# messed up developing



## zamanakhan (Sep 11, 2010)

i had some color film that i decided to develop in caffenol.I followed the recipe well and developed for 25min as per instructions. I then rinsed it with water 3x and put in b&w kodak powder fixer (i had dissolved it before) for 5min then i rinsed 5x and gave it a final rinse wash with water and 2 drops of liquid soap. 

the negatives didnt turn out at all they have a grey lining on the one side, i can see the images if i hold them up to a light but they are too dark. The film doesnt really look like negatives, the emulsion side did not fully dissolve away. 

What part of the process did i mess up?


----------



## Helen B (Sep 12, 2010)

If the emulsion side did not 'dissolve away' then it sounds like the fixing stage may not be complete. You can dip a piece of film back into the fixer and agitate it to see if it will clear. If it doesn't then the fixer is no good. Fix the film for at least twice the time it takes to turn the film clear, then rinse again. Keep the film in the dark until you re-fix it.

Did you mix the whole amount of fixer?

Good luck,
Helen


----------



## zamanakhan (Sep 12, 2010)

yup the whole amount was mixed into a gallon at once, i should point out that iam using color film and using b&w fixer. I think iam gonna throw the film back in the tank and let it fix for another 5-10min. Is there any chance i can deystroy the film by fixing it too much?


----------



## Helen B (Sep 12, 2010)

Another 5-10 minutes in the fixer shouldn't do too much damage. Some colour films use colloidal silver as the yellow filter, and that silver will remain in the film after a normal B&W develop and fix process. It, along with the image silver, gets bleached out in the colour process.

Best,
Helen


----------



## zamanakhan (Sep 12, 2010)

is the film light sensitive when fixing? can i do it without the light cover? this way i can see if its fully fixed or not. 

when is it ok to reveal film to daylight? right after developer and stop bath?


----------



## Helen B (Sep 13, 2010)

The film is sensitive to light until all the silver halide has been fixed out. The amount of silver halide that is reduced to silver by light during fixing is usually very small, however, as long as the developer has been fully deactivated. It is best to keep the film in the dark until it is cleared in the fixer when doing the normal development process, and it is no problem to do so.

Now that you have a partially fixed and washed film that has been exposed to light there is likely to be very little to lose by re-fixing in the light. Just don't allow bright light onto the film. Equally well you could refix a test strip from the film (ie a short piece cut off the film that you do not want) in the light, time how long it takes to clear, double that time, then refix the rest of the film in the dark for that time.

By the way, how much did you agitate during fixing?

Good luck,
Helen


----------



## zamanakhan (Sep 14, 2010)

didnt work... maybe it just wont work with b&w fixer, for the first to min i agitated it full on, then every 30sec 4 turns, and as the time went on i made the duration in which i agitated longer. It didnt work i left it in the tank for about 10min. Seeing as how the film wouldnt fix i left it in the fixer for even longer (30min.) Is color fixer also just one chemical or do i need several chemicals? if its just one chemical i might as well order a packet.


----------



## Early (Sep 15, 2010)

Excuse me for being ignorant, but I was always under the impression you needed bleach fix or both bleach and fixer for color films.


----------



## Helen B (Sep 15, 2010)

Early said:


> Excuse me for being ignorant, but I was always under the impression you needed bleach fix or both bleach and fixer for color films.



Only if you have used a colour developer or a heavy staining developer. If you have used a B&W developer a bleach step would give you a clear piece of film if using a negative process.

B&W fixer will remove the undeveloped silver halide from both colour and monochrome film. As I mentioned above, colour film sometimes uses a layer of colloidal silver as a filter, and that would cause problems because it will survive the fix step (it usually gets bleached out with the silver image during the bleach step). There are few modern films that use colloidal silver, as far as I know.

If you have a scrap of undeveloped B&W film (the end of the leader sticking out of a cassette for example) you could test the fixer using that.

It may be that the film was fogged/stained in the developer. It's difficult to tell without seeing the piece of film. It's also probably easier to learn how to develop film if you use simple B&W developers and B&W film - that way it is easier to understand mistakes.

Best,
Helen


----------



## Early (Sep 17, 2010)

Helen B said:


> Early said:
> 
> 
> > Excuse me for being ignorant, but I was always under the impression you needed bleach fix or both bleach and fixer for color films.
> ...


Thank you M'lady!  I always wondered though, what kind of image should I expect if I developed color neg film in b&w chemistry?


----------



## Proteus617 (Oct 2, 2010)

Early said:


> Helen B said:
> 
> 
> > Early said:
> ...


----------

