steve_s.

Jim, your comment was uncalled for and unprofessional.

 

I have gradually become more and more dissatisfied with the juvenile display of personal remarks made on this forum. Many otherwise useful threads degenerate into bouts of name-calling and personal attacks. The more we engage in this, the more it looks like this is the accepted norm on this forum.

 

There is no reason for it. I would like to appeal to everyone to keep their comments positive and on topic. We are all here to learn and share, and that is best done in an atmosphere of mutual respect.

I have seen this discussion before in a photo.net thread. The convention that has grown up in photography is different than that used in chemistry or science. Paul, I think Lee is correctly stating the common way photographers discuss diluted developers.

 

In photography, I have always read and understood 1:3 to mean one part of developer and three parts water. So Joey, I would call your example of 250 ml of developer with 750 ml of water to be 1:3, not 1:4 as Paul suggests. Its true there are four parts, but the ratio is one part developer to three parts water.

 

If it were as Paul suggests, than 1:1 would mean the same thing as undiluted. That is, one part developer and the developer is the only thing in the solution (no water added). That is obviously not the case. A dilution of 1:1 refers to something different than an undiluted developer and will have a different recommended development time.

 

Also, I have always taken the convention of dilution to be expressed with a colon, like 1:1 or 1:3, etc. In photography, the use of a plus sign, like +2, is usually taken to mean extended development times to increase contrast, as when using the zone system (N +3 means increase your normal development time by three stops). So I wouldn't describe developer dilutions as 1 +3.

 

I know this photography convention is different than the science convention, but that is what dilution ratios mean to photographers: 500 ml developer added to 500 ml of water means 1:1 dilution.

I use FX-2, which is a great speed enhancing developer. I rate FP4 at 160-200 with this developer and love the pictures. I did test shots rated at 50, 100 and 200 EI and did not see any loss of shadow detail in the final prints.

I used to buy expired film on ebay, and I had no problems on the few rolls I bought. But the prices are rarely that much cheaper than what I can buy from B&H by mail. B&H sells my favorite Kodak and Ilford films for less than $3.00 a roll, so why take the risk? You never know how the previous user has stored the film.

Joe, the answers above give very good information about why and when people sometimes choose to shoot film at a speed slower than the rated EI. I just want to say that not everyone does this. It depends on the developer you are using and what your intended purposes are.

 

I shoot at rated speeds or higher and use speed enhancing developers. I do this because I look to shoot people and street scenes, and speed is most important to me. I shoot HP5+ at EI 400 and develop it in XTOL. I believe Roger Hicks (a well respected author and contributor to this forum) has written that he shoots HP5+ at 500-640. If you did that in D-76 or other non-speed enhancing formulas, I think you might lose some shadow detail.

 

For FP4+, I follow Anchell and Troop's advice and shoot it at EI 200 and develop in FX-2. I did test shots at EI's over and under the rated speed of 125 and printed 8X10's to the same contrast. When examined with a loupe, I saw no loss of shadow detail at 200, so that's what I shoot. EI 200 is a great speed for most street photography and FP4+ is a great film.

 

To answer the second part of your question, I checked some of my sources (Anchell and Troop's "The Film Developing Cookbook," and The Massive Developing Chart at www.digitaltruth.com), but they don't show times for Plus-X or Tri-X at 80 and 250. At 400 for Tri-X, they recommend 10 minutes at 20 degrees C. I would recommend doing a clip test at 8, 9, 10 and 11 minutes and stick with whichever developing time gives you the negatives you like best.

I can't help you in Chico, but I use The Darkroom in Sacramento. You rent by the hour and pay chemical charges depending on how many final prints you take home. It is located off the 65th Street Exit from Highway 50.

Brian, first, thank you for the information about earthlink.net and the workarounds you are doing. I really do appreciate this.

 

Second, this is the first time in four months that you have responded to my inquiries, either on this forum or in emails to you. I am sorry you find this "tiresome." I don't do it to annoy you. I kept asking because you have never answered or even acknowledged my many requests for help.

 

Third, please do not get rid of the forum alerts. It is MUCH easier than using RSS, which I have tried. RSS only gives you the new threads each day, not the responses to previous threads, unless you go into each thread and add an RSS feed to it. If you do that, you might as well just go in a read all the postings.

 

Forum alerts are the main reason I use photo.net. Without them, there is no reason for subscribing to photo.net. I have been a 2 year subscriber and I make my purchases from the advertiser links on your site. Up until now, you have benefited from me financially because of the forum alerts. I am sorry they are a pain to work with.

 

Fourth, please keep up your hard work. It really is appreciated. I just wish I was treated with more consideration and my questions were responded to. At present, my subscription has expired. I am going to see how the forum alerts work out over the next several weeks before I re-subscribe.

 

Best of luck,

 

steve

Well, I did not get my email alert summary today either. That makes seven days not getting it, then two days getting it, and now two days not. Do you have any information on why this happens?

 

Also, I have asked a couple of times in this post if my email is being bounced but have not gotten an response. Patrick, can you check to see if my email is being bounced back to photo.net? I see no indication of this at My Workspace, but I may not be checking in the right place.

 

Any information you can give me would help. I feel really in the dark here.

Patrick, good catch! Sorry, I meant Brian, although I am sure he doesn't mind being called "Brain."

 

On a sadder note, I once again did not get my email alerts today. So the problem is not fixed. I get them for a few days and then not again for a few days. It is extremely frustrating. The main way I use photo.net is to keep track of postings by the daily email summaries. Do you know if this problem is going to get permanently fixed? It has been this way for many, many months.

 

steve

Brain, thank you. I have received email alerts for the last two days. I will let you know if I have more problems.

Patrick, I have been having this problem for many, many months now. I will get the email alerts (the daily summary of postings to the B&W film processing forum) some days and then not for others. This week was the worst. I did get my daily summary today, but it is the first time since May 31!

 

So I doubt the problem is fixed. Brian, has anything changed?

Brian, it has been six days now that I have not gotten email

summaries for the B&W Film Processing Forum. I was getting them the

week of May 24. Can you give me ANY information that will help?

 

Your help is greatly appreciated.

 

Steve Sphar

I have not recieved my daily summaries for the B&W film processing forum for five days now. I have been having this problem off and on for many months now.

 

Brian, I asked you in my post yesterday where to check for a bounce flag in my workspace. Can you give me a reply?

 

Also, I checked with my provider and they said it would help them to research this problem from their end if they knew what error message you receive on bounced messages. Can you tell me if my messages are being bounced and what the error message is? This would help me greatly. Thanks for your help.

 

Steve Sphar

Brian, I am also an earthlink.net user who is having trouble with my email alerts. I have not gotten one for several days. Can you tell me how to check for (and clear) the "bouncing" flag on my workspace?

 

I have looked around and can't find a "bouncing" flag. At my "Site Bureaucracy" box, when I click on "edit email alerts," it just says that my choices are enabled. Is there somewhere else I check to see if my account is bouncing the email alerts?

 

I appreciate your help. I will also check with earthlink to see if there is something they can do to help me.

 

Steve Sphar

My favorite combination for portraits is FP4+ developed in FX-2. It is bitingly sharp, so it can be good if you want to capture every crag in a craggy face, but can be bad if the person has skin blemishes that they don't want to see in the final picture.

 

For an example, see this picture of my daughter.

 

http://www.photo.net/photo/1258407

Good advice is good advice, irregardless of whether it is grammatically correct.

Lex, thank you for the help. I will look into RSS.

I would like some help from my friends in this B&W community. Are

any of you having problems getting your daily email compilations of

threads and responses to this forum?

 

For several months now, I have only been getting the emails

intermittently. I will get it for a couple of days and then it will

miss for several days. I have not gotten an email with responses to

this forum since April 27.

 

I have written to photo.net several times and used the site feedback

forum, all to no avail. Not even a response or acknowledgment from

photo.net. It is quite frustrating to not get to read all of your

new threads and responses. I miss my daily update on these responses.

 

So, I would like to know if any of you are having this problem. Do

each of you that have signed up for daily email alerts, are you

getting them? Or are you having the same problem I am? I would

really like to know if this is a photo.net problem or just a problem

with my account.

 

Thanks for allowing this off-topic thread. I need some help, and I

am NOT getting it from the photo.net administrators.

Gabriel, where did you hear that this feature was disabled? I have gotten daily email alerts for over a year up until these problems a few months ago. I last got an email alert on April 27, but none from April 28 through today, May 3.

Like Robert Holmes, I also have not gotten replies to my inquires. For two months now, I have been posting to this feedback forum and emailing Brian about one specific problem (not getting the daily emails) and have never gotten an acknowledgemnt, let alone a solution.

 

I am very frustrated with this situation. I believe that the photo.net guys are busy working to fix the problems. But it feels inconsiderate to be ignored for so long after repeated inquiries. This is creating ill-will among your (paying) photo.net faithful.

I wish I could be as confident as you. I have had this trouble for many months, and despite repeated inquiries and emails to photo.net, I have never even received an acknowledgement. At some point, I think someone would have the common courtesy to at least respond to me.

 

I support this site and the people who work so hard to make it possible. I am a two year subscriber. And I know they are busy. But no one can even acknowledge my emails and tell me they are working on it? Or can't work on it? Or it is unfixable? That is unexcusable. Eventually, it will burn my good will with this site and cause me to rethink about resubscribing. What good does it do me to contribute money to the site if I can't access its services?

Brian, can you answer my thread on not getting my email alerts?

For the third day in a row, I have not gotten the email notices i

have signed up for. Is this happening to anyone else? It is very

frustrating.

 

Does anyone have any information about this?

I did not get my email alerts for yesterday or today. Can someone

tell me why?

Lex, I agree that N+ or N- is meaningless in Diafine. I was suggesting a clip test to save the rest of the roll, not to test different development times. By shooting and developing a few frames first, you know which EI to use for the rest of the roll.

 

If you bracket several half stops up and down for every shot on the roll, only a few of the frames will be optimally exposed. Of course, that may not be bad if you want to compare different types of lighting conditions. Still a good use of a test roll.