Tetenal C-41 Press Kit

[mark45831]

been wanting to do some color film developing , B&H carries this but only in store pickup, but I am not set on this kit but was wanting some opinions on this and other kits and where I might be able to order it. I have to go about 80 miles to get to a camera store that carries stuff like this.

[tomspielman]

Amazon has a similar kit, so does freestyle, and the film photography project store (filmphotographystore.com). The latter seems to be out of the 1 liter kit but has the 2 liter kit for a good price.

[rodeo_joe1]

Tried a few kits, and Tetenal make the only readily-available C-41 kit that gives results even close to good commercial processing. Even then, 'kitchen sink' processing with no thermostatically-controlled tempering bath and using hand agitation, is going to give variable and inferior results.

 

Find a decent lab or buy a semi-automatic rotary processing machine. It's cheaper than wasting time and film.

[Ed_Ingold]

Tetenal kits combine the bleach and fixer into a single solution, Blix. My problems with Tetanal has been incomplete removal of silver, causing color balance issues and interference with dust and scratch elimination (ICE) in scanning. Bleach (potassium dichromate) is the proscribed chemical (oxidizer) which requires a special license to transport. You can mix your own from dry chemicals, which can be shipped easily, and use a separate hardening fixer, available and shipped commercially.

 

Temperature control during processing can be done without thermostatically tempered water. Put water into a foam drink cooler and adjust the temperature by mixing and stirring. Pre-temper your chemicals, adjusting the bath temperature from time to time. Don't try to wash the film with mixed water. The temperature can soar without warning. Cold water is sufficient and much safer. Rinse from the bottom up, with a tube through the core of the reels, using low water flow (to avoid damage to the film).

 

Over the years I have developed hundreds of rolls of film, with and without a temperature bath, agitating by hand. Seems to work. I prefer stainless steel tanks and and reels (since grade school), and agitation by inversion.

[glen_h]

I have some C-41 film in sizes that labs won't process, so someday I might do this again.

 

Otherwise, at the rate I do it, and the keeping property of mixed chemistry, having a nearby

lab do it works best.

 

I know some use Ferric-EDTA in the bleach, which as far as I know doesn't have the problems of dichromate.

[antoniobravo]

for only few rolls (~15), and with a reasonable shelf-life once opened, the small Compard kit works well and is cheap:

Compard Digibase C-41 ready to use kit 3x 500ml

I do kitchen development, with the regular Tetenal/Fuji/Compard/Rollei and it's easy to get consistent good results with little money: a sous-vide cooker in the sink to keep temperature stable, and I use a hacked cheap chinese small sorbet maker top for rotary agitation of the spool in a Paterson-like tank. I even use that DIY rotary agitation setting for BW, as it's easy to do tests, it's reproductible.

[john_shriver]

I wish someone sold the Compard kit in the US.

[tomspielman]

for only few rolls (~15), and with a reasonable shelf-life once opened, the small Compard kit works well and is cheap:

Compard Digibase C-41 ready to use kit 3x 500ml

I do kitchen development, with the regular Tetenal/Fuji/Compard/Rollei and it's easy to get consistent good results with little money: a sous-vide cooker in the sink to keep temperature stable, and I use a hacked cheap chinese small sorbet maker top for rotary agitation of the spool in a Paterson-like tank. I even use that DIY rotary agitation setting for BW, as it's easy to do tests, it's reproductible.

 

I use an electric roaster I got from a thrift shop that's switched on and off with a Raspberry Pi setup to regulate temperature. There's a specific algorithm used that you have to tune that I can't remember the name of off the top of my head. It learns how quickly the water is heated by the roaster and adjusts itself accordingly to keep the temp where it's supposed to be. It was a fun little project. I use a cheap aquarium pump to circulate the water. It works well but it's overkill.

 

Sous-vides have gotten inexpensive and are good solution but honestly a small insulated drink cooler filled with water would do the job just fine. Add hot and cold water as necessary to get the temp to where it should be.

 

Though maybe not quite as important as it is for C-41, B&W processing times often assume a certain temperature. It's around room temp but "room temp" varies significantly in my basement from season to season. So I use the water in a cooler technique with B&W chemicals.

Edited October 25, 2019 by tomspielman

[antoniobravo]

I use an electric roaster I got from a thrift shop that's switched on and off with a Raspberry Pi setup to regulate temperature. There's a specific algorithm used that you have to tune that I can't remember the name of off the top of my head. It learns how quickly the water is heated by the roaster and adjusts itself accordingly to keep the temp where it's supposed to be. It was a fun little project. I use a cheap aquarium pump to circulate the water. It works well but it's overkill.

 

Sous-vides have gotten inexpensive and are good solution but honestly a small insulated drink cooler filled with water would do the job just fine. Add hot and cold water as necessary to get the temp to where it should be.

 

Though maybe not quite as important as it is for C-41, B&W processing times often assume a certain temperature. It's around room temp but "room temp" varies significantly in my basement from season to season. So I use the water in a cooler technique with B&W chemicals.

 

your setting is more sophisticated than mine. :) and yes I agree that an insulated tank hand regulated according to a kitchen thermometer is enough, C41 chemicals for hand tanks are quite tolerant in fact. Yet it's not comfortable, prone to errors, and not easy for reproducible results.

 

initially I was having different ideas for more or less elaborated devices. What is important to me is to avoid standing by a sink all the time with a timer, doing hand agitations and rotations, and to have some homogeneity is the process for reasonably reproducible results. Important when experimenting/testing.

I am used to tinker a lot in different fields and often you have around devices, tools, materials easy to adapt for different goals.

 

in this case, I need temperature control and water volume temperature homogeneity (water will be more or less same temperature everywhere in the sink and constant speed agitation.

 

- for temperature control, a cheap sous-vide/circulator cooker works perfect. May just have to tweak the handle for the sink.

 

- for agitation: I just noticed that some of the small cheap icecream makers have the lock which has the small motor, a bit smaller than the diameter of a Paterson tank.

this kind of bowl, sold for 300 kr. ~ 30 eur ~ 35 usd :

 

 

 

it's useless for icecream making, but see its parts:

 

 

 

the top fits on top of a Paterson tank:

 

 

 

so, cut the connector of the stirrer blade and epoxy glue it to a Paterson agitator stick. and you have a Paterson electrical agitator at constant speed. It has enough power to rotate tanks with 2x 120 spools or 3x 35mm spools:

 

 

 

 

 

in order to have that top at the correct height over the Paterson central column, and stay stable while rotating, I needed to provide a compensating insert. I cut a stripe of flat 1mm plexiglass sheet, and bend it with a hot air gun into circular shape:

 

 

 

 

this ring isn't the full lenght of the circumference because some room is reserved for adjusting the Paterson stick on the agitator column in the tank, and a small piece of plastic is inserted and glued on the side of the stirrer block, which will rest of the one end of the plexiglass stripe and so will not self-rotate.

This small stopping piece of plastic, circled in blue:

 

 

 

the ring on the Paterson tank:

 

 

 

 

the whole in use. This costs ~1000 kr ~100eur ~ 110usd, it's simplier and more reliable than a Jobo system. I have never had problems

 

 

 

a couple short videos:

[tomspielman]

your setting is more sophisticated than mine. :) and yes I agree that an insulated tank hand regulated according to a kitchen thermometer is enough, C41 chemicals for hand tanks are quite tolerant in fact. Yet it's not comfortable, prone to errors, and not easy for reproducible results.

 

initially I was having different ideas for more or less elaborated devices. What is important to me is to avoid standing by a sink all the time with a timer, doing hand agitations and rotations, and to have some homogeneity is the process for reasonably reproducible results. Important when experimenting/testing.

I am used to tinker a lot in different fields and often you have around devices, tools, materials easy to adapt for different goals.

 

in this case, I need temperature control and water volume temperature homogeneity (water will be more or less same temperature everywhere in the sink and constant speed agitation.

 

- for temperature control, a cheap sous-vide/circulator cooker works perfect. May just have to tweak the handle for the sink.

 

- for agitation: I just noticed that some of the small cheap icecream makers have the lock which has the small motor, a bit smaller than the diameter of a Paterson tank.

this kind of bowl, sold for 300 kr. ~ 30 eur ~ 35 use :

 

...

 

I liking using film cameras but I enjoy tinkering with the cameras themselves or doing this kind of thing at least as much.

 

Well done !

[JDMvW]

Even then, 'kitchen sink' processing with no thermostatically-controlled tempering bath and using hand agitation, is going to give variable and inferior results.

 

I used to have a real darkroom with temperature control and all, but in my current 3/4 bathroom 'dim' room, I have not thought it worth the trouble, although it was much handier here when I still had local C41 development alternatives.