• 1236: end of first vaxx trip to Detroit Lakes; Minneapolis; beginning of skyway walk (21-28 Apr 2021. Orwo UN 54 as Potsdam Kino @ EI 100.) (On top.) (Partially lightstruck.)
  • 1240: Louisville swamp / Minneapolis / St Paul. (8–12 May 2021. Fomapan 100 as Arista .EDU 100 @ EI 100. Partially lightstruck.)
  • 1239: Skyway walk, eastern side of southern peninsula. (28 April–7 May 2021. HP5+ at EI 400. Partially lightstruck.)
  • 1238: Skyway walk, most (all?) shots exterior to skyways. (28 April 2021. Kentmere Pan 100 [24 exp. only] @ EI 100.)
  • 1237: Skyway walk in Minneapolis. (28 April 2021. Bergger Pancro 400.) (On bottom.)

Five different rolls, all shot at box speed, mostly (four of five) film I’ve never before developed in Caffenol but have previously developed in Rodinal. Developed on 35mm rolls in the five-roll tank. This is just a standard sixty-minute semi-stand development with one agitation interval after the first minute.

Loaded inside daylight changing bag. Pre-wet film for about an hour, changing water once. Developing tank came open while dumping out the pre-soak water, and the top roll (1236) is probably partially lost – hopefully not more. The lid on that tank is really looser than I’d like, and I should be more careful.

During the pre-soak, mixed 1L Caffenol CL, then 750mL Caffenol CL, all to be shared with another development in the two-roll tank: 16g + 12g waterfree washing soda, 11g + 7g Vitamin C, 21g + 14g iodized salt (HyVee store brand, 67mcg iodine/1.5g iodized salt), and 40g + 30g Kroger Original Roast instant coffee, distilled water. Mixed individual batches back and forth between three different containers as much as possible to make sure everything was evenly distributed. Poured in enough of combined batch to fill the tank, then set the rest aside for the other batch. Agitated 40x over first minute, then 15x over 15 seconds at 37:00. These are half-agitations, gently (i.e., gently twisting to a 90-degree inversion, then gently back); I want to see if that helps to reduce grain. Kept orientation the same throughout development: this larger tank leaks a bit.

After 70 minutes, disposed of developer, rinsed in 68 degree water, filling and emptying the tank until the water rinsed completely clear, then four more times. Fixed in Ilford Rapid Fixer 1+4 for 6 minutes (that’s now 22 rolls from this batch of fixer), inverting 10x over 15 seconds at the top of every minute. Recaptured fixer and rinsed for ten minutes, then emptied tank, added a few drops of Photo-Flo, filled tank again and agitated 20x, and hung negatives vertically to dry.

Evaluation and notes

Roll 1236

It’s a shame this was lightstruck; there’s some good pictures ruined. On the other hand, it’s surprising just how much of the roll is salvageable, or at least usable for special purposes.

But there’s some nice shots here, many (more or less) untouched by the light during developing, and sometimes the effect really does work, especially in 16 and 26. All in all, this film stock looks all right in Caffenol: there’s deep thick darks and some rather striking pearl whites (perhaps best visible in the scans that came from color, stored as .tif in the photo archive: shots 2 and 3, which are just beautiful, if I may say so myself). Detail is nice and the grain is restrained. I would shoot this and develop it in Caffenol again.

photos posted

Roll 1237

Pancro 400 looks good in Caffenol: soft, but kind of stately; the grain is fairly restrained in most shots, though kicking up the salt more in the soup might have paid off a little. Developing a little longer might have helped with contrast, too.

Stand development helped to compress some of the dynamic range, too, and some of the results (15) are stunning for that reason. There’s other shots, though, that are underexposed, and I was counting on the stand-development process to help elevate the shadows more, and Caffenol CL isn’t compensating enough with this film stock.

photos posted

Roll 1238

Kentmere 100 looks good in Caffenol: crisp and clean.The nice lines really show off some of the more geometric compositions here, too, like the Bob Dylan mural (3) and some of the architecture shots (4, 10-12). There’s some haloing, mostly visible in the via-HDR scans; a little more agitation might help with that.

There’s still some light damage, even down this far in the tank, but it’s mostly not a problem.

photos posted

Roll 1239

A shame that this was lightstruck, but it’s probably the least interesting roll of film shot during the skyway walk. Some of the photos that should have been good were ruined, though; and yet, some salvageable stuff came out that’s worth shooting (17, 22). But some of the lost shots are actually the nicer geometric compositions inside the skyway, alas; and there’s some good texture work on brick that’s not usable, either. Dammit. Most of the last third of the roll is a loss.

photos posted

Roll 1240

Fomapan in Caffenol CL looks really crisp. Grain is fine and there’s lots of detail. The tree bark in the Louisville swamp shots are gorgeous; the bark almost seems to be glowing. Lots of nice detail on brick texture in the later shots in the roll, too.

The roll is possibly a little overdeveloped, though. Luckily, the light struck mostly the least interesting frames, and very little was lost, overall.