Developing B&W Film: Part III - Loading 35mm Film onto the Developing Reel

Here I demonstrate loading film onto a Patterson-type developing reel, the necessary precursor to developing your film.

Fiskars scissors! Those make me proud as a Finn as they're probably the most iconic piece of Finnish design. They really are durable. You only need to buy them once in your life. I've got the slightly smaller paper scissors in my darkroom set.
Did you know that the orange colour of the plastic was chose as a result of a mistake? They wanted to do prototype runs in red, green and black but there was orange plastic left over from manufacturing of some kitchen utensils in the machines so the first run came out in orange. The board of the company got to see the scissors with orange handles and they liked those so much that the actual product also came in this colour and it became a trademark.

[mike.thomas]

Good tip. Dry is important. Some people use a hair dryer to make sure the reel is dry. I live in a very dry climate and don't usually do back-to-back development of multiple rolls, so it's not as much of a worry.

[WizzRacing]

Yes, I got ahead of myself as it was covered in the next segment.

Great stuff you got here. It should help others understand why film addicts are so full of passion about it.

[denizg]

Yeah I also actually prefered the 5 star system for ratings on videos too.. You had a much better understanding of the rating it got before watching and it was a more precise system..

[mike.thomas]

My reels came from Adorama, I believe. It's their "house brand". I've never used anything else, but I find them easy enough to use that I have not felt the need to change.

[mike.thomas]

Yes, you can do that: Either use a leader retriever, or don't rewind the leader into the canister when rewinding (some cameras with motors can do this automatically). The only issue with it is pulling the film back through the slit, and perhaps having more chance to scratch it, but I think that's minimal. It would have the advantage of keeping the film roll "under control" while winding on the dev reel. It's not enough of an advantage for me to bother, though.

[denizg]

Hi Mike Thomas,

Thanks for getting back to me. Just have to say I am learning so much from your videos and I recently found out you are on RFF :)

I agree and I hate how facebook and youtube feel like they have to keep changing layouts even if it's for worse (Failed logic?) I will try it at 100 to 120. Thanks for the reply..

[mike.thomas]

No problem. Yeah, RFF and getdpi are my two favorite photo haunts.

WRT YouTube, I just can't believe how bad the changes are. I'm a web developer, and I just can't see how making me click three times (two clicks are completely non-obvious) to get to my YouTube inbox makes any sense. Plus, I get no feedback as to whether there are new messages there or not until I'm actually there. It's such a huge move backward.

Good luck with the Portra. 160 is my favorite color film, esp. medium format.

[mike.thomas]

Yeah, but I bet it's second nature now!

I had trouble doing it in a changing bag. I did a few rolls in the changing bag, but lost one roll of film due to sweat and frustration. Now I just block off the light in my bathroom and do it in there. Much easier!

[mike.thomas]

Yeah, ain't YouTube's new layout great? Don't know why they felt the need to destroy something that was already pretty good.

I often set my meter to 100-120-ish when shooting Portra 160 because think it generally does well when overexposed a bit. I'd also rather lose highlights than shadows.

WRT Portra 400, I have heard that it is very versatile for pushing and pulling. I think I heard on Film Photography Podcast they had pushed it to 1600 but only did a +1 stop dev, with good results.

[mrca]

Best tip is you got rid of the piece of crap reels with tiny locating ears and have this one that I use. Easy to locate in the changing bag and they are easy to position the film on it and start feeding it through and past the bbs. Now with 35mm, I rewind the film on the camera until I feel it release from the right side, ie when the resistance stops. I had that amount of film exposed loading the film in the camera. After trimming off the tapered end, IN DAYLIGHT, I can start it on the reel then put in in the changing bag. Now I have had frustration even with that on the other reels jamming or coming out of the tracks, not with these spools. Save yourself wasted film, crazy frustration, just buy one of these spools. With 120, it's a piece of cake finding the landing squares and getting it started. Now there is a technique of having a few inch length of old film as a guide on the small eared reels, but if if jams or you want to load a second roll after the first... the reels will hold 2 120 or 1 220 roll the guide is gone and the frustration begins.

[WizzRacing]

I use both stainless and Paterson dual 35mm reels. Being that the Paterson can do both 35mm and 120.

One thing I did find with the Paterson is keep my thumbs over the loading gate enlet so the film can't jump over it at the end of the spool.

You might add how to remove the film being that I had to try several ways to find the right one for me that works.

[JavyKong]

is it possible to do it without breaking the canister? maybe using a picker to take the film out of the canister?

[denizg]

hi quick question i can't message you since new youtube layout but would you recommend over exposing or under exposing portra 160 to 400 or 100 in a push pull scenario..

I will shoot mostly street shots and at night wide open sometimes or at f 5.6 from shutter being 1/100 to 1/750

[komodoweran]

you can also do it with a piece of developed "trash" film and piece of scotch tape just put some tape on teh film and slide it into the canister works fine

[projektmetaphor]

I don't think so. If anything it would be even harder to do (or spool). I am not very sure, hopefully Mike or someone would know better.