 

From what I read I don't think the main benefit of stand development is found in edge effect and sharpness,but rather in reducing burn out of highlights and improving microcontrast but I have not done sufficient to give a reliable opinion.

[jtk]

Yes, 35mm.

[al_divenuti]

Honestly, I think the benefits of stand development with Rodinal are somewhat oversold.

 

About 18 months ago I did a series of experiments with Rodinal at 1:400 (not a typo - that reads 1:400) in a 2L tank to develop single rolls of Fortepan 100 in 35mm. That film, mind you, was about as "old school" as you could ever hope to find at the time and it should have been an ideal match for stand development.

 

All my experiments were conducted such that I gave the film 12 gentle inversions over the first 60 seconds and no inversions thereafter.

 

The first experiment with a 90 minute duration was a bust. The highlights were blown. The second experiment at 60 minutes was a bust as the highlights were still blown. The third experiment for 45 minutes gave me printable negs.

 

I compared those negs with ones I devleoped in Rodinal 1:100 under a Peak 7x loupe. As sharpness went, they were indistinguishable.

 

Not wanting to believe my eyes at what I *wasn't* seeing, I borrowed a friends Schneider 10x (which runs you about $200 if you buy it new). Again, no change.

 

The stand-devleoped negs DID have a bit better shadow detail to be fair. Call it 1/3 stop. Not more than that.

 

Microcontrast? Nanocontrast, perhaps. I didn't see any diference that I could be sure of when printing the 1:100 and 1:400 semi-stand negs (which were of the same scene and lighting conditions, btw).

 

In case you're curious, the tests were performed using a Canon EF 24/2.8 lens focused at infinity and stopped to f/11. Sharp enough lens, I should say...

 

For what it's worth, I have seen much, much better evidence of greater accutance and microcontrast using a staining developer, semi-stand development and, say, Tri-X or HP5+ than what I experienced using dilute Rodinal. I'd like to say the hightlights are more printable, too, but I'd be wary of making that claim without replicating Sandy King's experiments with a color densitometer measuring the blue-channel - a task I've no interest in doing.

 

I suppose you *might* have better luck with Acros, but I tend to doubt it.

 

Here's a sample in my portfolio from stand development with Rodinal. Sharp enough, yes, but I did apply some sharpening in Photoshop. I've got other stuff if my portfolio that is sharper still using Pyrocat-MC to which no unsharp mask in Photoshop was applied.

 

http://www.photo.net/photo/4372880

[jtk]

Al, DiV, thanks for your intensive observations. You were expecting something distinctive using 1:400 Vs 1:100...what was your logic for that?

 

The sample doesn't tell me much, what with the blown-out-twigs..it hints at over-sharpening..your other gallery images look much better on my monitor...what film/process do we see in the gravestones?

 

Randal and Alan, thanks...I'll do something along those lines with 1:100.

[al_divenuti]

John,

 

Enhanced sharpness relies on adjacency effects. These, in turn, *generally* rely on controlled exhaustion of the developer - which is a mechanims that dilution often aids.

 

If you look at most "classical" accutance developers, they typically look something like:

 

- Very little developing agent (often 1g or less per liter!).

- Relatively little sulfite. Now most people assume that's because of sulfite's action as a silver solvent but it seems that isn't the primary reason. Rather, it's because sulfite is a preservative that tends to suppress exhaustion of the developing agent and prevent adjacency effects.

- A fairly high PH (these developers are often mixed using Sodium Carbonate, Potassium Hydroxide, or similar)

 

Rodinal is a bit different than many "classical" accutance developers. It actually produces lots of sulfite ions in solution, uses a very large amount of its developing agent, and does not produce very good film speed.

 

These days I'm using Sandy King's Pyrocat-MC formula purchased from the Photographer's Formulary. I use it at a 1:1:100 dilution (you need to mix two stock solutions). I shoot 35mm 400TX at EI 200 and develop the film 70 degrees for 9 1/2 minutes. My agitation consists of 12 gentle inversions for the first minute, followed by 2 gentle inversions that occupy a total of 10 seconds every three minutes thereafter.

 

Very sharp negs and very smooth tones. I like the tonality for contrasty lighting situations. In flat lighting, however, I use Patrick Gainer's PC-TEA formula.

 

The photos in my portfolio from Forrest Hills and most of the Mount Auburn photos used Pyrocat-MC. Bonaventure used PC-TEA.

 

Hope it helps and good luck.

 

If you want to know more about the production of adjacency effects, you can search this forum for postings by Ryuji Suzuki, Patrick Gainer, and Rowland Mowerey. These folks had some (ahem) animated discussions on the topic which they are continuing with similar spirt on APUG.

[jtk]

Al, I've skated away from Photog's Formulary in the past because I wasn't silver printing and was fairly self-satisfied with my negs for scanning...but now I want to explore a little. Are you suggesting that Pyrocat formula is your favorite for scanning?

 

Years ago I theoretically settled on pyrocat, before kits were available...so I actually started using Neofin Rot und Neofin Blau mit meine HP4. But recently I've only used R09 @ 1:50 and Emofin, for different effects. Everything looks pretty crude, though I've had some very happy surprises with each.

[larrydressler]

The new t-grain films shine in it 1-200. Why would you try 1-400? that will cause a blow to the highlights. As for traditional films I love it. not everyone has the feeling for it as I do but this stuff is what I call lazy mans Diafine .. stir sit and wake up after a nap. I have not found a film that it does not like. I did though find that Plastic was better than SS because the SS seemed to cool faster than the Plastic on the long time but with SS I just added 10 extra minutes depending on the room temp.

 

Larry

[al_divenuti]

John,

 

I do like the results I get from scans using negs developed in Pyrocat-MC. But then I also have good results from PC-TEA and DD-X.

 

Pyrocat-MC is my favorite when the subject has a broad SBR, as I would expect to encounter in contrasty light. PC-TEA is used when the lighting is flat or in cases where people are the primary subject, and I only use DD-X if I have a need to push film, which isn't often these days.

 

I reached a point about 18 months ago where I stopped experimenting with developers because I felt the exercise wasn't doing much for my photography.

[al_divenuti]

Larry,

 

To your point about Rodinal 1:400 and blown highlights - I was making the point that the benefits of stand development using dilute developers are somewhat overstated in my experience. You can certainly be off by a matter of minutes and still get printable results, but I do not feel it conveys any real advantages over regular development techniques using, say, Rodinal 1:100.

 

Ultimately, I don't use Rodinal any more because most of photography is still done in 35mm using hand-held SLRs. I've become quite fond of the 135mm focal length and this forces me to use shutter speeds of 1/125 sec or higher. Since I do use contrast filters quite a bit and often shoot in contrasty light (which requires a lower EI), it can be a challenge to get the necessary shutter speeds while still maintaining an aperture that allows for good DOF. Rodinal doesn't promote particularly good film speed in my experience, so it isn't the right developer for me. And then there's the grain.

 

I do agree that if you want ultimate forgiveness, two bath developers and, in particular, Diafine - are the way to go. Three years ago I spent some time messing around with D-23 and divided D-23 and came away convinced that when properly used the two produce results that are more or less indistinguishable from one another.

[jtk]

My impression, years ago, about Diafine and D-23 was that they were both distinctly unsharp in 35mm. Ansel was reported to have promoted D-23 to his hangers-on, Adox KB14, tripods etc. I don't think any had investigated Rodinal or Neofin... seemed not to want what 35mm does best. Tetenal Emofin, which I sometimes use now, is two-bath, great for pushes, has a distinct look, but isn't so wonderful in terms of acutance or tonal separation...or maybe like Rodinal, I've just not mastered it yet.

[big toys are better]

The benefits of developer exhaustion to reduce overall negative contrast works with most developers when diluted to their minimum useful concentrations; Rodinal just happens to work particularly well in doing so but is not a good choice for fast films or small formats like 35mm Tri-X. It will work very well with slow fine grained films in 35mm, or mid-speed films like APX or FP-4+ in 120mm or larger.

 

It is not hard to see how large variations in concentration and exposure time affects the negative. but the finer effects are not so obvious. Printing often brings out those small variances. Changes in dilution and agitation do have significant affects with Rodinal developed negatives, and this is also evident with other developers although they may suffer problems due to streaking, etc. True stand development is not terribly useful for fine tuning those effects, and few developers allow for this anyways.

 

Try testing Rodinal with a slow contrasty film like Pan-F+ in 35mm (with exposures bracketed by at least one full stop) then developed in Rodinal at dilutions of 25, 50, 100 and 200 using either normal or 4 minute intervals between normal agitations, then print each of the images into a 5x7 or 8x10 print. Lots of time to spend but not so much film if you cut the 36x roll into 3 or 4 pieces after exposure.

 

Good luck, Mr. Kelly....

[arraga]

<p><i>I want to process some Acros with still/stand Rodinal technique tomorrow. I want maximum edge-effect and sharpest resolution.</i>

 

<p>Acutance (perceived sharpness) and resolution are two very different things. Undiluted Perceptol is a low acutance, high resolution developer.

 

<p>Now, assuming you want maximum acutance, you want crawley's FX-1. If you want excellent acutance, with somewhat lower grain, you want FX-2.

[jtk]

Thanks Santiago and RH, and again Al Di for thoughts.

 

Yes, I expressed myself carelessly. I'm aware that images can appear very "sharp" when they actually lose detail in grain or as a result of excessive sharpening etc...a fine-grained film with extremely high resolution (eg line pairs) might appear less sharp than a lower-resolution grainy film with significant edge effect.

 

I'm not after maximum detail resolution, certainly not at the expense of hand-held speed, but I am after perceived sharpness, helped along by edge effect, with 100 or more rating. I'd like to be able to shoot something routinely at 200 or so...maybe that should be Neopan 400 rather than Acros 100 :-)

 

Years ago I felt that 2475 recording film and my 8X10 negatives had in common the details upon which perception would turn as a person viewed an image...with 8X10 eyes would notice image details and with 2475 eyes would notice grain, and eyes might be just as happy either way :-)

[big toys are better]

As far as FX-2 goes, I've used the Formulary's TFX-2 proprietary variant with fine results but the cost was more than I could justify when Rodinal has close to the same qualities and is much more stable in storage. If I had the time and money, it would be really nice to carefully compare the two developers with different films. TFX-2 is sure nice for fine grained films, but so is Rodinal if you don't mind the modest loss in film speed. TFX-2 should allow you to shoot FP-4+ at 200 for some situations since it gives 1/2 to a full stop of speed boost, and Acros should be enjoy speed enhancement (~ 160, maybe even 200). Both developers work well for semi-stand and full stand developing since neither is very prone to "streaking".