Develop color film with black and white chemicals

alaios · Joined: 24 Jan 2014 Posts: 724

Dear all,
I have some color film at home and I wanted to practice my developing skills, ( I can not find cheap black and white iflm in germany.. even for expired).
Would it be possible to use my ilford liquid developer to develop some color films or not?

I would like to thank you for your reply
Regards
Alex

iangreenhalgh1 · Expire: 2014-01-07

It can be done, but the results leave much to be desired.

There are loads of German retailers of BW film, try this one in Berlin:

http://www.fotoimpex.de/shopen/films/35mm-films/

I can recommend the Fomapan 100 and Agfa APX 100, both are excellent.

alaios · Joined: 24 Jan 2014 Posts: 724

Thanks for the answer. I think it was more that I was expecting to find, even expired rolls, at 2 euros per piece for example
Cheaper are the 3.5 euros rolls

Regards
Alex

philslizzy · Joined: 07 Aug 2012 Posts: 4748 Location: Cheshire, England

7day shop sell b&W films, they ship from Holland (or Belgium - I forget). Are reasonably priced and have fast order turnaround. I've been using them for over ten years.

https://www.7dayshop.com/

I have developed 3 or 4 colour films with B&W developer, but the resulting negs are very dense, so dense you can see almost no image. I wouldn't recommend it.

However if you must,
try using Ilford ID11 at 22C for 14 minutes.

ref:The Massive Dev Chart

alaios · Joined: 24 Jan 2014 Posts: 724

do you have some examples on how dense they can be? Would they still have color or not?
Regards

Alex

iangreenhalgh1 · Expire: 2014-01-07

No colour. The density can be controlled but is also higher than a BW film, not least due to the orange-brown coloured material the actual film is made from.

Trust me, it's a bad idea, I tried over 20 rolls with a dozen different developers, even the best results were substandard.

philslizzy · Joined: 07 Aug 2012 Posts: 4748 Location: Cheshire, England

Ian's right.

I threw my negs away. There is no colour, just black and white. The negatives are very dark brown, the image on them seems fine but the VERY dark brown mask makes copying or scanning them an awful long process and the results are not worth bothering with. Seriously!!

I've given you the info you need to develop them, try one and see if Ian and I are right.

According to the dev chart only a few developers are suitable - see screen grab below

NB, XP2 is the only C41 film on the list, as C41 films are designed for a 'universal' process, it should work with any C41 colour film. In a fashion.

with 'notes' clicked on:

Suck it and see, this is all the info you have asked for. You've got a decent scanner, maybe you can get good results...

rmd44 · Joined: 21 Jun 2011 Posts: 7

Developed quite a few C41 in B&W chemicals and I'm more than happy with the results.

Personally I use Rodinal 1:100 stand development for 1 hour @68F.

As I no longer have an enlarger set up,all my negatives are scanned and printed.
The scanner seems to ignore the colour mask on the negatives,and they scan in with
an easily corrected sepia type tint.

With C41 negative(Agfa/Fuji) available in the U.K. for £1/roll it's an economical way to shoot film.

Check out :

https://www.flickr.com/groups/c41inbw/discuss/

iangreenhalgh1 · Expire: 2014-01-07

I defy anyone to show me a C41 negative developed in BW chemicals that bears comparison with a proper BW film developed properly.

rmd44 · Joined: 21 Jun 2011 Posts: 7

Ian....

You are obviously entitled to your opinion,and in the search for the perfect b/w negative for darkroom use you are undoubtedly correct.

However,with my darkroom long gone, in my search for negatives to be scanned/printed as opposed to wet printed,I stick to my personal belief that theC41/BW option can produce good results. The internet is awash with examples of C41 images developed in b/w chemicals

If the O.P. is a darkroom user then he should stick with b/w film,but if he scans then the C41 option can provide an economical alternative. It costs very little to find out.

Malcolm.

TrueLoveOne · Expire: 2013-12-24

I've done a number of C41 color films in b/w chems with various results. Long expired films are the worst, on some occassions i did not even have enough image to scan.
Developing them is not an exact science, it's more or less always a gamble. All brands of C41 films react differently.
If you click the photo it will take you to my flickr page where you can find more info on development in tags and/or description.

Either way: it can be fun to experiment sometimes! The scanner takes care of the dark orange mask in most cases, but it can also give some surprises, see the photo of the Renault Cammionette below, this is what came out of the scanner, it's not edited!

Here are some samples:

Racoon by René Maly, on Flickr

Betamax by René Maly, on Flickr

Verboden toegang by René Maly, on Flickr

My love by René Maly, on Flickr

Keychain by René Maly, on Flickr

Camionnette by René Maly, on Flickr

Be prepared for an occassional disappointment! At one point i had shot an entire roll and there was only 1 picture that showed eough image to make something, and even that one took quite some editing in LR to get this:

No rangefinders!! by René Maly, on Flickr