Films you never got around to developing

[tyred]

Funny, I aim to try my hand at E6 shortly. I have got the chemicals and it doesn't sound that terrifying after reading the instructions.

 

[Mad Doug Biker]

To be fair, at college, we had free C41 and E6 processing, so we never had to think about it!

 

[blockend]

C41 and E6? wow, you are keen!
We were always encouraged not to do that unless you were desperate as doing Colour was seen as being more trouble than it was worth.

I take it you have temperature controlled equipment for it??

Nope, a sink and a thermometer. We were lied to, C41 is an absolute doddle, easier than B&W in many ways because all times are exactly the same. Check out 'do it yourself colour' on Flickr or Apug http://www.apug.org/forums/forum13/ if you're interested. Kodak are still bringing out new emulsions like Portra 400, a superb, naturalistic, ultra fine grain film stock. Film is mostly internet order these days but there's cheap film and expensive stuff to taste. Cost wise there's not much between film and digital for most users, unless you shoot gazillions of frames.

 

[swee'pea99]

From what I remember, the one big difference with colour is that temperature control is critical. With b&w you can get away with a degree or more either side without things going pear shaped, but with colour they used to talk about getting it to (and maintaining it at) +/- 0.2, or something like that.

 

[Mad Doug Biker]

Yes, we were always warned about the temperature control needed.

I'll look into that C41 think Block, thanks.

 

[blockend]

Most analogue photography is hybrid these days, self developed films scanned and digitised. Some silver print in the old way (I do), other's ink jet, more are happy simply to screen share.
This company supply my processing needs:
http://www.ag-photographic.co.uk/

 

[Mad Doug Biker]

Thanks.

 

[Andy in Sig]

Here's a simple practical tip for getting the dev temp right in summer when room temps are often too warm (dev is usually done at 20 or 24 deg C): mix up dev, stop and fix baths in glass jars - I use 500 ml yoghurt jars for a two film developing canister - and put them in the fridge overnight. Take them out of the fridge on the day of development and put them in the room where you are going to work. Monitor the temp every hour or so and when they hit 20 deg, away you go. You can get the dev canister itself down to 20 deg by putting in tap water a bit cooler than room temp.