The Adox CMS 20 trials

[AJQS]

Here we go then, the finest grain and highest resolution B&W film available, lets put it to the test!

Initial experiment in published Caffenol recipe.

Set the OM2 up on a tripod, pointed it at my desk. light metered off my hand indicated a 1 second exposure at EI20 at f5.6. Eek, better use the self timer! Also bracketed a bit, went down to F2 keeping the exposure the same at a second.

Now I made abit of a boob here and usd my Bromide solution for the water, which is pretty strong stuff at 1.4g/l, so the negs came out incredibly thin, I initially thought there was nothing on them, but a very dim black patch appeared denoting my laptop screen, so I scanned it.

Well **** me that is indeed grainless! Here's a 150% crop, that is all dust, thanks to my overexcited haphazard rushing through this experiment!

Zoom in as much as you like into the clear areas between dust, there is NO grain pattern, it's pure pixels!

Now then 've just shot another set outside and made a stronger brew of Caffenol and the results of that look to be much much denser, so should be easier to scan, however I think they may be a fair bit too contrasty so I think a third brew is called for. Unfortunately I have to go to work shortly so I won't get the results till tomorrow, just to leave you in suspense.

Of course you could always just buy the Adotech developer and get grainless B&W with no mess, but where's the fun in that?!

 

[Woodsy]

What DPI did you scan this at?

 

[AJQS]

2820, non interpolated. I should add this is from a section not on the plane of focus, it's about an inch behind where it should have been.

Also forgot to mention that this stuff fixes in about 10 seconds flat, and turns the fixer a fetching shade of pink. Do not store in an old robinsons squash bottle or you may have a future problem!

When I get my developer mix right I'll do a nice neat comparison between a few different films under controlled conditions for a proper comparison, but for now you can take my word for it - you have not seen a fine grain film till you've seen this stuff!

 

[robhooley167]

I have some rolls of 120 on the way so i am interested to see how it comes out in very dilute Rodinal

 

[AJQS]

I have some rolls of 120 on the way so i am interested to see how it comes out in very dilute Rodinal

I've seen some examples and it looked good.

I reckon I can get it up to ISO 160 by using almost standard caffenol, not the modified recipe I started with.

Here's one from the outdoor trial:

(100%)

It's got very good lattitude, very good contrast, and a very good dynamic range. There is detail in the sky visible on the neg quite clearly (even with the naked eye) but the scanner couldn't quite stretch that far without some curves adjustment.

Actually the lattitude is very good, I have scanned ISO 5-80 on the same strip!

 

[AJQS]

Pop quiz, one of these is a digital imposter, but which one?

 

[Andysnap]

I'd say 3 but bloody hell its difficult to tell.

 

[robhooley167]

Can we have some 100% crops, its hard to tell without seeing a decent size image. But i think that the right hand one in the digital imposter

 

[AJQS]

Big clueL Digital is a Panasonic LX5

 

[Woodsy]

Middle one, highlights look like they've blown too easily... Or 3 because of the difference in the total DoF

 

[robhooley167]

Middle and left are film because the tripod hasnt moved, right one probably handheld?

 

[AJQS]

Yes, the right hand one is off the LX5.

Right then some more developments on the CMS20 front. ISO is now up to a whopping 200 - that's a 3 and a 1/3 stop push process with absolutely no adverse effect on grain. Contrast is quite high, but I've been adjusting the recipe to suit, and I reckon it's got a very APX100 look about it now.

For those interested, the recipe is now for 300ml:

4g coffee
0.5g Vitamin C
8.5g Decahydrate wahsing soda (3.2g for anhydrous users)

21 minute dev time, constant agitation 1st minute then 3 inversions every 4 minutes. Fix as before.

Fixer is in fact a great indicator of how your negs look before you open the tank - the pinker it comes out the thinner the negs!

I took a couple of shots with my Pentax ME which metered 1/125 f8 ISO 100, and developed in my previous recipe with shoter dev time and was unhappy wit hexcessive contrast. These were shot in the OM2SP, spot metered by zone metering arriving at exactly the same exposure, this time developed in the weaker recipe shown above, brakceted a stop over and under, this is what we get (ISO 50 was too blown out and contrasty)

Just about to repeat to make sure it wasn't a complete fluke and that you really can use a 20 speed film at 200!


Adox CMS20 @ ISO 100 by R. Alan Jones, on Flickr


Adox CMS20 @ ISO200 test 105 by R. Alan Jones, on Flickr

 

[visiono]

Alan, I'm just about to get this film for shooting outdoor portraits on 35mm. As i understand standard household coffee and baking soda can be used to develop this film. Would you say this is realiable for paid work? Adox claims the resolution is equivalent to a 500mp camera. What do you think? Have you printed this large to confirm ?

 

[steveo_mcg]

Alan, I'm just about to get this film for shooting outdoor portraits on 35mm. As i understand standard household coffee and baking soda can be used to develop this film. Would you say this is realiable for paid work? Adox claims the resolution is equivalent to a 500mp camera. What do you think? Have you printed this large to confirm ?

Hi mate, this thread is quite old and I'm not sure @Alan Clogwyn still hangs out round these parts but I'd not use any developer you're unfamilar with for paid work. Stick to what you know and if you don't know any developers (thats fine) stick to Rodinal or D76.

 

[RaglanSurf]

Hi mate, this thread is quite old and I'm not sure @Alan Clogwyn still hangs out round these parts but I'd not use any developer you're unfamilar with for paid work. Stick to what you know and if you don't know any developers (thats fine) stick to Rodinal or D76.

Wise words indeed, paid work is not the time to experiment imho.

 

[an1uk]

Wise words indeed, paid work is not the time to experiment imho.

Unless you can reshoot without penalty, like product photography.

I'm very surprised the images shown aren't effectively straight black and white with no inbetween on CMS20 shot at 200.

 

[Jao]

Unless you can reshoot without penalty, like product photography.

I'm very surprised the images shown aren't effectively straight black and white with no inbetween on CMS20 shot at 200.

Alan, Adox CMS20 is a fine grain black and white that gives an excellent range of grey tones. If you want straight black and white you might be better with an Ortho Lith film of some sort?