Rodinal and tray development

[Usagi]

Thanks!

Conclusion so far is that it's my agitation, not Rodinal. For some reason D-76 seems to forgive more.

Have to do some tests to verify this

[Shawn Dougherty]

Two sheets are the same as with more, you are still agitating by shuffling. the times do not change because each sheet, whether 2 or 6, are being moved once every 30 seconds.

My experience with Rodinal in particular is very different. I normally develop 6 sheets in 1500ml using my slosher tray. If I develop 3 sheets in the same amount of developer the result is a considerable increase in development. I have found the same with traditional tray processing and using 1 vs 2 reels in a two reel tank. Rodinal is quite sensitive to changes in film to developer ratio (even though the dilution is consistent).

All the best. Shawn

[Greg Davis]

I'll have to defer to your information in that regard. I've only used Rodinal once, ten years ago. I don't even remember on what film. I know tray development extremely well, but not Rodinal.

[Shawn Dougherty]

I'll have to defer to your information in that regard. I've only used Rodinal once, ten years ago. I don't even remember on what film. I know tray development extremely well, but not Rodinal.

Yeah, I ONLY found this with Rodinal. When I was using Pyrocat HD and experimenting with D-76 I would shuffle or slosher-tray(can one use that as a verb?) between 3 and 6 sheets and never noticed a real difference. So, it came as a surprise to me when i started using Rodinal. I wonder why that is?

Shawn

[Usagi]

I have finetuned my shuffling and did some tests with single sheet, using Kodak's agitation style.

For now, I have stick in D-76 1+1 until I am confident enough to give rodinal a try.

The thing that bothers me is kind that the gradient of negative is a bit hard to predict - even after series of test strips.
If I develop 5 sheets at time and shuffle them continously, the result will be softer than developing 2 sheets and shuffling them continously.
Ofcourse, developing only one sheet by racking the tray gives a lot of more contrast and to my surprise with combination FP4+ and D-76 also the shape of curve is more "swept", long toe curve.

Feels a bit strange as there's lot of books that suggest shuffling method for development calibration in the way that the one film is removed from the stack when the development time for that is full and smaller stack is kept shuffling until next one is removed...
And the last one? Didn't found any source that covers that part.

[GraemeMitchell]

I too have found rodinal to be more likely to incur uneven development compared to D-76 and HC-110. I use it in deep tanks tanks at 1+50, w/ sheet and roll film. I don't tray process. Daylight tanks weren't ever a problem, but the deep tanks are w/ rodinal.

What I think it is, and this is just a postulation, is that Rodinal begins developing very quickly and aggressively upon initial contact w/ film compared to other developers. It then settles into a more gradual development which can cont. to build density for a long time, more slowly. But b/c problems w/ uneven development mainly occur in the first 30 sec to min of development, Rodinal then becomes tricky. My guess. And just a guess.

So really try to make sure your first round of agitation is spot on.