Dokumol/Eukobrom alternatives?

[Elmarc]

Hello all,
I am coming to the end of my stock of Dokumol and Eukobrom which I use exclusively.
Now that Tetenal are no more can anyone suggest any alternatives for cold to neutral developers with deep blacks?
Anyone else here facing the same situation?

Any advice most appreciated as usual.

 

[miha]

@Elmarc AMALOCO AM 2002 is described as equivalent to Eukobrom by Nordfoto, who acquired both the trademark rights and the original recipes from AMALOCO.

 

[brian steinberger]

Moersch SE4 Neutral
Moersch SE6 Blue
Ethol LPD

 

[Keith Tapscott.]

Hello all,
I am coming to the end of my stock of Dokumol and Eukobrom which I use exclusively.
Now that Tetenal are no more can anyone suggest any alternatives for cold to neutral developers with deep blacks?
Anyone else here facing the same situation?

Any advice most appreciated as usual.

Fotospeed CD11 developer might be a suitable alternative, although it designed for machine processing, it should work perfectly well in a print tray.

 

[Elmarc]

Thank you for all your suggestions.
Much appreciated.
I am also looking into Adox MCC which seems comprable to both Tetenal developers.
Any MCC users here?

 

[miha]

What qualities are you looking for in a print developer?

 

[koraks]

What qualities are you looking for in a print developer?

That's the real question.

 

[Ernst-Jan]

Any MCC users here?

Yes but I am not one of those who has spend hundreds of even thousands hours in the darkroom and has a densitrometer.
MCC has a long shelf life and higher capacity than Dektol and black seems to be more black is all I can say.

 

[Elmarc]

What qualities are you looking for in a print developer?

Cold to neutral with deep blacks that does not exhibit any hint of a green cast regardless of paper.
A long working solution life would also be preferable.

 

[Elmarc]

Yes but I am not one of those who has spend hundreds of even thousands hours in the darkroom and has a densitrometer.
MCC has a long shelf life and higher capacity than Dektol and black seems to be more black is all I can say.

This is helpful nonetheless. Are you referring to the long shelf life of the concentrate or working solution?

 

[Ernst-Jan]

Both. But with the MCC it is no problem if there is like 3 weeks between your darkroom sessions, the working solution still is fine

 

[snusmumriken]

Cold to neutral with deep blacks that does not exhibit any hint of a green cast regardless of paper.

Is there really such a thing? What papers do you actually use?

 

[Elmarc]

In

Is there really such a thing? What papers do you actually use?

In my experience yes there is, at least to my eyes.
As I don't like to use selenium, I searched for a developer that would give me that cooler look. That is how I came to use both developers exclusively for years.
I use Ilford Classic Fb matt and gloss, Fomabrom 111/2 Fomatone 532/542, Forte PW to name a few.

 

[brian steinberger]

Cold to neutral with deep blacks that does not exhibit any hint of a green cast regardless of paper.
A long working solution life would also be preferable.

Moersch SE6 Blue

 

[koraks]

Fomatone 532/542

Good luck trying to get that to develop without any greenish hues.

Moersch SE6 Blue

That would also be the route I'd suggest, although not necessarily this particular product. Take a fairly active print developer and add a good amount of benzotriazole. I'd start with an MQ developer though, instead of Moersch' approach of PQ.

Here are two cool-tone developer formulas; both rely on benzotriazole to get the job done. I suppose you could also take something like ADOX Neutol NE and add some 1% benzotriazole to the working strength solution.

Burki – Jennings cold tone developer

ml:	1000​
Metol	3​
Sodium sulfite	40​
Hydroquinone	12​
Sodium carbonate decahydrate	200​
KBr	0.8​
Dilution: 1+2
Add to working solution:
Benzotriazole 1%	1 – 3ml

Muir's blue-black print developer

Stock	1000​
Sodium sulfite	180​
Hydroquinone	53​
Phenidone	2.2​
Benzotriazole 1%	150​
Dissolve; white precipitate forms. Then add:
NaOH	35​

Dilution: 1+5

 

[Keith Tapscott.]

Cold to neutral with deep blacks that does not exhibit any hint of a green cast regardless of paper.
A long working solution life would also be preferable.

Either Adox MCC or Fotospeed CD11 developers should be suitable. Both as far as I know are replenishable and both are said to yield neutral to slightly cool blacks with a very good working capacity.

 

[snusmumriken]

In my experience yes there is, at least to my eyes.
As I don't like to use selenium, I searched for a developer that would give me that cooler look. That is how I came to use both developers exclusively for years.
I use Ilford Classic Fb matt and gloss, Fomabrom 111/2 Fomatone 532/542, Forte PW to name a few.

Take a fairly active print developer and add a good amount of benzotriazole.

I’m really interested in this. What does the benzotriazole actually do in this context?

 

[koraks]

What does the benzotriazole actually do in this context?

I'm not really sure, but there are two pathways I can see the BTZ would alter image tone towards more cool/neutral hues:
1: Due to its developing inhibition effect, it may result in overall large silver grains; i.e. small grains aren't developed at all and development only proceeds if the grains are 'pushed over a bump' of minimal critical mass, in a way.
2: The benzotriazole may actually adhere to the silver grains, modifying their spectral absorption.

It seems that mostly #2 is the effect we're looking at here (although maybe if I read the quote below creatively, I can see a hint suggesting at #1 as well), as suggested in this thesis that I just found online (pp2-3):

Some organic compounds in the developer will adsorb to
the silver halide crystal during development and cause a
change in the developed image structure. It has been shown
that benzotriazole (structural formula shown in figure 1.)
in the developer covers only 10-15% of the silver crystal
surface and that the restraint of physical development is a
direct function of the surface area covered and not
necessarily dependent on the organic agent that is adsorbed
to the surface C213. Benzotriazole may also accelerate
chemical development C143, which in combination with the
restraint of physical development may partially explain the
blue-black toning effect of benzotriazole. It has also been
Page 3
shown that organic agents adsorbed to the silver crystal
surface, through development or otherwise, will change the
spectral absorption properties of the silver deposit
C22,23D

Perhaps of interest in this thread, here's the (film) developer that the author used for their experiments:

Interestingly, it's an MC developer (Metol-vitamin C).

The results of this particular research were disappointing for the present thread in that no human-visible color effect was observed, but this was about transmissive density (as opposed to reflective, which is what we'd be interested in here) and on a blue-based film (so any subtle changes were lost in the strong base color anyway).

The TL;DR is that I'd start by chucking a hefty dose of BTZ into the developer and accept that the paper gets reaaaalllly slooooooow (especially Fomatone, which is already quite slow to begin with). Toe shape will likely also be affected; this may or may not be considered as an advantage.

 

[snusmumriken]

I'm not really sure, but there are two pathways I can see the BTZ would alter image tone towards more cool/neutral hues:
1: Due to its developing inhibition effect, it may result in overall large silver grains; i.e. small grains aren't developed at all and development only proceeds if the grains are 'pushed over a bump' of minimal critical mass, in a way.
2: The benzotriazole may actually adhere to the silver grains, modifying their spectral absorption.

It seems that mostly #2 is the effect we're looking at here (although maybe if I read the quote below creatively, I can see a hint suggesting at #1 as well), as suggested in this thesis that I just found online (pp2-3):


Perhaps of interest in this thread, here's the (film) developer that the author used for their experiments:
View attachment 396949
Interestingly, it's an MC developer (Metol-vitamin C).

The results of this particular research were disappointing for the present thread in that no human-visible color effect was observed, but this was about transmissive density (as opposed to reflective, which is what we'd be interested in here) and on a blue-based film (so any subtle changes were lost in the strong base color anyway).

The TL;DR is that I'd start by chucking a hefty dose of BTZ into the developer and accept that the paper gets reaaaalllly slooooooow (especially Fomatone, which is already quite slow to begin with). Toe shape will likely also be affected; this may or may not be considered as an advantage.

Thanks, @koraks! I am always awed by the breadth of your knowledge.

I am intrigued enough to find a source of BTZ and try this, although I'm going to stick to Ilford MG Classic FB. What I appreciate most about this paper (after serving my time with Foma graded papers!) is the very clean highlights. What I don't like about it is the marginally greenish tone in Ilford's own Multigrade developer - hence I tone it slightly in selenium. Like the OP, I'd love to avoid that step.

PS - Wikipedia describes BTZ as a "bicyclic compound". Anything to do with bicycles is good with me.