I'm curious to hear if anyone out there has had experiences with developing photographic paper in film developers, and what differences there are in the final result. The main reason I ask is because I saw the formula for Gainer's Vitamin C Film Developer, which is extremely simple and inexpensive to mix, and seems to bee less toxic and allergenic than other developers out there. I'm most interested in this particular developer, of course, but I'm also interested in hearing about other developers.

Side question: does anyone out there know how long the shelf life of this developer is?

-- Winston Chang (winston@stdout.org), November 16, 2000

Answers

I think Dektol can be used for paper and film.

-- William Levitt (light-zone@operamail.com), November 17, 2000.

I tried Pyro once on a cheap Ilford RC paper and got the most interesting greenish tint prints. I have not done anything else with this though.

-- David N. VanMeter (davidvanmeter@columbus.rr.com), November 17, 2000.

It can definitely be done, but many artists, Sally Mann comes to mind as notable, use "spent" film developer to be able to control very precisely the effects they are trying to achieve. I know weak or spent D-76 can be used with good results. Try toning in tea...preferably Earl Grey.

-- Chad Jarvis (cjarvis@nas.edu), November 17, 2000.

Is it true that Earl "Middle" Gray was a photographer when not brewing tea?

-- Dan Smith (shooter@brigham.net), November 19, 2000.

There ain't nuthin' in the world that somebody else hasn't already thought of. Read this.

-- David Goldfarb (dgoldfarb@barnard.edu), November 19, 2000.

You can use Rodinal like that to good effect. Agfa used to sell it as a dual purpose developer.

It's all a matter of testing and taste?

-- K H Tan (kahheng@pacific.net.sg), November 20, 2000.