Some time ago I combined two new-for-me techniques in one batch of the film developing process – semi-stand and processing C-41 film in B&W chemistry. What prompted me to develop color negative Kodak Ektar 100 film with black and white chemistry, you ask? I have no idea, maybe a desire to experiment with film.
This roll of Kodak Ektar 100 was exposed more than a year ago and waited for attention in my fridge. Until recently time I used local lab service for developing color film (slides and negatives), but the last time I used them, two my color 120 rolls exposed in Ethiopia were spoiled by the lab so. I was now a little bit nervous because of this situation where I have no ability to interfere and to take control of the process and I don’t develop color film at home.
The process of this developing was very simple – actually the same as B&W negative developing. During the way of my “home education”, I learned to be very accurate with temperature, measures, and attentiveness in agitation. More then this – I decided to make it a semi-stand process – one hour of developing that can help to achieve the better tonal range and confidence that this long process will be less aggressive to the foreign emulsion.
The result I got was dirty and grimy – I read about in forums when I did homework about this (not) native process, but somewhere inside me was a hope for a miracle… And a miracle happened when I started the scanning process. You can see the results below – clean and crisp, sharp and well-toned scans of five frames (actually all 12 frames turned out very well in terms of photography and in terms of developing.
As I said, I’m always trying to be very accurate and exact during my stand (or semi-stand) developing processes. Well, it took some time to get used to and bring to perfection all stages. The stable (always 20°C) temperature of all parts of the process. I always put the tank during the long stand aspect in a pot filled with 18-19°C water and checked it from time to time.
A few words about photography gear, soup and times I used.
- Hasselblad 500CM with Planar 80mm f/2.8 lens.
- Expired Kodak Ektar color negative 120 film.
- 2 minutes of soaking in a clean 20C water.
- 1+100 Rodinal (one shoot) developer – one hour with one turn in the middle.
- One minute agitation in a clean 20C water.
- 8 min of fixing in Agfa Fix-AG 1+7.
- 2 minutes of the wetting agent at the end.
Thanks for reading,
~ Victor
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5 responses to “5 Frames… Of black and white Kodak Ektar 100 (EI 100 / 120 format / Hasselblad 500CM)”
Lovely frames and a great read. Thanks for the developing notes at the end also. I didn’t even know you could develop c41 in b&w yet alone with such lovely results. Where can I read more about this process? You mentioned forums; which ones?
Thanks for this Victor – a very inspiring set of images. I shall revisit processing B&W in Rodinal. My original attempts didn’t employ the pre-soak stage or stand processing, so the results were very unsatisfactory !
…DOH ! – I meant processing C41 films in Rodinal !!
Thank you John. i tried this combination a few times and every time got pleasant results – but this roll is my favorite in terms of quality – probably bcos of the density and a quality of the Kodak Ektar 100 emulsion.
you can see the whole roll here with the link to my original post.
https://www.victorbezrukov.com/semi-stand-developing-c-41-film-in-bw-chemistry/
Glad to be published with my 5 BW frames !
thank you EM !