Keith (M) Posted March 5, 2012 Share #1 Â Posted March 5, 2012 Advertisement (gone after registration) Last Friday for the first time I put a roll of Ilford XP2 through my Rolleicord Vb, with the intention of developing it in Rodinal, following a methodology found on the web. This calls for 5mL Rodinal + 495mL water, 30secs of gentle, slow inversions followed by 30 mins standing, one gentle inversion and another 30 mins standing. Normal stop and 5 mins fix and usual rinse complete the process. However, in a moment of complete brain-fade I used 50mL and 450mL and did not realise my blunder until scanning revealed histograms peaking in shadows and highlights with very little in between. Amazingly though, there are actually some rescueable images - just shows how tolerant some film/dev combinations can be of monumental blunders! Â High Key Trees Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Advertisement Posted March 5, 2012 Posted March 5, 2012 Hi Keith (M), Take a look here XP2, Rodinal & A Big Mistake!. I'm sure you'll find what you were looking for!
Michael Hiles Posted March 5, 2012 Share #2 Â Posted March 5, 2012 What would lead you to process XP2 in Rodinal? That film was designed to be developed in C41 chemistry, which produces results that are extremely satisfactory. I am no chemist, but this (and the agitation regime) does not sound at all promising. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
aesop Posted March 5, 2012 Share #3 Â Posted March 5, 2012 What would lead you to process XP2 in Rodinal? That film was designed to be developed in C41 chemistry, which produces results that are extremely satisfactory. I am no chemist, but this (and the agitation regime) does not sound at all promising. Â Â ...sage words, Michael, but I would be more interested in the resulting negatives - such is my warped mind. Keith, are you able to provide any direction (by means of a link, perhaps) to the source of the methodolody you used? Failing that, some detailed blow-by-blow instructions would suffice. Thanks. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keith (M) Posted March 5, 2012 Author Share #4  Posted March 5, 2012 Why would I process XP2 in Rodinal? Because I was intrigued by the results I have seen on various web sites. The very smooth gradation of tones and almost grainless appearance gives very attractive results. I regularly home-process normal b&w films, had some XP2 (120 roll) to hand and was keen to try and achieve similar results.  Discussion on Flickr Rodinal group, including examples  A blog on methodology and results  More from the Rodinal group  As soon as I have the opportunity I will put a second roll through my Rollei and try again, this time paying more attention to measuring the Rodinal! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Hiles Posted March 5, 2012 Share #5  Posted March 5, 2012 Why would I process XP2 in Rodinal? Because I was intrigued by the results I have seen on various web sites. The very smooth gradation of tones and almost grainless appearance gives very attractive results. I regularly home-process normal b&w films, had some XP2 (120 roll) to hand and was keen to try and achieve similar results.  Discussion on Flickr Rodinal group, including examples  A blog on methodology and results  More from the Rodinal group  As soon as I have the opportunity I will put a second roll through my Rollei and try again, this time paying more attention to measuring the Rodinal!  Very interesting. When you have more results, a look-see would be great. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
wlaidlaw Posted March 5, 2012 Share #6 Â Posted March 5, 2012 Surely it can't work because it is a dye based not metal halide base film. C41 processing is based on paraphenylene diamine rather than phenidone and hydroquinone used for conventional silver halide film. Â Wilson Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
adan Posted March 5, 2012 Share #7 Â Posted March 5, 2012 Advertisement (gone after registration) Just for the record, ALL "color" films (including the C-41 monochromes like XP2) are based on the same basic chemical reactions as B&W film. You expose silver (which has no native "color") and develop it. Even Kodachrome can/could be developed as a B&W silver negative. Â The difference when processing for color is that special developers form dyes along with the silver, and then the silver is bleached out, leaving the color dyes (or monochrome dye in the case of XP2). But if you use a non-dye developer, and SKIP bleaching out the silver, it reacts about like any silver negative film. Â I've "pushed" E-6 slide films by using Diafine as the first (silver) developer, and then maintained the color by using the regular second (color) developer in the usual set of steps. Â But - yes - Rodinal diluted only 1:9 is gonna turn ANY film into "Kodalith" chalk and charcoal. Â =8^o Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
250swb Posted March 5, 2012 Share #8 Â Posted March 5, 2012 I have done XP2 in Rodinal once but never went further into it. It was many years ago but I think the results were pretty good and just needed some tweaking. Unfortunately the price of XP2 was far more than a roll of HP5 so the brief experiment ended. But bravo to Keith for having a go. I'd like to see more. Â Steve Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
wlaidlaw Posted March 5, 2012 Share #9 Â Posted March 5, 2012 Without the bleaching stage, are you not going to get doubling up of the blacks with the activated dye and the darkened halide adding to each other. As Andy said, I can see it being very effectively as a super dense orthographic film but cannot see how it can work as panchromatic. Am I missing something? Â Wilson Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
spydrxx Posted March 5, 2012 Share #10 Â Posted March 5, 2012 Interesting....I never thought of developing C-41 films in rodinal. Since I have both, think I'll give it a try in the next couple of weeks. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
CalArts 99 Posted March 5, 2012 Share #11 Â Posted March 5, 2012 Some of my students do this often with various color films in various B+W developers. It started with an artist who did a project on old found rolls of film and developed them in B+W chemistry. Then the Lomo crowd got into it and made it somewhat popular. It's sort of a urban hipster thing now. Â Although after they try it a few times, they eventually go back to conventions. But it's a way of 'cross-processing' film and they like to experiment, which is fine as they are learning via doing. Â Here's a 'guide' to developing color film in B+W chemistry (using Porta, too.) A Pervert's Guide to Photography: 49: Guide to Developing C-41 films in B&W Chemistry (Kinky Cross-Processing) Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keith (M) Posted March 6, 2012 Author Share #12 Â Posted March 6, 2012 I had come across that same blog in my researches and whilst it is interesting, it is not something I would envisage doing. He had his reasons (old film stock), but on the occasions when I shoot colour film as opposed to my usual b&w it is because I want colour. My attempt at developing XP2 in Rodinal however is driven by liking the look of XP2 prints and the convenience of home-development with what I have to hand (very basic equipment and a kitchen sink). Buying C41 chemicals and more accurate thermometers etc etc for the very small number of colour films I use in a year just does not make sense to me. Â Hopefully I will be out and about with my Rollei today and run a second roll of XP2 through. As/when I have developed and scanned it, I will report back. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
wlaidlaw Posted March 6, 2012 Share #13 Â Posted March 6, 2012 Keith, Â I now find that my chromogenic black and white films are being more consistently processed than traditional black and white. I prefer the less smooth look of traditional film but have not found a decent local processor (Brighton Area). The so called professional local processor made a total botch of both the colour 120 and black and white 135 films I took in there last autumn. The colour was wrong and the black and white films streaky. Â Due to past carelessness, I am now pretty allergic to most photochemicals so self processing is not an option. Â Wilson Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
cbretteville Posted March 6, 2012 Share #14 Â Posted March 6, 2012 Haven't tried Rodinal, but I have souped both XP2 and BW400CN in Caffenol. The results from BW400CN took me by surprise, positively. Â Wilson, if fixer is ok, Caffenol is really quite interesting and eco friendly in that it uses coffee, ascorbic acid and washing soda (and a pinch of potassium bromide in some formulations). Â Carl Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
wlaidlaw Posted March 6, 2012 Share #15 Â Posted March 6, 2012 Carl, Â Sadly, the Caffenol recipe, which looks very interesting for me, does not appear to work on Rollei 200 film for some reason but only on their Retro. I mostly have been using Rollei 200 film except when using chromogenic and have quite a big stock of the 200 Superpan and some RPX 100 and 400. I thought I had lost a whole box somewhere in transit between the UK and France, only to find them 18 months later pushed to the back of a freezer in the garage. Meanwhile I had bought a whole lot more assorted Rollei. Â I may have to try again with the Draguignan Photographic club and see if I can persuade someone to do some developing for me. However I don't think they have quite got used to this modern "new-fangled" roll film stuff yet. They are just about getting comfortable with plates and cut film, as opposed to wet collodion. At the only meeting I went to, they all had long beards and berets - digital - never heard of it. Â Wilson Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Ornello Posted March 7, 2012 Share #16  Posted March 7, 2012 Last Friday for the first time I put a roll of Ilford XP2 through my Rolleicord Vb, with the intention of developing it in Rodinal, following a methodology found on the web. This calls for 5mL Rodinal + 495mL water, 30secs of gentle, slow inversions followed by 30 mins standing, one gentle inversion and another 30 mins standing. Normal stop and 5 mins fix and usual rinse complete the process. However, in a moment of complete brain-fade I used 50mL and 450mL and did not realise my blunder until scanning revealed histograms peaking in shadows and highlights with very little in between. Amazingly though, there are actually some rescueable images - just shows how tolerant some film/dev combinations can be of monumental blunders!  High Key Trees  XP2 is intended for C41 processing. Nothing else makes sense. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keith (M) Posted March 7, 2012 Author Share #17 Â Posted March 7, 2012 XP2 is intended for C41 processing. Nothing else makes sense. Â I see we have been joined by a member of 'The Flat Earth Society'. Â Did you not click on any of the links to see the results people have achieved? It may well be against conventional wisdom but I thought that a common attribute of L-Camera forum members was open-mindedness and flexibility of thinking. Ah, well... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bateleur Posted March 7, 2012 Share #18  Posted March 7, 2012 Interesting Keith, I like this sort of thing, thinking outside the box.  Regards Charles  (Who still want's to try a coffee developer routine sometime) Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
fotohuis Posted March 7, 2012 Share #19 Â Posted March 7, 2012 A bad C41 development of XP2 is even better then a B&W developer with XP2. It's more an emmergency solution then producing a decent negative. Â XP2 is meant for C41 development in a mini-lab (10 years ago on all corners) and then printing on classical B&W photo paper. The film is tending in the soft way so an E.I. around 200-250 gives the best result. Â However if you like to test all kind of different process and films I am not any authority to tell what to do or not to do. I see sometimes results in combinations which are theoretically almost impossible. But a small C41 kit in seperate components is not difficult to handle at all. Just find a big volume of water to keep the temperature during the C41 developer (3:15 minutes) around 37,8C/100F. Â Used chemicals you can even (re-) use for several weeks. And you can mix all type of C41 films incl. the above chromogene C41 B&W films. So in that way C41 home development is not that tricky. Â Best regards, Â Robert Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Ornello Posted March 7, 2012 Share #20 Â Posted March 7, 2012 I see we have been joined by a member of 'The Flat Earth Society'. Â Did you not click on any of the links to see the results people have achieved? It may well be against conventional wisdom but I thought that a common attribute of L-Camera forum members was open-mindedness and flexibility of thinking. Ah, well... Â It's pointless. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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