Home Developing Guide

Welcome to the Melbourne Silver Mine's beginner's guide to developing black and white film at home.

What you'll need

Protective equipment

• Rubber Gloves
• Protective Eyewear
• Cotton Gloves

Many photographic chemicals are hazardous and precautionary measures should be taken to avoid contact with skin and eyes and to avoid ingestion. MSM Inc encourages the use of rubber gloves and protective eyewear whenever dealing with photographic chemicals. Read the safety advice on all chemistry you'll be using before opening the packaging.

Hardware

• Measuring Jug (1 litre, marked in ml's - a small medicine measurer is good for Rodinal, for instance)
• Thermometer
• Daylight developing tank with spool(s) - either a plastic one (such as those made by Jobo and Paterson) or the stainless steel variety.
• Timer (countdown is best).
• Clothes pegs or film clips.
• Dark bag, or fully dark work environment.
• A well-ventilated work area.

Chemistry

• A developer (see Choosing a developer)
• A fixer
• A stop bath (optional)
• Photoflo / Ilfotol (optional)
• Water

Loading Tanks

The most commonly used home developing tank is the Paterson system 4, and in this tutorial we'll be assuming you are using this system. These tanks generally comprise of a tank, a centre spindle, a funnel shaped light lock and the film reels themselves. These tanks are also supplied with an agitation rod which fits into grooves in the spindle to assist in agitation, and a snap lock lid, which enables inversion agitation without having your chemistry tip out.

IMPORTANT When properly assembled these tanks are light-proof and can be used in daylight. Proper assembly means you have both the spindle and the light lock in place.

Using an old roll of film you do not want, practice loading the reel. For 135 film, (35mm) start by snipping off the leader and rounding the edges (rounding edges not critical but it can help.) Take your spool and look at it, ensuring it is set to the correct width - for 135 this would be its smallest setting. This can be changed by twisting the two sides in opposite directions until it snaps open, pulling it out or pushing into to correct setting, then twisting in other direction to snap closed. Practice this before loading film. For 120 film, the reel should be at its widest setting.

Locate the entry point on the reel. There are a couple of ball bearings there. Close your eyes and learn what it feels like with your hands. Try putting it down and picking it up with your eyes closed, locating the entry point and twisting to ensure the two entry point are lined up. This initial part can be tricky in a dark bag, so practice will help.

Take the film leader and feed it into the reel. It should be flat and even, and when in far enough it will not pull out (the ball bearings lock it in place.) Now, using a ratchet motion, allow the film to feed into the reel. Practice this with an old roll in daylight until you can do it with your eyes closed. Because you'll need to!

Assuming you are now loading a live film into a tank, in a dark bag - remember the following:

For bigger tanks that hold more than one reel, ensure the bottom of the tank is loaded first and any empty space taken up with empty reels. This is to prevent the reels from slipping up and out of developer when tank is inverted.

Ensure the light trap is locked in place, and the spindle is in place before opening the dark bag.

Well done you.

NOTE: Plastic reels can be notoriously difficult to load when wet, so ensure all your equipment is bone dry before attempting to load. Occasionally, the film may catch and refuse to go any further - this can be caused by warpage of the inner rails, sticky substances creating friction, or curling and rough ends on the leading film edge. If the film sticks, do not attempt force it too much (a little is OK - short gentle ratcheting can help move it on) - but rather, dismantle the reel, remove the film and try again. If you need to look at your reel to ensure it's OK - roll up the film and place it inside the tank, ensuring the spindle and light lock are in place. Then you can open the dark bag and work out what's going on. Cotton gloves can be useful to help guide the film without getting fingerprints all over it.

Choosing a developer

The developer you choose is in many ways not your most important choice. While it's true that different developers will produce different grain / tonality / sharpness depending on the film choice, it's far better to simply choose a developer and film combo and stick to it as you practice different developing techniques. In this way you'll learn the capabilities of the film and developer, and learn how to alter small variables to produce the negatives you want.

There are many brands of film developer available, all with wonderful name like - Diafine, Rodinal, Ultrafin, DDX, Ilfosol, Microphen , D-76… the list goes on.

Developers come in three main categories:

• Once-off. These developers you mix up, develop your film in, then discard. They are not designed to be reused, as the reaction with the film quickly depletes them. Rodinal is one such developer.

• Multiple rolls: these developers, like Ultrafin Plus, can be mixed up and the mixed liquid can be kept and reused a number of times. Ultrafin Plus for example gives you approximately 12 rolls per 1 litre batch before depletion begins, and comes in bottles enough to make 2 litres, so effectively, 24 rolls.

• Extra Long Life: Developers such as Diafine are two part developers. This separation of the chemical stages of development ensures that depletion is much much slower - theoretically there is a limit however in practice depletion is rarely reported.

Before you begin, ask questions of your fellow silverminers already developing at home. Look at film / developer combinations and decide which you are going to start with. There is no right or wrong, and one developer isn't really any better than another - it depends on the film you're using and the type of image you like.

The process

Developing black and white negative film has four stages.

1. Development
2. Stop
3. Fix
4. Wash

Begin by determining the ideal time and temperature for your film / developer combination. Each film will have it's own ideal time in different developers. For example, Fuji Neopan 1600 will take 8mins of development in Rodinal (1+50), while Kodak Tri-X 400 will take 7.5mins in the same dilution.

Before mixing up your chemistry, work out how much you need to cover the film entirely in your tank. Usually there will be a guide on the bottom of the tank, so read that first!

The chemistry usually needs to be at a certain temperature - most black and white developers are designed for use at 20 degrees Celsius. Run your tap and bring the water to that temperature by adjusting hot and cold.

The mix of water : developer varies from solution to solution. Rodinal is a highly dilute developer, which can be used at 1+100, or 1+50 or 1+25. At 1+50, to make 500mls you would make up 500ml of water, then tip in 10ml of Rodinal. (51 parts in total)

Other developers, like Ilford DDX will have a stronger dilution, like 1+4. In this case, to make 500ml, you'll need 100ml of developer and 400ml of water.

Once you have the developer dilution ready, and you know what time is required for developing, you are ready to go.

Set your stop watch to the time required - for example, 8 minutes. Hit start and immediately pour in your developer, followed by clipping on the plastic lid to your tank if it has one. Rap the tank sharply on a hard surface to dislodge any air bubbles from the film surface, and begin your initial agitation.

Agitation

The act of agitation serves to keep the developer from separating and settling into different strengths in the tank. It also serves to keep fresh solution moving over the surface of the film, helping with even development. Under or over agitation can have differing effects on the outcome, so consistency is the key.

Inversion agitation: With the plastic lid clamped on, invert the tank gently 180 degrees and back again two or three times.

Spindle agitation - using the turning peg provided with your tank, twist the inner spindle backwards and fro in an even swirling motion.

Generally, development requires constant agitation for the first 30 seconds, then intermittent agitation throughout development. Commonly, this would be agitation for 10 seconds out of every minute - although it may be 5 seconds every thirty seconds. Read your development instructions.

Stop Bath

When the development time is up, quickly pour out the solution and halt the development by filling tank with water at correct temperature (same as developing temp.) You can also use a chemical stop bath at this stage which will halt the development of the film slightly quicker and will also help prolong your fixer (by beginning to mop up the excess silver halide salts on the film.) A chemical stop bath is not really needed however, but you have the choice.

Fixing

As alluded above, the fixing stage serves to remove unexposed silver halide from the negative, leaving only the metallic silver (the image.) If you take the film out of the container and look at it after the stop bath, you'll notice it is a milky white colour, with the image standing out in black. The fixing stage "clears" the film, ensuring your shadows are dark and deep.

Under-fixed film will be cloudy, or sometimes streaky, and often it will be clear at edges but cloudy down the middle. If your fixer is not fresh, it's a good idea to check that the film is correctly fixed before washing. Ensure you wear gloves if you are taking the film out of the fix with your fingers.

Wash

Once fixed, the film is ready to be washed and dried, cut and scanned or optically printed. The washing time varies from film to film, but generally the so called "Ilford" method is the recommended technique of MSM.

Ilford Wash Method:

1. Fill tank with water at correct temperature, and fit the plastic lid.
2. Invert tank 5 times, then empty water
3. Fill again, this time invert 10 times, then dump water
4. Fill again, invert 20 times, then empty the water
5. Repeat step 4.

After this washing, the water should run out with no, or only very few bubbles. If you are unsure, repeat step four a few more times. The washing serves to removes all traces of fixer from the negative, which preserves the film to almost archival quality. Fix left on the film will continue to react and eventually your images can become comprised, so thorough washing is vital

Photoflo (detergent)

At the last wash, Photoflo (or Ilfotol) can be used to assist in the even drying of the film. Photoflo is a surfactant (wetting agent) which breaks down the surface tension of water. Only a very small amount is required: too much can create bubbles and scum on top of your negative, which would require further washing (and sometimes only shows up when dry.) Some silver miners use a small touch of normal dishwashing liquid, or shampoo which has the same effect. Rinse well after using these if so desired.

Drying

The film should be dried in a dust free humid environment - so for silver miners, bathrooms are often the ideal choice. If possible, clip the film up high, and clip the bottom at an angle to the top, keep film straight. (The angle assists in draining the water from the film.)

Once dry, the film is ready to be cut, sleeved, scanned and uploaded to the MSM pool.