Film kitchen-sink colour

pdh

Legend
Been pursuing "process" rather than content recently, hence my lack of involvement in the August Challenge; this weekend I turned my hand to home colour film (C41) processing, with developer made from raw chemicals rather than a kit (or, indeed, hair-dye).

The results aren't as good as they could be - there's a bit of a magenta cast - but on the other hand I've had worse back from the minilab, and I was pleased that on my first attempt I got any images at all ... so here's a couple of examples. Tweaked a tiny bit in LR4 of course.

This is Fuji C200 film in my 20-year-old mju-1 (that'll be a Stylus to my cousines americaine). Tesco were selling off 3-packs of the fillum for £2 the other day, so of course I bought all they had on the shelf.

 
2 and 3 are pretty good to my eye, in that undefinable film sort of way. One of these days I might join you, but for now I'll stand on the sidelines cheering you on.
Intrigued by the hair dye?
Keep mining this seam, it appears to be going somewhere!
 
Thanks Heather.

It's possible to develop colour film in hair-dye (e.g. the Fi just gets Lower) so long as the dye part contains paraphenylenediamine (PPD). Very many do, especially black ones; Other ingredients often seem to include para-aminophenol, which is the developing agent used in Rodinal

PPD can be used to develop both black and white and colour films, but is now considered too toxic for general photographic use (although of course it seems fine to spread it on your head for minutes at a time :rolleyes: - but note all the dire warnings on the packets about allergy testing, and the inclusion of gloves)

I had no luck getting colour out of hair-dye developer, but others have, and to be honest I didn't try very hard as I was placing an order anyway for some other bits and pieces with a supplier and adding on the colour developing agent was marginal extra cost. For completeness, you'll be pleased to know it is 4-(N-Ethyl-N-2-hydroxyethyl)-2-methylphenylenediamine sulfate :D

too much information yet?

hehehe
 
Always good to have a vote of confidence in one's efforts, Barrie :D

Now ...

When I was first getting back into film last year, I used £1-a-roll colour negative (C41 process) film for testing cameras and practising developing.

Colour film can be developed in black & white chemistry quite happily (there's the same amount of silver halide in colour film as B&W - in fact, I think more, but I can't find a reference for that at the moment), but of course you only get a monochrome image. Here's an example, developed in a Rodinal-type developer, which I took about a year ago:



9546299618_5ce911aa76.jpg

b20120810-1 by _loupe, on Flickr


Interestingly (well, I suppose that's rather a loaded word) the B&W chemicals don't destroy the colour dyes that form an image when developed in colour chemistry, so there remains what you could call a "latent colour image" (there's no such thing really, it's just that the dyes in the emulsion that form the colour image aren't destroyed), in the developed monochrome negative. Time, temperature, humidity, fungi, bacteria and whatnot will damage it eventually, but all things being equal, it'll remain there for ever.

This colour image can be recovered at any time after the initial B&W chemistry has been applied (Although if you had applied a metal toner to the negative - selenium for instance - it can't be).

The negative is first "bleached" (not the kind you put down the toilet), then washed and exposed to light; then it is run through the normal C41 development process. A colour negative results, albeit rather grainy and low contrast.

Here's the same picture as above, redeveloped a year later to yield a colour image (don't look too closely, as the image is quite badly degraded due to my using a very suboptimal formula for the bleach) ...


9543527833_f6bca1245b.jpg

b20130819-4 by _loupe, on Flickr
 
Back
Top