Rodinal
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Rodinal is the trade name of a black and white developing agent produced by the Belgian company Agfa based on the chemical p-Aminophenol.
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[edit] History
Rodinal was patented January 27, 1891 by Dr. Momme Andresen. The main selling point of Rodinal was its availability as a liquid developer rather than in powder form, which eased the process of making up developer for film development. Rodinal was the first product ever sold by Agfa and is the oldest commercially available photographic product that is still being sold today (2008). After the patent expired, Rodinal started to be sold under different names by other companies.
[edit] How to use
Rodinal is sold as a concentrated liquid and has to be diluted. 1+25, 1+50 and 1+100 are common dilutions, wherein 1 part Rodinal is diluted to X parts water. Higher dilutions than 1+100 will slow down subsequent development and increase the perceived sharpness of the film. Working solutions can only be used once. The most complete listing of Rodinal development times with a wide variety of films may be found at the Massive Dev Chart
- See also: film development.
[edit] Edge sharpness
Rodinal is known for increasing the perceived grain of many black and white films. However, it also increases edge sharpness dramatically: since the developer is used up more quickly in dark than in light areas, development of light areas next to dark areas (the edges of the image) is reduced. This increases the contrast at the edges and therefore also increases the perceived edge sharpness. Rodinal is often used in very high dilutions (1+100 and above) in order to maximise this effect.
[edit] High Acutance
A well-known property of Rodinal is its high acutance, due to the fact that the Rodinal formula contains no silver solvent. As such, the metallic silver in film, once developed, is left in its "natural" state, and does not undergo any "softening" by means of a solvent. It is not uncommon for photographers to add a solvent (such as sodium sulfite) to soften the granularity.
[edit] Current Production
As of November 2005, Production of Rodinal moved from Agfa to a&o Imaging Solutions Gmbh in Koblenz, Germany. According to a&o, the formulas have remained the same, and the Agfa logo appears on newer bottles, along with the a&o Imaging Solutions label at the bottom.
[edit] References
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