Coffee as a Developer: Not Yet My Cup Of Tea

Brian Moore

Brian Moore

Moderator
A few images from my first roll developed using "Caffenol." I made no adjustments whatsoever to the scans--they're just what they looked like out of the processing tank.

XA3TriXinCaff-025_zps68fe5954.jpg


Camera and film: Olympus XA3 and Kodak Tri-X 400 at box speed.

Caffenol Ingredients:

-Half a liter of water at 70 degrees F
-5 heaping teaspoons of the cheapest instant coffee I could find
-4 teaspoons of washing soda (I used "PH Up" which is available at swimming pool supply shops)
-1/2 teaspoon of iodized salt
-1.5 teaspoons of ascorbic acid (vitamin C powder)

Developed for 15 mins.

Results: underdeveloped and showing what I think is "bromide drag."

XA3TriXinCaff-030_zps1ce99b18.jpg


XA3TriXinCaff-035_zpse3463994.jpg


XA3TriXinCaff-037_zps2b81f662.jpg
 
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Brilliant!!
I'm so impressed that they came out so well!!
The second shot is especially good too!

what do you mean by bromide drag ... I've read that twice in the last few days ... No idea what it is or means?

Would you be offended if I changed the thread title to something more obvious - I'd like to make it into an article for the home page ... :)
 
Thanks, Hamish. Change the title if you want to. Nae bother.

Bromide drag, as I understand it, manifests itself as streaks of inconsistent development lengthwise in the image. The images above don't show it too badly, but others in the roll showed it quite prominently. (See below.) It can be avoided, I've read, through better agitation. This makes sense, since with this batch I agitated the canister for the first 45 seconds and then did just one inversion each minute for the remainder. I usually agitate a little more than that, and since I normally use Rodinal Bromide Drag isn't an issue since I've read that Rodinal is not subject to Bromide Drag.

Here's one explanation: Analogue Photography and Film FAQ: Bromide Drag

Image with pronounced Bromide Drag?
XA3TriXinCaff-024.jpg
 
Brilliant Brian - quite the home chemist! :)

Love the look - especially on the architectural shot #2
 
A work in progress it might be, but it's a fine start!
tonally they are really nice I think! Shame about the "drag" but it doesn't seem that will be to hard to solve??
that website you showed me said 30 sec agitation ... You just gotta put a bit more energy into it Brian ... Lazy! ;)
 
Hamish Gill said:
A work in progress it might be, but it's a fine start!
tonally they are really nice I think! Shame about the "drag" but it doesn't seem that will be to hard to solve??
that website you showed me said 30 sec agitation ... You just gotta put a bit more energy into it Brian ... Lazy! ;)
Click to expand...
LOL. There are so many opinions on agitation schemes. They're like arse holes; everybody's got one.
 
I have just developed some Delta 100 with Caffinol and as far as I can tell they came out all right. The full verdict is still out as I don't yet have a 120 film scanner so I can't the complete result. I was about to mix some ID-11 until I spotted that the supplier had only sent me a 1litre pack instead of a 5 litre pack so I couldn't use it in case I have to send it back. So I decided to take the plunge.

I used some:

Cheap Tesco's instant coffee - around 49p
Hollands and Barret Vitamin C powder - this was the most expensive item at around £6.50
Decahydrate Soda Crystals - £1

For half a litre you need:

20gr Coffee
8gr Vit C
73gr Soda Crystals

All weighed out with some precision scales.

15 minutes at 20 deg C with 10 agitations at the start and 3 every minute.

As soon as I get the scanner I plan to buy I will post the photos. They were only test shots to work out correct exposure for some still life's but I'm keen to see how well the negs scan.
 
I am very impressed at the Coffee experiment. Such DIY approaches are to be encouraged to my mind, and I think you have done a great job. With some experimentation I think you will get some very interesting effects.

A bloke in the pub once told me that films could be developed in urine, but I think he was taking the pi$$.
 
Paul Lange said:
I have just developed some Delta 100 with Caffinol and as far as I can tell they came out all right. The full verdict is still out as I don't yet have a 120 film scanner so I can't the complete result. I was about to mix some ID-11 until I spotted that the supplier had only sent me a 1litre pack instead of a 5 litre pack so I couldn't use it in case I have to send it back. So I decided to take the plunge.

I used some:

Cheap Tesco's instant coffee - around 49p
Hollands and Barret Vitamin C powder - this was the most expensive item at around £6.50
Decahydrate Soda Crystals - £1

For half a litre you need:

20gr Coffee
8gr Vit C
73gr Soda Crystals

All weighed out with some precision scales.

15 minutes at 20 deg C with 10 agitations at the start and 3 every minute.

As soon as I get the scanner I plan to buy I will post the photos. They were only test shots to work out correct exposure for some still life's but I'm keen to see how well the negs scan.
Click to expand...

Well done, Paul. Almost all of the BW foties I have posted since December have been processed in Caffenol. (Exception: images shot on Kodak BW400 C41 film, which I just take to Costco and get negs processed in an hour for $1.30.) After my first batch of Caffenols--the ones that I said were not my cup of tea--I was able to fine tune the process and get decent images.

You may remember these:
http://www.realphotographersforum.com/people-portraits/10546-coming-through.html, http://www.realphotographersforum.com/animals-wildlife/10489-sadie-stairs.html

Both were shot on Tri-X.

- - - Updated - - -

stan hesketh said:
I am very impressed at the Coffee experiment. Such DIY approaches are to be encouraged to my mind, and I think you have done a great job. With some experimentation I think you will get some very interesting effects.

A bloke in the pub once told me that films could be developed in urine, but I think he was taking the pi$$.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the comments Stan. I bought some more Rodinal so I'll be going back to that for a while. The coffee experiment was fun. I'd read somewhere--I think from some fellow on Flickr--that urine could be used. I think you'd have to be pretty desperate to do that though.
 
The Cup of Tea is yours, Brian! They look impressive. Film, coffee and beer, can't beat that. :)
 
In your photographs, you make it look sweeter. :cool:
 
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As promised here is a photie that was developed in Caffenol. This one came out particularly well but there was a mixed bag of results but I think this may have been down to that this was really a run of test shots and many were either under or over exposed or had various coloured sheets of plastic over the lens. This was taken without a filter and slightly under exposed, the cloth was blue and white and the background a dark grey.


Gingham Blue RIng by Paul R Lange, on Flickr
 
Cheers.

I have picked up the Photie term from somewhere and now suspect it may have been you Brian. :D

Barry, I have read (I am not an expert) that it is the soda that can be the problem. If you bought the soda crystals from the supermarket (I bought Dri-Pak brand) chances are it is decahydrate which means you have to use 2.7 times the amount. There is also monohydrate and you have to use slightly less that decahydrate, I think around 1.5 times and then there is anhydrous which is what the formulations on the web seem to use.
 
Here's a conversion table to go from anhydrous sodium carbonate to the different hydration states.

Screenshot2013-04-30at124325_zpsdced47c3.png


To convert between hydration states use the following equation:

New weight = weight stated in recipe x MW of form to be used / MW of form stated in recipe

Where MW = molecular weight from the table above.


For example, if it states 24g of heptahydrate and you have decahydrate:

24 x 286/232 = 29.6g
 
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