Developer: Bellini Eco Developer
This is the second developer I am trying at present, still early days!
The Bellini Eco Developer is pretty interesting, it is a clone of Kodak XTOL but supplied as a liquid concentrate that is dialuted 1:1 to create a working stock solution which can then be reused over a month(ish) to process up to around 15 films. I am having a go with this to let my youngest have a play at doing some darkroom work - it is a “safe” chemical being based on Asorbic Acid… or Vitamin C! Which is great in theory, but if it doesn’t work in practice then it is a complete non-starter!
Fortunately it does work! I processed a roll of Ilford FP4+ using the AGO today and the results were wonderfully detailed and fine grained, although it looks like I have either overexposed or over developed the film as it is hugely dense! This is a learning process though so next time I am going to reduce my processing time a touch and see if that helps! First impressions are good though, and this is probably one I will revisit for a more in-depth review soon as we are going to shoot a few films over the weekend and develop those (Kentmere Pan 400 in this case). Being a reusable solution is interesting as I can just pour out the container and pour back in over the next few weeks, which will be good if I am shooting extensively. It will, however, be rather costly if my output is low!
