My second try at processing film at home was an utter failure. I was overconfident and tried a roll of Verichrome Pan expired since the early 1980s. The stuff simply would not go onto the reel. After 45 minutes of trying, it got so hot and humid in my dark bag that the film stuck to itself and was ruined. In retrospect, I probably reached too far too fast.
So for my third try I used up my last roll of Kosmo Foto Mono in my Agfa Clack (review here). I probably should have used my Yashica-12 as last time for consistency’s sake, but the Clack takes 8 6×9 images vs. the Yashica’s 12 6×6 images and I wanted to get through the roll as fast as I could so I could get on with the developing.
I had better luck this time, but the results still weren’t perfect. I diluted Rodinal to 1+50, and used the time-temp converter at the Massive Dev Chart site here to adjust developing time to my developer’s actual temperature, which was 23°, not the recommended 20°.
I am surprised by the widely varying directions online for developing black-and-white film. Some of them call for rinsing the film first, and some say that step is wholly unnecessary. They all use the chemicals in the same order, but except for the developer stage the amount of time for each subsequent step is all over the map.
Last time I used the Massive Dev Chart Timer app, and it was great except that it calls for a Hypo Clear step. I’m not using Hypo Clear and I couldn’t figure out how to skip it in the app. So this time I found some instructions online and followed them using my iPhone timer. My stupid iPhone screen kept shutting off and my damp fingers had trouble unlocking the phone — frustrating, and I’m sure some of my timings were off as a result. So maybe I need to invest in an actual timer.
As I searched online to find those instructions again, I came upon a different article that talked about agitation techniques in film developing — and discovered that I’m agitating too much and too hard, and that the results I’m getting are consistent with that. So next time I’ll agitate much more gently.
Below are all eight photos from the roll, from first to last. I put the film into the reel end first, so the last shots on the roll were closest to the reel’s core.
The negatives came out dense and several of them were blotchy, consistent with overagitation. The images closer to the spool’s core appear to be more messed up than the ones farther away. I had to really work them over in Photoshop. I was able to breathe good life into only a few of them.
My goals for developing my own film are to get scans fast and inexpensively. I’m not doing this because I want to fall in love with the process and be some film-processing fanboy. I’m mercenary; this is a means to an end, period. I’m not enjoying the learning curve. I will persist in hopes that I can soon get consistent and acceptable results.
I’m out of Kosmo Foto Mono now. I have a roll of Fujifilm Neopan 100 Acros left so I’ll shoot it next. Looking around online, people seem to get great results with T-Max 100 in Rodinal. The Film Photography Store sells it for a good price, so a 5-pack is on its way to me now.
Here now, the photographs. All but the first two are from downtown Lebanon, IN.
Get more of my photography in your inbox or reader! Click here to subscribe.
