Anonymous
I have a question for you /p/, how many of you actually take pictures on traditional cameras and develop them yourselves? I do for everything but night photography.

Picture slightly related, its a picture I took out of my garden a couple of weeks ago; at night.
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>> Anonymous
     File :-(, x)
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>> ac !!VPzQAxYPAMA
Several of us do. I spent most of last night reeking of fixer myself, with a developed roll of TMax100 as my reward.
>> Anonymous
I just finished processing one roll of C41 and one roll of E6 in black and white chemicals.

The roll of C41 is some very very old kodak gold that I found in one of my parent's old point and shoot film cameras. I figured that since it's so damn old (early 1980s i'm guessing), the dyes in it are completely shot and not worth getting processed.

The roll of E6 is some kodak elite chrome I was shooting while on vacation. I had an underwater camera body from a while ago that I thought I'd try, but unfortunately one of the seals must have been bad because all of a sudden it started acting very very strange and then it just stopped working all together. I took it back to my hotel room and opened it up in a makeshift darkroom (about 20 of the 36 exposures were taken) and rewound the spool. My fingers were sort of damp at the time (I wasn't thinking, I was still in a daze about what had happened), so some of the frames I figured were shot cause of the stopping effect of the water. Instead of paying a buttload of money to have the film processed, I figured I'd try to cross process it and salvage a few frames at least from it.

1/2
>> Anonymous
Well, anyway, I just got back from processing them (my tank is a two-roll developing tank) in kodak T-Max dev (70F, 8 minutes), followed by a stop bath and then in Kodafix hardening fixer (70F, 10 minutes - a long time to hopefully clear up the already very, very dense negatives).

I was expecting garbage coming out, but in fact the results were pretty damn good. I don't have access to an enlarger at the moment, so printing them will have to wait until I'm back on campus, but I got basically everything out of the C41 roll and about 14 usable frames out of the E6. The negatives are very dense, but I think that after some burn time tweaking and some contrast adjustment, I should get some nice prints out of them.

Someone gave me a pro-pack of velvia 50 (original stuff) that wasn't stored properly. I shot one roll, had it developed and the results are pretty terrible (no fogging, just a huge magenta shift). If my prints turn out fine from these negatives, I'm going to shoot the rest of the 19 rolls in the pro-pack and process them myself in B+W. It's a fun little project and, hey, it's uber-cheap black and white film!

2/2
>> ac !!VPzQAxYPAMA
>>108698
Huh. I'd been wondering if you could develop C41 in B&W chemistry.

Post scans when you can. I'd like to see that.
>> Anonymous
>>108701
It's basically all black and white film except colour film has extra dye layers that get activated during the "color developer" step. Then the remaining silver is bleached out with the bleach/fix step. The negatives are very dense cause there are still layers that were designed to be washed out during the bleach process. I'm expecting I'll probably have to triple or quadruple exposure time for the paper, as well as bump the contrast up a few grades with multicontrast filters + paper.

It might be a while before I can post scans. I could try to set up a lightbox and get an idea what they look like by taking shots with my dSLR, but no real scans/prints for a while.
>> Anonymous
>>108704
That kinda sucks, but anythings better than nothing
>> Anonymous !MjcMqTX/iM
C41 in black and white developer gives really dense negatives, hard to print, but scanning will work without much problems, so that's definiatly a plus. If you replace the bw fix with a C41 bleach fix, you'll actually get a hint of a color in your negative as well, and it'll be less dense.

Also, was wondering, what are the best high speed films that I'll be able to develop in either D76 or TMax chemicals?
>> Anonymous
>>108714
Kodak P3200 and Ilford Delta 3200 are tabular-grain films that will work great in T-Max developer (not so great in D-76)

I guess you can get traffic surveillance film that can be pushed like crazy that will go beyond 3200, but those two are the ones you'll be able to find quite easily.
>> Anonymous
>>108693
What fixer did you use, if it smells that bad?
>> Anonymous !MjcMqTX/iM
>>108715
Thanks, I'll be sure to pick up some Delta 3200 tomorrow.
>> Anonymous
>>108725
Regular T-Max 3200 can be pushed up to 6400, but the T-Max 3200P (the p in it means push) is designed to still work fine if it's pushed up to 25,000, as long as it's developed in slightly warmer-than-normal T-Max developer (23C or higher recommended)

See kodak publication J-86 for a pretty good chart on pushing/pulling films with TMax developer
>> ac !!VPzQAxYPAMA
>>108720
Kodafix. Doesn't smell *bad*, just smells like fixer.
>> Anonymous
>>108789
I used kodafix as well, and I don't notice any smell really. Just a slight vinegar smell from the acetic acid it contains.

Whatever generic bulk fixer our school's lab buys, however, has an EXTREMELY strong smell. Even when mixed for paper, it stays smelly for hours and won't wash off your hands.
>> ac !!VPzQAxYPAMA
>>108811
Huh. Might just be that, for some reason, my developing tank always leaks during the fixing stage so I always get fixer all over my hands.
>> Anonymous
>>108811
Find out what it is and how it's diluted. You might be wasting full concentrate strength fixer.
>> Anonymous
>>110290
The guy in charge of the darkroom really knows his stuff so I'd be surprised if he'd make that mistake, especially with the tiny budget he's given.

It's just really cheap bulk chemicals. Terrible smell.

On a related note, I'm about 5 days away from developing a roll of HP5 Plus :)
>> Warren !WSxruxpIJs
Actually, there's only one version of the TMax. TMax P3200 is the one and only TMax film of that speed. I have used it at EI 25000 and the results were usable, but I wouldn't call them pretty. Best used at an EI of 3200 or lower, as its actual speed is closer to 1000 ISO.

To answer the OP, I shoot a lot of B&W film still and develop it myself. 35mm and 120 at this point, I used to shoot everything up through 8x10 sheet film.
>> Anonymous
>>110294
5 Days? Bummer. I do it any time I want to in my darkroom. Why not get a tank, reel, developer and fixer yourself? I use 1 gallon Arizona Iced Tea Jugs marked with bright warning labels. Water can be used for a 30 second stop bath and a tiny (tiny!) amount of dishwashing liquid to a gallon of distilled water makes a great emulsifier substitute. Total cost should be under 20 bucks, 30 if you splurge. Wristwatches make good timers.

16 rolls of film, one shot: 10 bucks. If you dilute or reuse, 32 rolls. Fixer lasts a little longer before it gets exhausted.
>> Anonymous !OuxWo/SDUE
>>108715
Couldn't get any Delta 3200, our local store didn't have it. I went for Fuji Neopan 1600, which I'm going to push to 3200. Will be shooting and developing tonight.

>>110314
It's just very easy on a school, and you can actually meet people and talk while developing your film.
>> Warren !WSxruxpIJs
>>110322
The Neopan is great film. What are you developing it in? I've always souped it in HC-110, but recently I've been experimenting with Pyrocat HD and things are looking good.