[Leica] Cold light

["Walter Levy" <wlevy@home.com>]

Takeshi Hashimoto wrote:  "The less you develop your film, the better:
better definition, less grain, etc."

Is this like the story of the man who went to the brickyard to buy a load of
bricks?  The yardman told him "The more bricks you buy, the cheaper they
are," to which the man replied, "Great!  Keep loading them up until they're
free!"

(I tried developing a roll of FP4 in distilled water for 30 sec at 68
degrees, sure enough, NO GRAIN! ... not much definition either, though...)

Seriously, though, Takeshi's point is well taken.  It's true enough,
shorter, gentler development cycles are generally better as the silver
grains don't have a chance to grow too big or clump too much.  Lately I'm
experimenting with TMax 400 and FP5+, using a custom blend of one part D-76
stock diluted with 1/2 part used D-76 1:1 and 1/2 part distilled water.  I
read somewhere that the byproducts of development will slightly dissolve the
grains, hence the used developer in this mix.

And no, I don't use a Leica enlarging lens and I don't think it would make
that much difference relative to the difference between using condenser and
cold light sources.

Gee, I didn't expect to start such a vigorous discussion by my original
post!  I was just excited by my first darkroom session with cold light...

Best regards to all LUGnutz near and far!

Carpe Argentum

- - Walter