Alternative Recipe.

[Ralph Turner]

I've started using a different caffenol recipe from my more usual 'C-H' variety, namely 'Delta'. It uses much less soda (albeit higher amounts of coffee and vitC) and no bromide, but still seems to leave very little if any base fog on 400 iso film (HP5+, Kentmere). I'm still fine-tuning dev times, but I'm liking what Ive seen so far, ie a touch less dense and contrasty, but still producing a good scan. Here are the quantities in grammes per litre previous/current - Soda 54/24, vitC 16/20, coffee 40/45. Using less soda and no bromide is good news for our septic tank drainage. (Image - Voigtlander Vio C, Ilford HP5+)

 

[Gianluca Drago]

@Ralph Turner I have never developed photographic film, so reading your recipes is like deciphering the Rosetta Stone or the message addressed to extraterrestrials by Carl Sagan during the Voyager mission. Like a SETI@home experience. Fascinating.
I suppose my tomorrow morning coffee will taste different from usual [but I urgently need to find some bromide before sunrise].

 

[Ralph Turner]

@Ralph Turner I have never developed photographic film, so reading your recipes is like deciphering the Rosetta Stone or the message addressed to extraterrestrials by Carl Sagan during the Voyager mission. Like a SETI@home experience. Fascinating.
I suppose my tomorrow morning coffee will taste different from usual [but I urgently need find some bromide before sunrise].

Lol! Not sure I could recommend imbibing the bromide (unless you're a horse) or, for that matter, the cheap instant coffee powder I use for this - it's really only fit for film devving!

 

[Ralph Turner]

Links added here for a little more clarity.

http://dickkoolish.com/rmk_page/misc/The%20Caffenol%20Cookbook%20&%20Bible%20-%20Recipes%20and%20Tutorials.pdf

Recipes

Caffenol Recipes that are proven to work can be found here. If not stated differently, the temperature of the solution should be 20 degrees Celsius or 68 degrees Fahrenheit. For all other temperatu…

www.caffenol.org

 

[Gary R. Smith]

Hi Ralph, recently I've been pondering developing at home (after 50 years of not doing my own). Your post makes me wonder if there are possibilities for home development that don't result in strong chemical odors (my wife is extremely sensitive to odors and chemical odors in particular).

 

[Ralph Turner]

Hi Gary. I'm not sure caffenol has a particularly good reputation, smell-wise, although I personally don't mind it. To maybe give you a vague idea of what its odour is like, to me it's a vague mix of coffee and new bicycle inner tubes, if that makes any sense. Somewhat different to traditional dev smells. I believe mixing the ingredients in the right order can help mitigate the effects, though.
Since I came back to home devving just over a year ago I've only used caffenol , a decision I haven't regretted.

 

[Gary R. Smith]

Thanks Ralph! Today I added 2 new old cameras to my pile and I suspect I'm going to have to figure out a way to start doing film at home again.

 

[Ralph Turner]

Thanks Ralph! Today I added 2 new old cameras to my pile and I suspect I'm going to have to figure out a way to start doing film at home again.

I hope all goes well with it

 

[Stevenson Gawen]

Thanks Ralph! Today I added 2 new old cameras to my pile and I suspect I'm going to have to figure out a way to start doing film at home again.

Not to take the thread off track too much (I'm still yet to try caffenol... I want to though!) I started out developing using Cinestill DF96 monobath.
As the name implies it's an all-in-one mix. Load film into tank, warm the DF96 to the right temp, fill tank, keep warm if need be in water bath, agitate to specs (important) drain df96 back into bottle, rinse with water.

It does have a smell, but as there's a rather short timespan that the chemicals are actually open or being handled it's very low level (at least to me).
It's reusable for a number of times with slight increases in development time - I never did 'wear out' my batch.

It gives good negatives with HP5+, I would say a smidge less apparent contrast and sharpness than Ilford ID-11 (the only other I've used) but overall good.