Well this being the first dedicated book on the topic, I was naturally very interested, having dabbled in the technique a little before. I was hoping for big things waiting the 3 weeks and laying out the $50 USD, but alas ive come away with the feeling of having watched an episode of any popular American series – where there is more substance in the ad’s than the actual episode.
First off there is little evidence of proofing – typos are rife in the text. Next there is little coherence in the actual layout – not that these are major issue given that Mr Axel is no author, rather a pro photographer. His pictures and examples go some way to making up for this.
My biggest gripe with the book is the whole reason I purchased it – to get some concrete recommendations on what dilutions and times to use for developing. There are a whole list of films the author has tried and tested – complete with nice little comments – yet no mention of suggested chemistry for each. Worse than this is the author’s preferred chemistry to use with Fuji acros - including rodinal (1:300), xtol, ¼ teaspoon borax, and 10g ascorbic acid - In 800ml water for 3 hrs. Now this may seem all well and fair, apart from the borax and bit – he mentions “borax (not boraxo)” well sorry you are selling to an international market – I haven’t got a clue as to what Boraxo is – a simpler option would be to perhaps offer a description or chemical formula. I ended up giving it a go with plain old liquid borax (as that is what is available here), and I assumed I was on the same page as Axel. Well I wasn’t, I suspect this misunderstanding on Borax was the undoing of my 3 hr stand trial – my result was precisely nothing! Not even a few scant highlights!
At this point ill mention that this wasn’t my first go with stand - I have successfully developed a few rolls of APX100, APX 400 and Tri-x using the standard rodinal 1:100 for 1 hr, 1:100 @ 2 hrs for pushing. So I was a little disappointed with the 3 hr stand technique, and have since improved on it. Axel is certainly not wrong in recommending Acros as a good stand dev candidate. My results have been a little strong for the conventional 1 hr 1:100, and closer to the money at 1:200 for the same time.
To get back to the point, I think the biggest undoing of the book was that the issue of tank volume was not outlined clearly enough. This is critical for stand development, whereby if the tank volume is insufficient the developer will exhaust and result in incomplete development. All too frequently “experts” on the internet with little scientific knowledge seem to want to be able to measure 1mL or less of fluid to fit their 300 mL tanks or so. My solution – use a large tank – at least over 500mL per film, and make up the dilution to a volume you can actually accurately measure (5mL is a heck of a lot more accurate to measure than 1mL taking into account residual volume and meniscus effects). I have no problem with making up 1L of solution, and turfing the rest – im only wasting a few precious mL of developer and getting a nice accurate dilution.
Overall, after reading the book, I had the overwhelming impression that it was the author’s opinion that stand development was the only way forward – a little preachy if you ask me. Axel clearly knows his topic, as he is a regular poster on several online forums. I just wish he carried this through in his book that I had to pay for!
