Increasingly, I've found that testing can be helpful. Yes, you can just shoot and make corrections on the fly, but you won't have the controlled, quantitative information you get with tests. You also stand the chance of messing up some valuable shots. But you do spend a fair amount of time and film doing tests.
Your plan looks basically good. I especially like the idea of making prints. You may find you like one developer much more than another, and then you can shorten the tests by just using it. I have a couple of suggestions. Be sure to select some standard scenes, so you can meaningfully compare the results. Choose stuff with a wide range of tones. Bracket exposures. Different developers give different film speeds. If contrast is off, retest with an adjusted developing time. I've found it useful to take a couple of shots of a step tablet on a light table as part of my tests. It tells you things that photos of a scene can't easily show. But the standard scenes are extremely valuable for the general look and printing qualities. |