Well, that was interesting. Learn something new every day?
Over the past couple of days I tried to write an article about my method of developing small-format film, a method I carefully built up over many years and through much research. I had everything worked out to a fare-thee-well. I figured it would be easy to write because I could do it off the top of my head.
And I found that...I couldn't. Reason? It's no longer on the top of my head!
It's been 22 years since I last developed film regularly, and some of the details I thought I would never forget, I've forgotten. Timings, dilutions, details about equipment and the history and lore of materials. I used to be able to recite it all without any effort.
I could still write that article, but I'll have to research some of it.
Elusive and rare
However, I made a welcome and unexpected discovery that I thought I'd throw out there for people who are developing their own film in 2022. One of the rarest and most elusive bits of darkroom equipment I've ever discovered is actually still available. I was very surprised.
A little background first. There are two kinds of developing tanks: the plastic ones, called Paterson-style, that look like this, and metal ones, made of stainless steel. Some people like one, some people the other. It's really just an Android vs. iPhone kind of thing. There's no right or wrong. It mainly has to do with which kind of reel is easier for you to load. I lean toward stainless. I never used plastic reels and plastic tanks except to help students with them, and I don't like 'em. The reason being that they only work right when they're absolutely dry. That's all well and good if you only develop one tank every two or three days. But sometimes you need to do another tank right away, and it's very frustrating to stand there endlessly with a hair dryer trying to get all the moisture out of the nooks and crannies of a plastic reel, only to find when you get in the dark that you didn't stand there long enough.
But there are problems with stainless tanks and reels too. The main one is that you need good reels in good condition. Cheap school- and group-darkroom reels bend if you drop them, so they're usually all bent up, or have been bent and bent back. If you manage a group darkroom, which I have done, you have to become skilled at fixing cheap reels and trying to get them more or less back into true. Being out of true is what causes all the problems. I swear allegiance to the beautiful reels made by Hewes in the UK. Which, by the way, I thought were extremely expensive when they cost $30 each! But you only need a few, and they will last your entire lifetime, and then the entire lifetime of the person who gets them after you. Not only are they superbly made and much heavier and stronger than typical stainless reels, but, crucially, instead of those infernal spring clips that most reels have, they have two little prongs in the center that fit into the sprocket holes of your filmstrip. Far easier to deal with. Now, here's the trick. What you do is to get into the habit of not winding your exposed film all the way back into the cassette before you remove it from the camera. To indicate that it's exposed, just fold the leader over. When you go into your dark closet or wherever you go to load your exposed film on the reels, you can get all set up before you even turn off the lights: clip the end of the roll square with scissors, then attach the film to the center prongs and get it started with a turn or two, all in room light. Then just set it there within easy reach where you can find it in the dark. Then, when you go dark, the hard part is already done, and you don't have to fumble with opening the cassette, cutting the film end, and loading the darned spring clip in the dark. Plus, Hewes reels are much easier and smoother to load because they're polished and smooth and dead true. Expensive, yes, but they'll pay you back every time you use them.
The tops
The other problem with stainless tanks is the tops. You do not want the common molded top that looks like this:
They can work all right, but they're cheap and will get damaged or start to leak sooner or later. These are marketed by Kalt and Omega and various other brands.
But you also don't want the classic old-fashioned stainless top:
The problem with those is that the light baffle only lets in a tiny dribble of liquid, and it takes forever to exchange solutions. I guess you get used to it if it's all you have, but it's a poor design.
So what do you want? The best one I ever found was marketed long ago by Kindermann in Germany. NOT the current Kindermann tank-top (sorry, but that's what it is), which is the plastic molded variety. The old one was much better made, of a rubbery material, with a top that fit and never leaked, and a design that allowed a free and easy exchange of liquid.
The problem was that Kindermann stopped making them twenty years ago. In the early 'aughts I went to great lengths to find and buy a second one, thinking I would one day continue doing darkroom work.
So here's the surprise: it looks like they're still available. If you go to eBay and search "Seki universal developing tank," you'll find a small two-reel stainless tank with a top that looks exactly like the old Kindermann one. I don't know what's going on with that; they all come from South Korea, so maybe Kindermann's original supplier was South Korean and either has some left over or is still making them, and is either selling them to a different customer (Seki) or selling them themselves (under the Seki name). I don't know. But it sure looks like that's the elusive top that I always thought was head-and-shoulders above any other alternative.
To see if it's really the same top, I'd need to order one and compare it to the ones I have.
The Seki tank with that elusive top
They do seem to be providing them only with two-reel tanks. With my developing method, following the research of George Post, I leave a generous airspace for better agitation; my standard was to develop three reels in a four-reel tank, with an empty reel at the top. I would only develop one reel in a two-reel tank. Stainless tanks are pretty well standardized, though, so that the ubiquitous molded tops would fit them all. But you'd have to get a four-reel tank from a different source and see if the Seki top fits. I would imagine it would, but you'd just have to try it.
George Post, who did an impressive amount of research on 35mm developing, did find that the most even development was achieved by developing one roll of film in the bottom position in a two-reel Paterson plastic tank, with the empty reel on top and only half the recommended amount of solution so as to leave a generous amount of airspace. But I had great results adapting his principles to a four-reel stainless tank. I'm too lazy to develop one reel at a time and then wait 24 hours for the reel to dry.
This is all pretty esoteric. But it's not a PITA if you find it fun, which I always did. And you only have to equip yourself once. Unlike digital stuff, you can keep using film stuff pretty much forever. Anyway: three Hewes reels, one cheap eBay reel as a spacer, that Seki top, and a four-reel tank. That's what you want—if you prefer stainless and want the best.
Mike
For further reading: "Classic Printmaking for Fun, Part I" (June 2011.) (There was never a Part II. Or maybe the article I tried to write yesterday would have been Part II.)
Featured Comments from:
Ken Bennett: "When I was stringing for the AP I spent a a few thousand hours souping color neg film in makeshift darkrooms at major sports and political events. We used metal reels, and sometimes would put two rolls on each reel, with the emulsions facing out. I could load reels half asleep or even half drunk. :-) Probably can't do it anymore. Before we got the Leafax film scanners in the early '90s we made color prints for the portable drum transmitters. Making color prints in a hotel bathroom was an art form."
robert e: "Wow! Learning a new darkroom tip is the last thing I expected from this day. That one about starting a Hewes reel with the lights on is gold! Wish I'd known it when I was developing film weekly. I still have a couple of those beautiful reels, though, so maybe it's not too late. I've been curious about the new all-in-one baths anyway. But I'll wait to see what you have to say about the arcana of agitation."
Richard Alan Fox: "I developed film in tanks for approximately 40 years. I started with Kodak plastic aprons and ended with the Paterson reels and tanks. The key to a dry reel is to have many on hand. I gave up the darkroom 20 years ago and don’t miss it for a moment; nostalgia is best left in the forgotten past."
Mike replies: I hear you. Digital is so much easier it's impossible not to go that way. And yet, it has never been remotely as satisfying.
John Shriver: "I still love developing B&W film. Never liked B&W darkroom printing—too frustrating. My daughter got props at college in 2012 for arriving with her own Nikor reels and tanks and knowing how to load them. I've got all the small Nikor reels: Minox, 16mm, 35mm (20 and 36), 126, 127, 120/620, 116/616, 118, and 122. Used all of them but the Minox, 16mm, and 126. I also have two Hewes 35mm reels, which I got for a pittance at a yard sale. But two of them don't fit in the Q15 tank; you need a (rare) Q18. It's like riding a bike: once you have the feel for loading Nikor reels, you never lose it. (I will note that the larger sizes are fussier.)"
Steve Rosenblum: "Hewes reels all the way! Not only are they still being made in Everton, Sandy, Bedfordshire, but the manager will happily correspond with you regarding any questions. Also, if you want to 'split the difference' they make 35mm reels that fit JOBO and Paterson plastic tanks as well."
Bear.: "Oh for my lost youth and the time I spent acquiring expertise in arcane topics, now without purpose and utterly forgotten!"
Jeff Hohner: "Mike, you are a memory machine. So many of your posts cause me to remember intense, particular pleasures from my photographic past. In this case, the intimate relationship between fingers and film and development reel in the pitch black of the darkroom; gently guiding, ratcheting, cajoling the film strip onto the reel; understanding for a brief privileged moment that being unsighted doesn't mean not having a complete perception of a thing and a process in minute detail. The stakes were high. Getting those two or three dozen latent images (potential keepers every one!) onto the reel and into the tank was do or die. Once the film canister had been cracked, there was no going back. I can still feel/see the little round guide tabs at the opening of my Paterson reels (I was a plastic guy) in my minds eye as clearly right now as I did in the dark 40 years ago."
Chris Nicholls: "Big fan of your 'Not much of a system System' and Barry Thornton's excellent articles on the use of contact prints to guide the approach to good negatives. I still have a copy of the article I sourced from LuLa, and learned so much from your writing. I'm down to a couple of rolls of film in six months now, but still enjoy a little quiet time in the darkroom. Keep it up."
Eric Peterson: "I weep with joy that I can send now my Texas Leica Tri-X to a good lab close by. But I thoroughly enjoyed today’s TOP. It recalled memories of some early roll film efforts. I think I used Rodinal, but holding that wet film up against a light for the first peek was just a magical transforming experience. Keep on truckin’!"
Malcolm Collier: "We (myself and parents John Collier Jr. and Mary E.T. Collier) always preferred FR plastic tanks although we also used steel a lot. FR reels were loaded the same way as steel reels and had the advantage of being less prone to film getting out of alignment on the reel. They could also be loaded when still damp. But they went off the market a long long time ago.
"But what I really am sending in is my mother’s comment about digital photography after 50-plus years of developing film, often in remote field situations. When I asked her what she thought of digital photography her immediate words were 'No more dish washing!'"
Richard Alan Fox: "Developing film in tanks was much like washing dishes by hand. [Richard, did you and Mary Collier know each other? —Ed.] Developing RAW files on a big screen and printing on an inkjet gives me the greatest image making satisfaction I have known, post exposure. One more thing regarding the Paterson reels, they adjust to hold 35mm, 120 or 220."
Sroyon (partial comment): "John Szarkowski once said, 'The hard part isn’t the decisive moment or anything like that—it's getting the film on the reel.'"
Luke: "So many awful memories, so much time wasted, so many late nights. Digital is so much MORE satisfying, with the ability to instantly see the results of changes in processing."
Kenneth Tanaka: "Tanks for the memories, eh? I’ve never had a strong urge to develop a roll of film. I took a short swing at color printing 40 years ago but quickly (mercifully) snapped out of it when my first wife threatened mayhem."
David Brown: "When I was doing basic darkroom workshops (stopped with the beginning of COVID and then just 'retired') absolute beginners would develop a roll of film and make prints all in one day. The single hardest part of every workshop I ever held was teaching and loading the blasted reels. The facility where I taught (Dallas Center for Photography) insisted on steel reels, which I agreed with; but plastic would have been much better for a beginner. IMHO My answer to the plastic vs. steel debate was always: Steel is better if you don't drop them; plastic is better if they are kept clean and dry."
Mike replies: If you drop a Hewes reel it will simply bounce, and you won't be able to detect any damage.
Doug C: "Hewes really won me over when they custom-made for me four 220 reels for JOBO 2500 series tanks, which are larger diameter than any of the above-mentioned systems. I really am still amazed that they were willing and able to do that. I had purchased a large supply of slightly outdated 220 film and found it was extremely difficult to load on plastic reels (one more thing to look out for). I was also amused that they had no way to process a credit card charge except through the pub next door. So that's how it showed up on my tax records. They were a bit expensive, or massively cheap depending on your attitude about custom work."
Tom Burke (partial comment): "Good post—I enjoyed it. Shows me how much of an amateur I was!—I’ve never heard of Hewes reels, despite a.) living in the UK all my life, and b.) being a voracious reader of Amateur Photographer during my film-developing days. I simply don’t recall ever seeing the name."
Mike replies: They might have been marketed under some other name over there. They were marketed under the name "King Concept" in the USA for many years; in fact I had known about them by that name for quite some time before I ever heard the name Hewes UK.