Monday 9 April 2012

Accelerated E-4 in C41 chems.

A long time ago, I found a roll of exposed film. It was some form of Gevaert film, and colour at that. I developed it in B/W chems (I don't recall which ones), and tried to scan it. The negatives were far too thick, because the colour couplers were still in the emulsion. It was just about discernable that there were images on the film, but other than one of some horses, it was impossible to tell what they were of, even looking through the negatives at a 100W bulb.

Several years later, I have finally got round to doing what I had originally intended: I have bleached the negatives using re-halogenating bleach (from a sepia toner pack) and re-developed using RT C41 chems.

The results are in no way perfect, or even acceptable to any but the most curious, but it is possible to see what the images were of - mainly studio shots of a blonde girl aged about 20. There are a few others out and about around Durham (in the N.E. of England). A 645 camera had been used.

Anyway, here are the results. My recipe was vague, I simply bleached until there was no image left (the emulsion went kind of creamy), washed the film a lot, then shone a bright light at it, and redeveloped in C41 chemicals. I didn't time any of the steps, as they are all "to completion", so I just left it for as long as I thought might be necessary - 20 minutes or so.

Here are the images:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/msmoynihan/sets/72157629775142653/