Kodak 7222 Hand-Process clip test

Hand-processed B/W neg film (16mm) in a rewind tank; telecine and reversal in FCP. All just test footage, but YouTube did not handle motion from shaky handheld shots well (that was how it was shot, not an artifact of processing).

Process:
Approximately 25'-30' of film
Used 1L of Kodak D76 diluted 1:1 (500mL D76 + 500mL water) + about 1.5CCs of 20 Mule Team Borax, which formed a precipitate/didn't totally dissolve so this was probably too much. Around 68F.
Developed for around 9:30, winding back and forth constantly at a rate of about 100'-120' per minute. (around 15sec to go from one spool to the other.
Stopped for 30sec by running from one spool to the other and back again.
Fixed for 5 minutes (non-hardening fixer??), more or less same agitation.
Rinsed by filling tank, winding film across, dumping tank, 4 times
Perma-Washed for around 2 minutes, probably winding film for 9 passes.
Rinsed for 7 minutes by leaving the tank drain open and running water while winding film constantly. Could probably get away with less.
Dried with air running (no heat) strung up in a drying cabinet. Film may have had slight curl and seemed almost too wide to get on the reel without scraping, but I must be imagining this, since it ran through the projector fine. Lots of dust.

Notes:
Neg was relatively thin (not too bad for telecine) and lacking in contrast (not too good, but not horrible). Next time I would consider developing for longer, closer to 10 minutes or more, especially for a longer length of film. Given the length of film processed, it's extremely unlikely that the developer was exhausted, though I could see that as a possibility for 100' in 1L D76 1:1. Might consider straight D76 (purportedly less sharp, less grainy).
Film base retains a fair amount of purple antihalation dye-- might consider fixing longer (6 minutes?) and PermaWashing longer (4 minutes?).

Conclusion:
Results definitely acceptable, very useable. Low contrast range meant no clipped values in telecine which is nice, but a lot of histogram stretching (and less tonal gradation) to get good contrast which is not.

Category:

Education

Tags:

• FIlm
• 16mm
• art
• cinematography
• handprocess
• kodak
• develop
• diy
• cinema
• kino
• d76
• borax

[zaphodchak]

@kaiserclemens It's all in the description: Kodak D76 1:1 + borax for 9min 30sec, Kodak Indicator stop for 30sec, Kodak hardening fixer for 5 minutes, rinse, then PermaWash for 2 minutes. All of these chemicals needed more time, much more to do 100' at once. You'll find that once you factor in your time, lab processing is no more expensive than hand-processing. Generally hand-processing is a way to get a certain look rather than save money.

[kaiserclemens]

Hi! Could you tell me what chemicals you used - and the times for each? I have 7 rolls of that exact film stock for my grad film and can't afford to send it to the lab. Got a Morse G3 processing tank - should it work with one of those? I would sincerely appreciate the help!