Hi again,
The negatives processed by Tabs Kit chemicals look just as good as those done with the other Tetenal C-41 chemicals that I've been using for years. The same amount of care and attention is needed. Processing is done at 38C --controlled by a Lauda laboratory thermostat with a circulating pump to within a tenth of a degree Celsius. The arrangement I have employs a Kindermann stainless steel tank (32 cm long) that sits at an angle in the water-bath and is rotated at a constant rate for the duration of each step. Pouring in or out takes about 10 seconds. I use 300 ml of solution and this covers the reel completely when the tank is vertical. The starting time of pouring in and out, is accurate to within a second. I believe the method is better than that offered by a Jobo because the temperature is better controlled. And anyway plastic tanks are bad conductors of heat. Chromes I process (also in Tetenal stuff) come out perfectly and I've just taken a look at some 6 x 6 and 35 mm slides processed last year. As for making prints. When I was still using the Epson 750 Photo the prints were fine -- mainly portraits -- when the bloody jets were not blocked. I've also had prints made by a really professional lab from negatives and chromes processed in Tetenal chemicals and they were very good. I'll scan some other Tetenal processed negatives and slides and post them on my temp site. When I say the colour balance is 'out' I don't mean it can't be handled. It's quite easily fixed using small adjustments of the sliders or later in Photoshop. I'm convinced the problem lies with the scanner software because when I was using the Olympus S10 I had no such problem. There is also too much automatic correction done by the software that comes with the 3200. Turning it off (reset) doesn't help either. But I won't go into that because I don't know enough about it yet. Spring will be here soon and I'll take some 'normal' pictures and we'll see how the Tabs Kit handles those. Of course many of the above conclusions depend on the Tabs Kit chemicals being *exactly* the same as those in the other kits. The instructions are the same -- time temperature capacity and so on. Also remember I only took the Tabs because they were out of stock of the stuff I normally use: C-41 Colortec Kit for Negative 3 x 1 litre art nr. 10224. The Chrome chemicals I use are Colortec, E-6 - three bath, art.nr. 102032 -- by the way. I like Tetenal and the negatives are as good as those from the lab in the city -- and a lot cleaner. You don't say what you think of the owl picture -- as far as colour goes. I know it's not sharp. Don ______________ Dr E D F Williams http://personal.inet.fi/cool/don.williams Author's Web Site and Photo Gallery See Extra Pages 'The Cement Company from HELL!' Updated: August 15, 2003 "Oh my God! They've killed Teddy!" ----- Original Message ----- From: "Butch Black" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Wednesday, March 17, 2004 2:09 AM Subject: P: C-41 Tetenal Tabs Kit continued > Don Wrote: > > > By the way colour balance *is* a bit of a problem. The film type profiles > that come with Silverstream and Epson's own software don't work very well. > > > That is why I asked. I have had the occasional customer process his/her own > C-41. Most of the times the color balance was off enough that it was > difficult to get a good machine print from it. So unless you had a color > darkroom or sent out for a custom print the results were less then optimum. > I think you need something like a JOBO and you need to use C-41 or > equivalent chemistry that processes around 38°C. The fact that your profiles > don't work well with it confirms my suspicions. > > Butch > > Each man had only one genuine vocation - to find the way to himself. > > Hermann Hesse (Demian) > > >
