Topic: I Did C-41

[Francois]

Yes, I've officially done my first C-41 processing!
I had an old kit that I bought years ago and decided to mix it.
I also developed my first roll through it. Misread the agitation instructions. Rinsed at the wrong time. Re-adjusted myself for it.
And to my surprise, there is actually some stuff on the film!
The entire process scared the crap out of me. Managed to spill a bit of blix too.
Even though I wore some poly gloves, I have the feeling that my hands smell of chemicals.
It's now drying... Can't wait to see what's actually on it.

[jojonas~]

Go you! And hey, welcome to the world of color
What kit did you manage to get?

[ManuelL]

Looking forward to your results.

I have done C41 a couple of times, but it is not for me. I used the low temperature process at 24C. Still found it too cumbersome to maintain the correct temperature throughout the process.

That said, I now have an Adox Scala kit sitting in my cupboard, waiting for some film.

[jojonas~]

Looking forward to your results.

I have done C41 a couple of times, but it is not for me. I used the low temperature process at 24C. Still found it too cumbersome to maintain the correct temperature throughout the process.

That said, I now have an Adox Scala kit sitting in my cupboard, waiting for some film.

I agree with the temp. though if I don't have a motorised dev tank spinner, I'd rather have it go quicker. specially after 10 or so rolls haha..

oh, I've got that Adox Scala kit as well! seems cool but it bums me out a bit loosing the possibility to make prints easily in the darkroom from the developed film.

[Francois]

I got a kit from Argentix.ca
It's their own brand name so what's in it is anyone's guess.
The colors came out on the horrible side of things, but it's not entirely surprising as I used an unknown camera with an unknown lens, very expired film, messed-up the development with a 5 year old kit...

Here are a few of the heavily corrected photos

[AJShepherd]

I have done C41 a couple of times, but it is not for me. I used the low temperature process at 24C. Still found it too cumbersome to maintain the correct temperature throughout the process.

Not done any C41 since before the pandemic and am currently too skint to do any, but in the before times I bought a 'Sous Vide' cooker, which I clamp onto the side of a plastic bucket, put the bottles of chemistry in, add water until it's up to the neck of the bottles, switch on the heater and set the temperature a few degrees hotter than the chemistry requires.
it'll bleep when it gets up to temperature, and by that time the chemistry in the bottles will be at the right temperature.

I found that worked really well when I was using the Tetenal kit. It was also cheaper than similar devices sold expressly for photographic purposes!

(Though I really don't fancy doing any sous vide cooking with it - I mean, I know the food has to be sealed in a bag, but I'd still worry about contamination!)

[Francois]

I don't blame you as I wouldn't trust it either.
Personally, anything that cooks in a plastic bag soaking in a water bath in a plastic bucket for hours (if not days) doesn't get my seal of approval when it comes to food safety.

I have somewhere a fish tank heater that I got just for that. Also, my lab is just next to the hot water tank so I get plenty of really hot water to pre-heat the water baths.

[jojonas~]

I got a kit from Argentix.ca
It's their own brand name so what's in it is anyone's guess.
The colors came out on the horrible side of things, but it's not entirely surprising as I used an unknown camera with an unknown lens, very expired film, messed-up the development with a 5 year old kit...

Here are a few of the heavily corrected photos

Now that's my kind of game! Let all the dice roll and see what comes out

And hey, pictures! I like the dancing flowers

[Francois]

Thanks!
It's the first time I tried tried this multi-exposure technique.
The motion comes from the movement between four exposures.

[Ed Wenn]

Good work, Francois. I'm somewhat amazed, not to mention gratified to learn that there's SOMETHING in the world of photography that I beat you to by a good few years. I must say that I enjoy(ed) C-41 processing at home. My friend, Al Cooper, who used to hang out here years ago is a big proponent of C-41 and even ran a test of how long he could re-use the same soup for. In true FW style he started out by trying to get dramatic colour shifts from overused and very expired chems, but ended up concluding after a couple of years of testing, that the whole process was pretty forgiving. He never got anything really dramatic. It might be worth trying to dig out his old posts on the subject.

[Francois]

I know, for years I've been chickening out because of the smell. But in the end, it's not as bad as I thought.
I've been to so many labs where the smell would probably have developed a roll of film if left on the shelf long enough that I was expecting the worst.

I remember Al. I still can't believe the life he got from that kit. Every time he was updating us on this experiment I kept thinking that this guy definitely found a way to beat the system!

Now, I'm slowly getting my process up to speed. I have to re-adjust Reinhold's room temperature chart for my own kit (it's off by about 50 seconds).
And I'm trying to find a better way to get good scans from my crap scanner...

[jojonas~]

Ed: there's still some fun to be had with c-41! I need to try bleach bypass and developing in black and white developer before the c-41 chems.

Thanks!
It's the first time I tried tried this multi-exposure technique.
The motion comes from the movement between four exposures.

yeah, reminds me of those old holga shots where people tried for longer exposures on early models without the bulb more

[Francois]

Yeah, now I'm trying to find a P&S that will do multiple exposures as carrying both the 801 and my F90x is a bit backbreaking.

[jojonas~]

hmm, I know lomography built in the function in some of their cameras, like the fisheye two.
though I've seen some 90's compacts that are more feature rich that can do it too. I think I have a pentax and maybe another that does it. a quick search revealed the Minolta Riva Zoom 105 as another example (thanks, camera-wiki!)

[Francois]

I'll have to go through one of my P&S boxes to see what I have.
I know that the Canon Sureshots don't have that function (I have many).
I'll have to check the others.

[LEAFotography]

Isn't it fun    Well done for diving in, and for putting those chemicals to good use.

The heater in my tank failed after 18 months, but I've replaced it with a tropical fish-tank heater which gets it up to 35c...though I did my first roll at 20c as I couldn't wait for my heated tank to arrive, and just wanted to get started 

One thing I wish I'd know before mixing up my chemicals is that I could have used the fixer mixed for my b/w films, rather than opening the sealed bottle of fixer that came with the kit (leaving me with two opened bottles of fixer). I guess it's less of an issue if the kit uses a Blix...

[Francois]

Since it was so old, I simply didn't mind using it all.
And since I have some 1.25L bottles, measuring and diluting half wouldn't have been a good idea.