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Hi Walter,
You don't say why you want to know the chemical composition of DD-X. If you are planning on making your own from scratch you can hardly claim to be lazy! Are you concerned about lining up a substitute developer in case Ilford goes under? You might send and e-mail inquiring about this to Photographer's Formulary.
Your results with DD-X as compared to Rodinal suggest that the TXP/DD-X combination produces a less than optimal curve shape, at least for your printing paper. If I understand what Phil Davis has said on this subject, it is pretty hard to modify that curve shape with changes of dilution and/or agitation technique. So if you are convinced that TXP/DD-X is giving you less-than-great low value separation and no midtone "lift" shouldn't you try another developer, rather than waste time experimenting with a combination unlikely to produce the results that you want?
Having said that, let me ask, are you sure of your results? If you look at Phil's tests results of the old TXP you will see that one of the most striking things about it is that choice of developer has a negligible effect on curve shape. Now Phil did not test TXP in Rodinal; but it would surprise me if this developer, alone among popular developers, altered the shape of TXP's characteristic curve.
If you do want to try intermittent agitation techniques with large format film the best device I know for this is the "Cradle" from Summitek. The Cradle is a six-compartment insert that fits a standard 11X14 darkroom tray. There are cutouts in the Cradle that allow developer to circulate freely over and around the negatives. Up to six negatives are loaded in the Cradle; it is then placed in a tray of developer; after development the cradle is moved to the stop bath, and then the fixer, and so on. The advantage of this method over standard tray development is that you keep the films separate, and thus there is no risk of scratching them. I use the Cradle whenever I have 4 to 6 negatives that require exactly the same development time, but I agitate continuously and use the time, temperature, and dilution that would have used for tube development.
If you do manage to achieve the results you are looking for with TXP/DD-X please let us know how you did it.
David
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