Lately, I've started experimenting with a few alternative processes again. I tried caffenol on film a few times (see some results
here), and I read that one could also process film in a similar solution made with red wine. Of course I had to try it! Here are details of the recipe and my results.
The recipe:
1 bottle (750 ml) red wine. I used home - made red wine that has (I think) a fairly high alcohol content. I think any red wine will work, though.
Approx 6 Tbs washing soda (This should be about 75 grams, I think. I don't have a scale so I'll admit to estimating this measurement)
4 grams Vitamin C (You're supposed to use acetic acid powder, but I used crushed tablets and it seems to work okay.)
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| The ingredients, ready for mixing. |
Mix everything well. The mixture starts to smell like Manischewitz concord grape wine. Nasty.
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| Mix Well |
Some of the washing soda solidified in the solution. This should probably be filtered out. I didn't filter and said f**k it and threw everything in the tank. Probably not a good idea, but I've never been a stickler for details.
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| Wineol in the tank, working its magic. |
Load the developing tank. I was processing T-Max 100 4 x 5 sheet film (expired in 2012) and loaded a Paterson tank using the
'taco method'. Bump the tank to remove air bubbles, and agitate for the first minute. Develop in the wineol for 45 minutes. I agitated every three minutes or so.
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| Dumb the developer |
After the time is up, dump the developer from the tank. As you can sort of see in the photo above, it has gone from a lovely dark purple color to a dark brownish black. It also smells even nastier at this point, so be sure to do this in a well ventilated space. Pour water into the tank (I never use stop bath) and agitate a couple of times, drain, add more water and agitate for about one minute. Dump the water and add fixer. I use Ilford Rapid fix. When the fixing time is up, pour out the fixer and wash the negatives for about 12 minutes. Remove the film from the tank and allow to dry.
That's it. And now, here are the results:
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| R and T, 2014 |
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| Ghosts, 2014 |
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| R and W, 2014 |
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| R and J, 2014 |
As you can see, there is a lot of streaking on each side of each negative. I'm not exactly sure how it happened, but I think it's because I didn't filter my developer. I'm still fairly pleased with the results. Tomorrow, I'll shoot more film and try again.
Thanks for visiting. Please leave any comments or questions in the space provided.
