Preparations

     

Mixing chemicals (distillate water)     

I use one type of developer for long time. Using different developers all the time and different films prove to be certain way to chaos, disappointment and non-reproducible results. I am using liquid concentrate developers for reason that I use them one shot. I used to mix Kodak Xtol from powder and keeping five one litter bottles, but when I discover Ilford LC-29 and later Paterson Aculux 2, I never mix from powder again. I am using Paterson Aculux 2 diluted 1:9 for all my development for last few years. Developer I always dilute by demineralized or distillate water just before I am going to use it. As demineralized water is cheaper and easily obtained than distillate, I use that. Now a days I am using two Paterson tank which
each takes three 35mm rolls and require 900ml of liquid. I come to this change because I do make a lot of films and this way I can develop three films at the same time. Normally I do develop second tank just after first is finished. This takes me about two hours time
including preparation, washing film, cleaning and hanging film for drying. This way I can do in one go six films. Than I need to wait until tanks are completely dry and I can do next round, normally it needs few hours to dry itself.

Cooling/heating     

I strictly keep temperature of 20C. In winter I warm up bottle with mixed developer in warm water bath and in summer in cold some time with ice cubes in it. I also try to cool tank. This eliminates temperature changes after developer is in tank. In hot summer when temperature here in building can go up to 28-30C I prepare developer to 19.5 or 19C so when it is in tank it raise a bit to 20C and not more.

Developing

How do I start timer ?

I am starting timer when whole developer is poured in tank. Normally it takes about 7-8 seconds. With a Paterson 3 roll tank it is very fast. It is less than four seconds. That is also one of the reasons I switched to this tank. Also pouring out is even faster whole 900ml of liquid are gone in two seconds.

How do I invert and how to measure interval ?

After developer is in tank I shake for about 15-20 seconds (I do not do this with Paterson tank that intensively as the liquid is floating in spiral inside of the tank quite a lot so I only invert tank 2 or 3 times and let the liquid float itself) and tank tap tank on bottom to release a bubbles from film. Than I inverting every minute 3-4 about two times which takes about 8-10 seconds. I do this inversion slowly. For each film and each light it was exposed I have little different way of agitation. My normal film is Fomapan 200 exposed at 100 and I know that if it is exposed in contrast light I only invert once every minute. If shots are done in dull weather with lower contrast I can get nicer results when I invert 3 times in those 8-10 seconds.

When I measure temp while developing ?

In about middle of the development time I open cover of tank and measure a temperature. I do this mostly only in hot days to ensure that temperature didn't rise too much. If temperature raised, I do shorter development time.

Stop bath

When I pour dev. out ?

I start purring developer out of the tank down the sink (one shot) about 10 5 seconds before time of development is finished. This plays with the fact that I start timer only when all developer was already in tank.

Stop bath yes/no and how.

These days I use stop batch. I use Amaloco S10 stop bath with indicator. Why did I decide to do that. Well simply, some development required rather short time. Developing Foma 200 at 100 is sometimes six minutes development time. And I have three rolls in tank and 900ml of developer. Even the tank is empties in few seconds I expect that there is still quite a lot of developer on the surface of the films. And therefore I use the stop bath.

After 20-30sec in stop bath I pour it back to bottle and that I rise tank with 20C water for about 20-30 seconds.

Fixing

Fixer and how to invert.

After rise with water is done I fill tank with prepared fixer at temperature of 20C in the same amount as developer. I am using Amaloco X89 fixer diluted 1:4.

For how long fixer ?

I fix for 5 minutes and invert every minute for 10-15 seconds. More or less same way as I do with developer.

Fixer back to bottle.

After five minutes I put used fixer back to bottle. Normally I prepare 1 liter of diluted fixer from concentrate and than use it for 10-15 rolls of film and than replace by fresh mix.

Cleaning and last steps

Clean with water

After fixer I fill tank with water and shake 5-10 times and fill again with water and do the same.

Cleaning agent and how agitating it.

After water I use cleaner fluid Amaloco H-8 diluted 1:7 for three minutes while inverting constantly. This will clean film from purple artifacts of fixer. And ensure that I do not need to wash film very long.

Wash out and inspection.

After cleaning agent I fill tank with water and do 5 inversions, than fill again and do 10 inversions. And than leave tank wash with running water for about five minutes. As last I do again 5 inversion and flush water out of the tank.

Anti spot wash.

As a last liquid which goes to the tanks is wetting agent. I use Amaloco H-10. I let it sit in tank for minute or so and than I take film out of the tank I look quickly over it. Next I put metal clips on it. Holding film on one hand a leaving the other hand hanging down I pour it with wetting agent from tank. I pour it from both side and I take care to not put any liquid on metal clip I am holding in my hand. This will ensure that film will dry equally and no traces of water or wetting agent will leave on film. I use to have a problem that drying marks from stream of water were present on the edge of the film. I have bought and now I use Durst film squeegee. So I softly
wipe the film from top to down with it. I have no more those drying edges, but on some films (foma 400 specially) I having some scratches, not sure why it is, maybe just this film is bit more sensitive on mechanical touch. Never had this problem with any Fuji film.

How to hang and cut.

Than I hang still wet film on dark, dry and not dusty space to dry. It takes about 2-3 hours in warm weather and about six hours in winter. Usually I do two to four three to six rolls in one or two goes and let them dry overnight. Morning I cut then by six frames and place then do sleeves where up to seven strips for six frames fit. I number each roll by the year of development and sequence number. So I have rolls name 2003-34, 2003-35...