This week, I decided to continue on with colour development and expose my last remaining roll of re-spooled cinema film for my work-week photo making. Tuesday’s photos (1-4) were made on the way to the bus for an electrolysis appointment after work, and Wednesday’s (5-12) were on a post-dinner walk to take advantage of the sunshine.
As soon as I pulled the roll out of the tank on Thursday, I knew that there was a problem. The negatives were thin, dull, and uneven, and reminded me of last year’s misadventures with the C-41 Eco Kit. I suppose this shouldn’t be entirely surprising: the Eco Kit uses some ECN-2 chemistry. Still, with the first six rolls (mostly) as they ought to have been, I was not expecting this one to turn out any differently.
Admittedly, I could have done additional work in colour-correcting the scans, but when I was doing the scanning, that prospect felt a little Sisyphean. The gap between my colour-grading skills and what may have been necessary to get the results I would have expected is wider than I have the time (or energy1) to fill at this very moment.
🧪🧪🧪🧪
So now I am left with a chemistry kit that I don’t trust, a fridge stocked with plenty of more traditional C-41 and E-6 film, and chemistry kits for both. I also now have one more week of work, just under two weeks before we head to Montréal and just over two weeks before surgery.
Since I don’t trust the ECN-2 kit now, don’t believe that I will have the time to expose and develop either 8 rolls of E-62 or 16 rolls of C-41 beforehand, and don’t want to risk otherwise good film chemistry spoiling over the weeks as I heal, I think it’s time to concentrate on black-and-white for the time being.
I will expose colour while in Montréal for development once I’m ambulatory and able to stand at the sink again.
…or maybe I will sacrifice one roll of C-41…
Camera
Lens
Film
Developer
Time & Temp.
Scanner
Location
Date(s)
Filing
Minolta XG-1
Minolta MD Rokkor-X 50mm f/1.7
Kodak Vision3 250D
Flic Film ECN-2 Kit
3m at 41.1°C
Plustek 8200i / SilverFast 9 / Apple Photos
Ottawa, Ontario
May 26, 2026 (1-4)
May 27, 2026 (5-12)
Series 7, Roll 090
- Now off hormones in advance of my (good) surgery on June 16th, I am not feeling especially well in a variety of ways. ↩︎
- Slide love sunlight and I don’t know if we’d have enough of it. At $30-$40 per roll, it’s also too expensive to want to use it for so much day-to-day photo-making. I like to spread it out over 4-8 weeks. ↩︎