Here's my procedure, add your $.02

[jeffrey_lazo]

Since selling my Digital SLR in favor of getting back to shooting

primes, B&W, and scanning my negs, I have started to forget my

developing tricks. Here it what I have been doing lately, resulting

in dense negs that do not scan very esaily.

<p>

</p>

1.load tmx into 2 Hewes reels, SS tank.<br>

2.pre-wash for a minute with constant inversions.<br>

3.Devel for kodak prescribed times, 68, tmax developer.<br>

4.180 degree inversions clockwise, 5-7 per second, every 30.<br>

5.10 seconds, constant agitaion, Ilford Stop bath.<br>

6.5 minutes Ilford rapid fix, inversions same as developer.<br>

7.Rinse-fill, 5 invers, fill, 10 ivers, 15,20,25,30.<br>

8.rinse w/ photo-flo.

<p>

</p>

I am scanning with a scan dual II, vuescan. I seem to be getting

dense, sometimes grainy/contrasty negs, which would point me to too

high of temp, too much agitation or to long of developing, all of

which I think I am controlling.

<br>

<br>

Any adjustments you would make?

[vatovec]

I would skip the presoak step it is no longer needed with modern emulsions - And if you get too contrasty negs you should shorten development time.

 

And change only one step at a time so you will know what you`re doing.

[pascal_miele]

like David, skip the presoak.

 

If you are too grainy and contrast, this can be an artefact of the scaning not the film grain.

 

Try a classic silver print before any change to the process.

[lex_jenkins]

Ditto the advice from David and Pascal. Just a few more suggestions:

 

You can influence grain to a small degree by modifying your agitation technique. And different developers will deliver different apparent grain.

 

But scanning b&w film will almost always present a problem. You might try the various grain minimizing filters offered by Vuescan.

 

Also, TMX (T-Max 100) generally scans with the least apparent grain of any conventional b&w film I've tried.

[lex_jenkins]

Another tip:

 

Negs destined to be scanned generally need to be a bit thinner. Try less development. I've successfully scanned razor thin negatives that could barely be printed by conventional means. You can always tweak the scan afterward to get the desired contrast.

 

You'll also see less grain with less development. (Mike Scarpitti should feel gratified to hear a plank of his platform echoed by someone else, if only for the hybrid film/digital method.)

[rick_jones5]

Lex - please clarify and/or give more information. You mention "grain can be influenced to a small degree by modifying your agitation technique". If you had stated agitation technique will influence negative densities and thus apparent grain I would have no question. If the actual mechanics of agitation can influence apparent grain I would be grateful to know exactly how you agitate to effect apparent grain. Never too old to learn new tricks.

[carl cherry]

Scanning the negs as 48-bit color positives will help with any B&W negatives with any scanner. You'll end up with an image that looks overexposed, very flat with very subtle gradations -- looks hopeless but is perfect for digital processing. If you have an advanced program like PS, save a mixture of the three color channels in mononchrome mode, then convert to grayscale, 16-bit. Keep in 16-bit for as long as possible for adjustment layers (levels and curves). If your orginal negative was anywhere in the ballpark, you can make great digital prints with this method.

 

Don't change your processing until you try this method. But I agree with Lex -- thinner is better than thicker if your only concern is scanning. I pull most film two stops to get a low contrast starting point. Carl

[lex_jenkins]

Rick, the frequency of and intervals between agitation can affect grain with acutance developers. It can also affect the contrast index. This is well established with Beutler formulae, Rodinal and others.

 

For example, with Neofin Blau and APX 25, the developer manufacturer lists times for continuous (every 3 seconds) agitation and the more familiar 1-minute interval. Using the 1-minute interval method twice as much time, 8 minutes vs. 4, is needed to reach a CI of 0.55.

 

What isn't clear is an agreement regarding acutance, with concurent increased grain, and agitation. With acutance developers the consensus seems to be that extended interval agitation *increases* acutance and therefore grain while those characteristics are lessened with continuous agitation.

 

Being that it's early and I'm in the middle of my first cup of coffee I might be omitting some useful information or have simply gotten my wires crossed.

[chris_waller]

I pre-soak. I know some people regard it as only one step

removed from voodoo but it works for me. But i just give about 6

inversions and let it stand. When developing I invert 4 times in

the first 30 seconds then once every 30 seconds after that. I stop

for 1 minute. fix for twice the clearing time, checked by dropping

the leader in the top of the tank at the beginning of the fixing

stage.

[sjmurray]

I'm using a similar set-up (Dual Scan III). I have been scanning negs I took 20 and 30 years ago, so the density and contrast varies a lot. I have gotten the best results with a wide range of negs using Vuescan, and typically setting the Black Point and White Point settings both to zero, for starters. This captures about as much gradation from the neg as possible. Like the above post mentions, you get a somewhat flat looking scan but it is perfect for working with in Photoshop. I have been scanning in 16 bit gray scale, 2800 dpi, no smoothing or sharpening during the scan. Even my Tri-X negs are no grainier than the silver prints from the same neg. I can see the actual grain in my prints, which looks like it should, not better, no worse. I think lower res scans give you more obvious pixellation, which looks like grain, but its not. Stick with the highest scan resolution of your machine. Vuescan also has a variety of films you can preset for. I tend to use the profile for TMX 100 on all my black and white negs. I found the Minolta sofware for the scanner really sucks, and I cannot do any of this fine tuning without Vuescan. Its like having an infinite number of paper grades for printing, and that's before going into Photoshop. I have made some pretty impressive prints this way, and I have the silver gelatin versions to compare to.

[mike_scarpitti]

'Kodak prescibed times' could be the issue, but necessarily for the reasons you may think. Chemistry is over-strength when fresh. According to standard practise, chemistry is manufactured over-strength (±10%) to allow for shelf aging, which weakens the ingredients.

[mskovacs]

I've recently tried scanning some push processed HP5+ negs from my wife's sister's wedding and I find that my Nikon scanner has a rough time extracting detail out of the dense areas (bright areas in positive). Since grain and contrast are the result of shooting fast films and push processing, I think these will require a trip to the traditional darkroom to print successfully.<p>The frame below looks great as a neg on the light table but the detail of the bride's face and chest looks blown in the scan.<p><img src="http://www.photo.net/photodb/image-display?photo_id=1884402&size=md">

[mike_scarpitti]

There are super-proportional (or is it sub-proportional?) reducers that reduce the heavier parts of the negative more than the shadows. Maybe worth trying????

[jeffrey_lazo]

I really appreciate all of the information and opinions. I will closely watch my timings,

probably drop the pre-wash and slow down/ go with less intense agitation. To make

thinner negs that will scan better, would I be better off rating my tmax at 80, or just

under deeloping my negs by 10%?

[al_kaplan1]

If you insist on scanning from a B&W negative shoot chromagenic (C-41 process) B&W film. Otherwise if digital output is required scan from a high quality B&W print.

[hil3]

Wow, 5-7 inversions per second! You must be able to flick your wrists like a hummingbird flaps its wings. ;0)

 

Try 3-5 inversions in a 5 second period of time (will probably seem like an eon between inversions to you). Also cut back to every minute rather than every 30 secs.

 

I didn't notice what film and EI you are using, but it will probably help if you cut back Kodak's times 10-20 percent.

[jeffrey_lazo]

Whoops! My hands aren't that quick! I do 5-7 inversions in about 5 seconds!

[jeffrey_lazo]

Been sticking with tmx and tmy shooting at 100 and 400.

[richard_cochran]

<cite>To make thinner negs that will scan better, would I be better off rating my tmax at 80, or just under deeloping my negs by 10%?</cite>

<p>

First off, to make negatives thinner, you'd want give them LESS

exposure, not more, which means you need to increase the rated

film speed, not decrease. Exposing Tmax 100 at 125 or 160 will make

thinner than normal negatives. Exposing at 80 or 64 will make the

negatives thicker than they were when exposed at 100.

<p>

But that may be irrelevant, because the second point is

to remember the adage, "expose for the shadows, develop

for the highlights". Exposure is the primary control for

shadow density, while development primarily influences

highlight density. If you cut exposure, you'd reduce

highlight density somewhat, but you'd lose shadow detail.

If you're happy with your shadow

detail, but you want to cut the density in the highlights

to allow your scanner to pull more detail out of them before

blocking up, then you need to cut development, not exposure.

[scott_eaton]

<I>If you insist on scanning from a B&W negative shoot chromogenic (C-41 process) B&W film</i><P>Nothing I've seen in this thread, or the majority of recent threads on scanning B/W would convince me otherwise I'll tell you that. Blocked highlights, grainy, poor midtones.....<P>Since it lacks strong density range in the first place, properly exposed and processed TMX 100 should scan just fine. This is among the better scanning conventional B/W films and if your film is dense then reduce your process time. Good TMX negs actually look just a bit on the thin side.

[wclark5179]

How do you rate this image? The client liked it and so I like it! It was shot at a wedding reception, TMY 400 ASA developed in ID-11, 1:3, 17 min at 68 degrees. I follow Ilford's recommendations for agitation, 4 times gentleinversion for 10 seconds once each minute. TMX, 100 ASA is even better! Photo taken with Mamiya 645 with bare bulb flash.<P>I like how TMAX films scan!<div></div>

[garry1]

Let's see-

counting my posting, that give you a total of 42 cents. That make this advice worth a package of gum. }:^)> }:^)>

I was going to be serious but someone beat me to the hummingbird line.

[patrick_gainer]

Thinner is better for scanning in my experience. I mean thinner due to underdevelopment. If a neg would take grade 4 paper to make a decent print, it will usually scan very well. With high contrast, you run the risk of exceeding the density range of the scanner. As long as there is any detail in the shadows (Zone III) and the contrast is low, you can get a good scan from some negs you would give up on under the enlarger.

[jeffrey_lazo]

Ok, so I adjusted my developing agitation to rotating on a horizontal axis rather than 180 degress of inversions, negs look thinner, but I did a too quick of a job shooting the roll with my strobes and under-exposed the images. One came out nice, so I know it wasn't my developing. I will shoot another roll in the "real" world and devel the same to test.