Why Do Some Developers Give High Base Fog With Lucky SHD 100

[00:00:00]Hi everybody. Welcome to my dark room.

[00:00:02]As you can see, I've got a whole lack of negatives in front of me. Why, you ask?

[00:00:07]Well, I've been a little disappointed uh with the high base fog that I've been getting with Lucky SHD 100. This is all uh Lucky SHD120.

[00:00:21]Mainly I've been using developers like PC512 and uh Pyrocat HDC both giving me really high base fog which is a little alarming especially because I bought a box of the 8x10 that I wanted to use for all printing but if it's going to have a high base fog I won't be able to use it for that. This PC512 had with no restrainer, no benzo triazol in it. So my base valve was 28.

[00:00:49]That's really high. Scary high. Can't use that.

[00:00:53]So I decided to take a closer look at see if there's something I could do. Is there another developer I could use that would give me less base fog? I found out that it all comes down to alkalinity and activity of the developing agent.

[00:01:10]Another developer that I like to use D23. It's a very versatile developer.

[00:01:15]It's easy to mix up. It's only two ingredients, metal and sodium sulfite.

[00:01:19]So, I decided to mix some up and dilute it one to one. And I shot a roll of film to the same subject, cut into thirds, and I developed one of the thirds right here.

[00:01:34]And I was shocked. Why, you asked? Well, because came out really clean and the base fog was only.11.

[00:01:42]Thought, wow, that's fantastic. So, I thought, well, why don't I try another developer that I have on hand? I've got some boxes of percept I've not used. So, I mixed it up. I diluted it one to one and it also came out clean with a base fog of 0.11 just like the D23.

[00:02:05]So why there's no restrainer in either of these? I mean I checked online for percept and there's no restrainer.

[00:02:14]There's a lot of sodium chloride in it and that might have something to do with it. Also in the D23, I think the large amount of sodium sulfite has something to do with it. And also metal is a is gentler reducing agent. So we're not I'm not seeing that type of fog base fog. That's great. So there's two developers that I can use safely and one that I can actually mix up from scratch.

[00:02:48]But, you know, I really like PC512 and I love Pyroet HD and I would like to continue using those two developers. So, well, I might I might have to add a restrainer. So, I have lots of benzo triazol. So, I mixed up a batch of that at 1%. And I shot another roll and cut into thirds and I developed the first third in was it PC512 with 10 ms of the 1% solution.

[00:03:18]and came out a little bit thin. It's not too bad. Probably should have developed it longer, but but this is a big butt.

[00:03:26]The base fog is very clean. Happy. Very happy. The base fog was 08.

[00:03:34]Now, I know I need to develop this longer. So, that might bump up the base fog. That was 10 ms. So, I thought, well, why don't I do this again or develop the next strip, but only stick in five ms. And I got a pretty clean base. And the base fog is.11.

[00:03:52]And my development time was 10 minutes, which is reasonable time. Now, how about Pyrocat HD at a dilution of 1 to 1 100.

[00:04:02]Normally I get pretty high base fog. It could be like8.20 around there. I shown another roll, cut it into thirds and I [clears throat] developed I I dilute diluted the pyroicadia to 1:1 to 100 added 5 mls of benzo developed for 15 minutes. Yeah, I had to increase the time. I increased it by about 15% from my normal time and came out nice and clean. Base fog is.11 and some really good densities in here.

[00:04:32]So that's a good sign.

[00:04:35]But 15 minutes I don't really like developing for that long. So I took the other strip and I diluted the pyrocat HD 1 to 1 to 50 added the uh 5 ms of benzo triosol and it came out pretty clean again base fog of.11 and my development time was 10 minutes shorter so that's more reasonable if I'm going to use pyroad HDC I'm going to uh make diluted 1:1 to 50 with just 5 mills of benzo triazol. Now Sandy King when he came up with pyroat HD, he was originally using sodium carbonate as the buffer. It's gentler than potassium carbonate. I think he switched over to potassium carbonate because sodium carbonate is a little bit harder to mix into water at a high concentration. So I mixed up 20% uh solution and that became my part B.

[00:05:38]And the dilution I used was 1 + 5 + 94 5 ms plus 25 ms of part B into 470 m of water. And I came out with lovely negatives. The base valve is.17 which is a little bit lower but it's not low enough. So, I would probably have to add uh like 5 mls of benzot triazol to get it down. But it's good to know that I can use sodium carbonate because I've got lots of that on hand. Always seem to be running out of potassium carbonate.

[00:06:15]So, there is hope. And I guess the next thing for me would be to uh go out with some 8x10 film and see if I can replicate this. I'm sure I will be. So, anyways, that's all I wanted to share with you guys. Um, hopefully this is you'll find this helpful, especially if you're using the same developers as I do. And lucky SHD 100. Yeah. Catch you guys later.

[00:06:51][music] G. [music] [music] D.

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[00:07:57]>> [laughter]