510 Pyro Developer

In recent month's I've been experimenting with 510 Pyro Developer, a formula that was established by American photographer Jay DeFehr.  Although Jay's interest in subject matter is much different than mine, he really likes to experiment in the darkroom and has come up with a number of developers that are beginning to gain some attention in the film based photographic community.  

This particular formula is a pyro based developer, which imparts a proportionate stain into the emulsion of the film.  As it is typically used at high dilution it also seems well suited to extended development in highly dilute solution.

I stumbled across some information on line that suggested a development time for Arista EDU Ultra 200 film in 510 Pyro.  This is a low-cost emulsion manufactured in Eastern Europe and distributed by Freestyle Photo out of Califormia.  As I had several boxes of this low-cost film in stock I decided to load some up and experiment with this developer.

The information I had come across recommended "Semi-Stand" development in a dilute solution of 510 Pyro.  This technique basically utilizes a very dilute developer solution with the film left to stand in it for an extended period of time, with little or no agitation.  The idea is that the developer quickly becomes exhausted and development stops in the highlight areas of the film, where there is a lot of silver halide to be converted to metallic silver.  In the shadows area where there is very little exposure of the emulsion, development continues for a longer period of time.  This technique is supposed to restrain highlights a little, and support shadow values.  I thought this would be perfect to experiment with on some building interiors.  This type of image tends to typically include some shadow values, as well as some areas of highlight that are considerably brighter.

I exposed my 4" x 5" Arista EDU Ultra 200 negatives at 200 iso, and developed in 510 Pyro, diluted 1:200, for 24 minutes, at 21 degrees C, with minimal agitation.  The film was initially agitated for a minute, but thereafter was only agitated 3 times, for 15 seconds, at 6:00 minute intervals.

Over the Christmas holidays, and at the beginning of January, I made several day trips out northeast of the city.  I photographed at the abandoned Monastery, as well as a couple of other locations.  While working at these locations, I shot a few extra sheets of this Arista film, and this past weekend I processed them in 510 Pyro, using this semi-stand technique.  I am quite encouraged by the results.  Eventually when I get around to processing some of the other negatives that I exposed at the same time, I will be able to determine whether or not this technique yields any appreciable improvement.