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Hi again,

and here I am with yet another question about developers. As usual, the question arises after reading the Adam's The Negative. He mentions that both methodologies have a compensating effect, so my question is: is one method better than the other, or do they give about the same results? The book does not make any comparison, for what I remember. This is another technique that I never used in the past, but I'd be curious to try.

Thanks,

Val

Suppose like most things Darkroom, conduct your own tests and see which works best for your application/methodology.
I've never really had any need/desire to go much past ID-11/Perceptol/Microphen and now XTOL.

That's the plan! I'm just curious to know about other people experiences.

Valerio

As Ed suggests, suck it and see... I was a dedicated DDX user but then discovered Prescysol EF using the partial stand method.

Paul

It seems like forever since I have posted anything on here . . .anyway . .
2 Bath vs Dilute - well I have used both fairly extensively, tray developing 5x4 . . .
Dilution H in HC110 (though not highly diluted like semi-stand Rodinal) is very good, but time and again you hit the old wall of possible over-development and dense negatives, it is also very critical of temperature, AND, the big one, certain films really don't get on well with it - FOMA 100 being a good example. This being said, when I got nice results I got very nice results.
Barry Thornton's 2 Bath - it is as near as damn it a perfect developer for me - I use it with 5x4, 120 and 35mm and usually have results that I am happy with - it is very good with most films. One thing I would say though is that despite the recommendations not to use a water pre-soak with a 2 bath developer, BT2 really benefits from it. All the chemicals are relatively cheap and easily sourced from Silverprint.
It can be a little flat, but this can be sorted out by slightly longer in the first bath and upping the agitation in the second bath by about 30 secs and then leaving to stand longer. All in all, it is long lasting, easy to mix and a reliable tool.
I haven't used the likes of the more common divided developers, or as I said very highly diluted semi-stand development (who has the time???) so I can't comment on them, however, people like them, so if you want to go that route there is always that option.
Search around there's a ton of info . . I can recommend the happy chappies at FADU if you have any questions too.
Hope this helps.
Phil

Hi Phil,

thank you for sharing your techniques on the two types of compensating developers. Just a quick question: if you took two identical pictures and then developed one negative in a highly diluted developer and the other with the two baths technique, would you get similar results or would they rather different?

Cheers,

Val

To be honest (and this might put the cat amongst the pigeons) apart from more contrast gained with Dil H in HC110 (and that is not nearly as dilute as some people do with stand development and Rodinal, so I can't comment on that), I don't get a huge amount of difference!
What I prefer about the 2 bath is it will control skies very well, though obviously total overexposure does result in denseness . .. However I feel I have used BT2 enough to pretty much fine-tune it to each negative and film. Barry I believe developed it for roll film use, but like I say I have found it very good for almost everything I have needed to develop. You can obsess to the nth degree about developing (I have . . . .)!
I also tend to expose shadows on ZIV as opposed to the regular Z III - gives me better low level detail and the 2 bath helps with any over-exposure!
His site is very imformative and kudos to whoever keeps it going as it is a great resource like his books.
http://www.barrythornton.com/
Cheers
Phil

Thanks for the explanation Phil. I was expecting that the two techniques wouldn't yield significant differences, but I guess - as others suggested - it's all down to do my tests and see which one gives me the results I want!

Val

Yep - it's all about trying things out!
P