Topic: Colour negatives processed with B&W chemicals

[sapata]

Has anyone tried processing colour negs with B&W chemicals ?

I have some LF negs I want to shot but the price to process is insane... so maybe I'd experiment with that if it's possible. I'd love to see some examples...

[LT]

I've never done it but lots of people here have ... some quite recently if I remember correctly.

[Urban Hafner]

I've never done it myself, but it can be done. Some people say that there are issues with the negatives being somewhat unstable, but I don't have any details on that.

Urban

[choppert]

Don't do it!!!!!!

I've processed a couple of rolls of Gold 400 in B+W and they have yielded pretty crap results.

The negatives are practically black with only the faintest image on - one of the films had been over and under exposed to test what happens and the same crap negs resulted.

You have been warned! 

[Windy]

Some that I did recently here

[Pete_R]

Yes I've done it. The results are dense because of the orange mask of the film but they scan OK. As I normally process C41 in black and white dev anyway (XP2) I just stuck to my normal processing of 15 minutes in Aculux.

[al]

I'd agree with Peter, the negs are dense but as long as they're reasonably well exposed you can pull a fair bit out of them with a scanner. 

Have you thought about colour development yourself though?  A small kit isn't too expensive and it's not really any more difficult than b&w.  If you end up with some uncorrectable colour casts due to poor temperature control (very unlikely) then you can always greyscale them and end up the same place you would have done using b&w chemisty, but probably with better results.

my experience with colour in b&w chems
http://www.flickr.com/photos/alspix/tags/c41inbw/

and with "kitchen sink" C41:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/alspix/tags/novaprospeedc41/

[Nigel]

Al - your Nova Prospeed shots looked great. I googled Nova and apart from the chemicals they sell they have a really interesting 'secondhand darkroom section' and one on 'setting up a darkroom'.

All here: http://www.novadarkroom.com/1/Darkroom_Chemicals,_Papers_and_Accessories.html

[moominsean]

developing color is no big deal. it's exactly the same as BW except the chemicals have to be much warmer. i run the bottles under a hot bath tap. chemicals don't last as long, though, so sometimes it's better to save rolls so you can develop many from a single batch.

[Sorry, image deleted during forum software upgrade. Please re-upload if so inclined.]

[sapata]

Great ! I guess I'll have a go...  would it be better to overexpose a little to compensate the orange mask ?

developing color is no big deal. it's exactly the same as BW except the chemicals have to be much warmer. i run the bottles under a hot bath tap. chemicals don't last as long, though, so sometimes it's better to save rolls so you can develop many from a single batch.

Sean , your shots are great ! Are the grains results of the process or is it the film ?

Thanks guys !

[moominsean]

expired film (1969 or so in the bottom shot) so probably a little of both...

[Ed Wenn]

.... chemicals don't last as long, though, so sometimes it's better to save rolls so you can develop many from a single batch.

Sean, it may be the difference in conditions between Arizona and Blighty, but I remember that Al did some tests over a couple of years where he tested colour chems which were way past their use-buy date and he still got great results. Have you actually had the chems fail on you, or were you just going by the info on the packs?

Colour devving is something I badly want to try. I just need to wait a little bit longer before I can trust my kids not to fiddle with all of the exciting-looking bottles that I'd have to bring in the house.