Sunday, June 3, 2012

Developing color with hair dye?

Yes, many people claim it is possible and I already had some lucky results. I have tried with two different brands and both of them worked more or less promising.
But after the first time, the same hair dye, used days after, failed. The same with the other brand. So, I came to the conclusion that it only works with a new unopened hair dye. After that, maybe it looses this property in contact with air or light or I don't know what. Maybe I should have done like I did with CD-4, some grams of metabisulfite to preserve it against oxidation.

Because of this, I will have to kill, by now, CAFFCOL III, it would be very expensive to buy a new hair dye each time I develop a film. The recipe will stay there, you may try it, but I give no warranty on the results, it's up to you. If you discover something that makes it work always, please tell me.

Later on I will buy a new package of hair dye, dilute it with some preservative and see what happens then.

But now, after the disaster I had today with a complete 36 exposures film to trash, I am about experimenting the 2-bath developer with CD-4, CAFFCOL II.

First time with Brand A

First time with Brand B

Second time with brand B, almost bleach by-passed.
The second time with brand A gave null result, nothing to see, no color development at all, all silver was bleached and fixed out and no dye remained, very little in the first photos, a pale shadow can be seen.

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