Carelessness

It occurred to me this morning I'd been going about this rather badly.

I had two rolls of film to develop, so I went down to my converted darkroom. Previously a cold room from a pub (I giant walk in fridge), it's light tight and insulated against the Australian summer. The sliding door has a habit of getting stuck when you don't open it at just the right speed (must see to that), but it's generally light-tight enough. After plugging up the holes in the roof (it rained - should have seen to that earlier), it's sealed and comfortable. We installed some ventilation and I've done some printing quite happily.
So I sat down at my desk, which I got at an auction for $1. It supports my new Beseler 4x5 enlarger (needs a 150mm lens), a 8" roll paper cutter (need to figure out how to work that), and an Ilfolab processor I picked up with the enlarger (needs some looking at). Generally, a nice collection of impressive machinery.
I grabbed the scissors I'd borrowed from the kitchen, popped the caps off the film and loaded them onto the reels and dropped them into the tank, and put the top on. Rolled over to my shelf of chemicals (old office chairs, very handy) and grabbed my bottle of Xtol. I was down to the last little bit in the 5ltr bottle, and it looked a little suspicious, so I hedged my bets and decided to mix up the box of ID-11 I had. I'll buy some more Xtol later.
I emptied out the Xtol and gave it a quick wash. Hmm, out of water. I walked out to the garden tap (no plumbing in the darkroom yet) and filled up my water container and lugged it back. Time to try to get it up to 40 degrees, according to the instructions.
Well, 20 minute later after some messing around with a stove kettle once again stolen from the kitchen, a basic water filter, and two old measuring jugs, I got it up to 33 degrees and decided I was happy enough. Dissolved part A, Dissolved Part B, added water to make 5-ish litres. Lost track when I was adding hot water from the kettle. I accepted it, and diluted it down 1+1 to develop that film from before.
I got the film developed, and hung it up to dry - fogged. My little steel developing tank had developed a crack I never paid much mind to before, but apparently sitting around for so long while I tried to mix up new developer was enough to fog it quite noticeably.

I've developed around 80 rolls with these tools, in the spare room, in the bathroom, or sitting outside on the step. They work, but they're prone to error and inexact. Doing it quick and dirty shouldn't be acceptable if you value your photos.
It doesn't pay to be careless. It's frustrating, inefficient and let's face it - really stupid. If you have a 4x5 enlarger and devoted darkroom but can't mix up your developer exactly, it's time to step back and look at what you're doing.

I've got a shopping list going, I'll get my own scissors tomorrow. On the plus side, some of the fogging seems rather complimentary - we'll see. My screw ups always turn out interesting, at least.

Infrared Experiments, Part 1

Today, we'll be trying Infra-red photography.
Well, not today, as I don't have my film yet. But we'll go over the basics today, and I'll continue when I do have the materials I've ordered.

In my case, I've ordered:

• 5x rolls of ILFORD SFX200
• Hoya R72 filter, 52mm

ILFORD SFX 200 is the ILFORD offering for infra-red film. It was brought back into production recently after much consumer lobbying, and has regained it's popularity. Especially in 120 format, it has been very welcome.
It has extended red sensitivity, so it can be used as a normal everyday film without the filter in place, rated at 200ISO. With a filter in place, it's extended red sensitivity allows a variety of Infrared effects to be taken advantage of.
It's infra-red sensitivity peaks at 720 nanometres, and extends to 740nm.
That's where our Hoya filter comes into play, the R72 filters out all light below 720nm, allowing for the most dramatic IR effects attainable with this film.

SFX200 can now be obtained from all the regular channels once again. It was discontinued when Ilford went into receivership in 2005 and was reformed under HARMAN imaging, but it's been put back into production as of 2007. If your local store insists that it's been discontinued, they are wrong. It does command a premium, but as a specialist product it's bound to.

The filter will be fitted to the 50mm f/1.8 Nikon lens on my FM2n, and we'll see what happens.