When the film is loaded onto your canister and you are ready to place the T- Max developer....after you place the developer in the canister should one agitate it very slowly or does it really matter if one agitates it in a normal pace and then sets down????? Will this produce more grain????Or will it have no effect on the film???? What are some of the things that I can do to reduce grain on my prints while processing the film??????????

-- Jerry Anaya (A3nafra@aol.com), September 21, 1997

Answers

Response to Film Processing

If anything, with TMax, make sure you agitate well. It was developed & is used a lot with rotary processing which uses constant agitation. To keep grain down use diluted developers & shoot for good contrast with them. With TMax, above all, be consistent. Grain with the 100 isn't really much of a problem no matter what you do unless you are worrying more about grain than image content. work with your images so content is paramount & the grain problem(real or perceived) will start to diminish in importance.

-- Dan Smith (shooter@brigham.net), September 24, 1997.

Film Processing

The greater the agitation the greater the grain. I would agitate normally for the first 10 - 20 seconds. It is important to get the developer on the film evenly especially at the beginning. If you do not agitate enough there may be uneven development since some of the film is not getting the developer. I agitate once a minute, three inversions and spin the tank from right to left. I do it on the easy side. As an experiment, you can try inverting once after the developer is in the film. Then every minute agitate only by twisting the tank from right to left. Tilt the tank (I use a stainless steel one) slightly. When half the development is up, invert once. Then continue the process. You will see very fine grain this way. I do not do it, and don't know of any who do because you will probably get less shadow detail if there is a minimum of agitation. You can greatly reduce grain by overexposing and underdeveloping. For example rating tri-x at 200 and developing 10% less than recommended for developing at 400 will give you a thinner negative with less grain. For t-max 100, I have only tried it once, rate it at iso 50 and develop it in d-76 1:1 for nine minutes. I do not use t-max developer, but when I used it, I prefer to dilute it 1:7, that is one part developer to seven parts of water. Diluting developers produces thinner negatives which have less grain. That is why most people dilute D-76 1:1.

-- Kenneth Williams (loftacall@email.msn.com), April 25, 1998.