Film Photography Project: New Film: DEREV PAN

The Film Photography Project is offering a new line of films, called Derev Pan.  The film is hand-rolled, fresh scientific aerial photographic film.  This film is not an expired film, but a currently manufactured film from the Ukraine.  The name of the film comes from the Ukrainian for tree. 

The film will be available in ISO 100, 200 and 400, and is a fine to extremely fine grain film.  The price is an affordable $5.99 per 36 exposure roll.

See some tests here, where Alex Luyckx proclaims of this film, "I knew I had a winner as soon as I pulled the film out of the tank, and was blown away when I the images up onto my screen. The images have that typical brightness I find when processing in Pyrocat-HD not to mention a good tonality and smooth contrast."

Looks like 2019 is not going to slow down adding new films for analogue photographers to try.

Kindle: Free and Convenient Storage fo eBooks

Yesterday, this blog published an article with a link to an e-book by Tim Layton.  Grab that book from here, if you do not already have it.

Today, your blogger will reveal a great way to store and organize any and all e-books, data sheets and any other electronic document in e-book or PDF format to a central location accessible just about anywhere.

Amazon Kindle devices are probably well known to just about anyone, but Amazon actually offers the Kindle service free to just about any device or computer.  There are free apps for iOS, Android and Windows.  It is also possible to access your Kindle content directly over the Web with just about any popular web browser.

There is no fee to sign up for a Kindle account and one can easily email content to a special email address that will automatically send content to your managed devices.

This video will show you how to sign up for an Amazon account and get started adding books to your Kindle account.  There are plenty of free Kindle books, if you wish to browse and add books from Amazon.

If you already have an Amazon account, sign in and go to Accounts & Lists.  There will be an option to Add Kindle Unlimited.  Sign up there.

If you already have a Kindle account, sign in and go to Accounts & Lists, then select Manage Your Content and Devices.  Click on the Devices tab to see the email address to send content to your Kindle account.

Store all your data sheets, formula e-books and other electronic documents related to photography on your Kindle account for easy access at any time, whether on a photography shoot or while planning a scene.

Tim Layton: Debunking the Myth of Aging D-76

Tim of Tim Layton Fine Art debunks the myth that D-76 changes pH after two months by measuring the actual pH of a solution of fresh D-76 developer against a bottle of the developer left on the shelf for two months.

The reason one would leave D-76 to age in an attempt to increase its pH is to increase contrast in the negative developed in the agent.  If the pH is higher, then there will be more contrast.

By mixing up a solution of the developer two months in advance, he was able to measure the pH against a fresh batch of D-76, and therefore assess any possible increased potency of the developer.

The result?  The pH was nearly the same for both batches, well within measurement error.  The conclusion, contrary to the forums, was that D-76 aged by two months does not increase the contrast of negatives developed in the solution.

As a bonus, Tim gives us free access to a collection of formulas he has put together into an e-book.

Check out his video here.

YouTube: Tim Layton, Fine Art in Botanicals

Tim Layton gives an instructive session with large format dry plates, including printing the sample dry plate that he exposed.

Tim lays out the three options for large format glass dry plates today.  The first and easiest to to buy the plates already coated.  There are no large factories pumping out millions of glass plates today.  However, Jason Lane of Pictoriograhica (Etsy store front) makes pre-coated dry plates for a reasonable price.  Tim plans to review some 8x10 plates from Pictoriographica in the future.

Second, is to cut your own glass and then coat the plate yourself.  He recommends a product called Ag-Plus, no relation or affiliation to this blog, and will offer techniques and tips to coating the plate.

Third, Tim actually has made his own dry plates from scratch, mixing the emulsion himself to meet the requirements for light sensitivity and speed that he wants.  Again, a later session will describe how to make the dry plates and measure the EI (speed) of the plates once they are made up.

Tim also has an ezine called Darkroom Underground.  This zine comes out quarterly and has an annual subscription rate of US$89 a year.  The zine contains technical articles from a wide range of experts, essays and tuturials.

Click on for an expert demonstration of split grade printing in action!

YouTube: Film Rescue International

For all those times that one would need to develop an old roll of film that has been in storage or the attic for some years, if not decades, then Film Rescue International is the answer.  In particular, if the film is Kodachrome, which can no longer be processed traditionally.

Film Rescue will process Kodachrome film such that a B&W image is obtained.  Better than no image, as the people in this video will attest. 

Film Rescue International to the rescue!