Hand-Processing Super 8 film in Caffenol Step-by-Step (Expired Kodachrome 40)

A step-by-step guide to hand-processing expired Kodachrome 40 Super 8 film stock using the Caffenol CM recipe. You only need 1 litre of Caffenol to process a cartridge of Super 8 but here we make up 2 litres in order to process two films.
Recipe for 2 Litres of Caffenol CM:
108g washing soda - pour into your 2 litre bottle and fill up with 1/3 water.
32g vitamin c powder + 1/3 water
80g coffee + 1/3 water
For original Caffenol recipes see the Caffenol Cookbook.

[@AvantKinema]

** You can subscribe to our KZbin Channel here, thanks: kzbin.info ** ** Mini-Biog: Scottish experimentalists Sarahjane Swan & Roger Simian create films, installation art & writing under the name Avant Kinema + music as The Bird And The Monkey. **

[@IKS-Exploration]

Can you make this video again without the music please many thanks :)

[@stevemorley2888]

Love this!! I'm just getting into standard 8 and I've been carefully reading around stocks and processing but...JUST DO IT. I've got all the stuff so what am I waiting for.... Very liberating. Nice one!

[@jamalbaker4423]

I waiting for my bitches to get home. Let them do it.

[@renemies78]

This was so damn cool! I've never seen anyone develop Super 8 with caffenol. Really cool.

[@ZeroBudgetFilmSchool]

Thanks for the shoutout and for keeping the film process alive! I've since found that you can re-use caffenol and process at least one more film in it if you do it straight after. I suppose if you have a second developing tank (which I don't yet) you can just pour the caffenol straight from one tank to the next.

[@AvantKinema]

Thanks, Ben. Yep, we decided to try reusing a batch of caffenol too and it seemed to work fine. Also - because we ran out of Vitamin C powder we tried out a couple of Tesco 1000mg Vit C tablets instead and it worked fine for some reason, even though it's about a 10th of the amount the recipe asks for :-)

[@ZeroBudgetFilmSchool]

cool, that's good to know. I'm almost out of Vitamin C myself.

[@AvantKinema]

We have a batch of K40 Sound film but don't yet have a sound camera or projector. When you shot your Ginger Baker video did you just process the film like normal and the sound played ok once you projected? - Roger & Sarahjane

[@ZeroBudgetFilmSchool]

Yes, I just shot and developed in Caffenol as usual and the sound came through fine. However as you can see, dark Jazz clubs are not the best conditions to get an exposure on 20 year old Kodachrome 40! I also shot some of that roll in daylight (sunny) and it came out great. How much K40 do you have? Maybe we can do a trade-off? I lend you my sound camera in exchange for a roll.

[@AvantKinema]

Oh, cool. We'll probably have bought a sound camera before we get down to London again but we're happy to send you a K40 Sound cartridge in the interests of scientific research. I think most of them expired in the late 1970s. What's the address to send it?

[@AvantKinema]

JWright - We curl the film loosely around the pipe in the Patterson tank and try to make sure we move it all around enough to get all the film covered by the "chemicals". It does cause extra scratches & glitches. If you want cleaner results apparently buying an Eastern Block Lomo Tank is the best way to go. Cheers - RS & SJS

[@jacksontuchscherer5332]

Hey I've never developed any kind of film before. I think I'm okay with the chemical side of things but reading this comment, I realised I don't fully understand how to use a Paterson reel and which size I need to buy to fit 50ft of Kodachrome 40 in! Can you recommend which size would be roomy enough and then also just confirm that you wrap the film around the black middle pole bit of the tank rather than using the white "reels". Sorry I'm totally new at processing film so I just want to make sure I have the basics down! Any advice you have to offer would be greatly appreciated :) Thanks

[@AvantKinema]

@@jacksontuchscherer5332 Hi, Jackson. Sorry we missed your comment (which was apparently over a year ago!). Hope you managed to get it all sorted out. Personally we use a really big Paterson tank and we curl the film loosely around the black pole so that hopefully the chemicals are distributed fairly evenly.

[@einar.stabenfeldt]

Thank you so much for this! About to try the same

[@IanPhillipsWildlife]

I've got an old Kodachrome 40 cartridge stashed away somewhere, I going to have to try this.

[@AvantKinema]

Cool - it's great fun!

[@mumandtwins]

What size paterson tank is that, and do you need to put a spiral in there to wrap the film around, i would love to get a lomo tank but price to Australia is orohibitie atm

[@crabnebula1914]

Can you substitute washing soda with baking soda?

[@kyanos1]

I just stumbled across this and was thrilled. This is very exciting. I have an old roll of k40 that I'm going to try. Has anyone tried this with agfachrome super-8? I have one roll that I've been meaning to develop for about 20 years. Thanks

[@entity9742]

Why is it projecting upside down?

[@selcukcoskun8808]

Hi there Can you tell me how long the first and second baths are?

[@leotadaa817]

Hi! Thank you for the video! Could you tell me, what is the name of that tube dish?

[@leotadaa817]

Paterson developing tank i quess

[@crabnebula1914]

Quick question, do you let the solution cool down before using it, or is the elevated temperature better for getting the remjet coating off? I've done it both hot/cold/room temp and had varying results, I figured it was the inconsistency of the expired film but...there might be more.

[@kevinharman-thomas5182]

is this the same for B&W reversal film ? also i have a 4 film patterson tank, would 1 litre be enough for 1 film or should i put 2 litres in it ?

[@ryycasper161]

will this work for 200t and 500t???

[@therestorationofdrwho1865]

Is there a way to do it with no chemicals and only stuff from home? Like not fix or bleach type stuff?

[@LittleDragonProductions]

Yall should invest in a lomo tank or something that keeps the film from touching each other, that's part of the inconsistency. It's a real shame we never get to see how good the process COULD be, simply because every frame is going to turn out different using this process. I've used the lomo tanks to some success over the years with B&W, consistency is much better.

[@jaredmichaelsobotka3454]

Awesome vid! Is that a 3 or 5 reel paterson tank?!

[@rickcoona]

i take it you mean instant coffee powder not ground coffee beans, yeah?

[@grinninggoat5369]

Have you tried this with peroxide & ascorbic acid reversal process yet? I am about to try a caffenol then peroxide/acetic acid bleach reversal then caffenol 2nd development of 40 ASA double 8 reversal film in a morse G3 rewind development tank. As a side note, the old instructions for the Morse G3 tank say a piece of sponge in place of the roller by the glass reexposure widow will help remove any film backing on film that has it. All I have to do now is work out caffenol development times since it is a rewind tank and the whole roll is not exposed to fresh liquid at the same time, got to wind it through the open gap between reels back and forth... Any suggestions?

[@JammiYork]

Very cool. Thanks for posting. BTW, music sounds like Killing Joke.

[@loicmartos7844]

hi i ve 4 film to devellop in kodakchrome 40 and i ve loved your video man, very nice but i have two question, do you mix your ilford stop bath wih water and how much? or can i simply use one from a retailer in black and white only to stop it ? and how much time do i need to let in the bath before putting the stoper ?

[@abhinavkarhale]

I died little listening to the music but the video is very very cool

[@thebombefilms]

This is great, a cheaper way to get film and process it. I'm lucky there is a place about 5 mins down the road from me that does telecine, they don't do processing so this would be perfect

[@tejfood3833]

Can you do it without the Patterson's tank?

[@AvantKinema]

Thanks for the question, TEJ Food. You would really need to use some kind of developing tank (unless you have access to a dark room - not exactly sure how well that would work as we've never tried that). We use a pretty big Patterson tank but you could use a smaller one, which would be cheaper to buy. For the best result, many people rave about the Lomo Tank - a vintage bakelite spiral tank produced in the Soviet Bloc - which you can pick up on eBay.

[@fowliefilms8581]

Fantastic and really helpful video. Can't wait to try this out in the coming weeks :)

[@AvantKinema]

Thanks very much, Daniel. Glad you liked the video. It's a lot of fun trying this out and quite a buzz when you actually see an image appear on stock that expired decades ago.

[@lewimoors5295]

I don't get the part with "1 part stop bath to 19 parts water" and "1 part fixer to 4 parts water" ? What's a part in this case?

[@rogersimian416]

Hi, Lewi - if you put in 1ml of stop bath you'd need to put in 19mls of water.

[@gerryroberts662]

Wow,.,. this is so much knowlege.. I need to know this stuff..I wish i knew how to do this,, DAMB stuff..Can you use Negative in a Hi8 camera will that do the same thing..??

[@AvantKinema]

Thanks, Gerry. No - Hi8 is a video format not film. You need to go totally old-school to do this and buy a Super 8 camera and some filmstock. There are loads of guides on how to pick cameras and film on eBay. And once you're ready to try out home processing, the four Caffenol guides on Zero Budget Film School's KZbin page are a good place to start. xx

[@gerryroberts662]

Is ther ways of duplicateing old 8mm film on New Stock Super8mm.. not Convert to DVD..

[@AvantKinema]

Hi, Gerry - you can use an old camera to shoot with new Super 8 filmstock (eg - TRI-X black & white reversal). You'll still need to get it processed and then it's up to you whether you want it converted to a digital format such as DVD. Once reversal film is processed you can project it straight through a Super 8 projector if you want to, or learn how to edit in the old fashioned way, using splices. Unfortunately, using Caffenol only produces a black & white negative. If you're using negative film in a projector it will show as a negative image unless you get somebody to create a positive print for you. That's why it's often a good idea to get a digital telecine copy of your film which you can bring into the computer to create positive images which you can then edit in editing software such as FinalCut.

[@randallstewart175]

Wow - how silly can you get? What knowledge - that you cannot dunk Kodachrome film in coffee and expect to get a useful image? Useful? If you are one of the half dozen people who owns an exposed roll of Kodachrome and wants to "process" it instead of decorating a display with it, have at it, but be original: use" use fresh pee; orange juice, burbon - it's all the same result. Fool.

[@LittleDragonProductions]

@@randallstewart175 What is wrong with you? Let people have fun with their science projects would ya? Nobody is expecting a perfect clean image, the fun is the science experiment. Some people do this because they enjoy it, imagine that?!!?

[@GabrieleLopez]

has someone tried to rodinal stand the film? Thanks a lot for any answer!

[@thomasmutter8896]

Does this work with colour film?

[@rogersimian416]

Hi, Thomas - Caffenol only produces a B&W negative, as far as we know.

[@thomasmutter8896]

When will it be refined to work with colour film?

[@rogersimian416]

No idea, Thomas. Might be better using something like C-41?

[@AvantKinema]

Hi, @Thane Mac Kodachrome 40 used to be colour film, but the chemicals to process it in colour are no longer available. It can now only be processed as a B&W negative. The last batch of colour-processed K40 was at Dwayne's Photo Lab in 2011: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dwayne%27s_Photo

[@HELLHAMMERHANDHIX]

them thar wildkat royals r kinda cute u know !!!...but a gretsch woulda looked cooler !!!...however 10/10 for a good vid !!!

[@clemsedar2882]

WIll this kodachrome cartridge work with my kodak xl-401 milnota super 8 camera?

[@uriellopez2130]

Yes

[@Igaluit]

I don't see the point in using old kodachrome film, since the sophisticated process of washing off the special dyes is no longer available. May as well just go with what's available now.

[@AvantKinema]

Sounds pretty boring to us, that, Igaluit. We like to experiment and try to make something out of old stock that other folk have discarded. If you want the easy route, you could always just stick with digital? Cheers.

[@Igaluit]

I have nothing against experimenting, but the result in this case was just a monochrome-greenish film. But, if you have the time, all the power to you. I don't know what caffenol would do with the current film stock - I guess it's Ektachrome. I've heard of caffenol being used on B&W, but first I've seen it on chromes. If you're rescuing old film, that's another story. Caffenol might look great on black and white movie film.

[@AvantKinema]

Yeah, I think Caffenol is always used for BW negatives (or Reversal film if you add extra processes eg - hydrogen peroxide + lime juice). So people are going into using up old expired colour filmstocks knowing that they will get monochrome results, since labs stopped processing K40 in 2011. So, although the results are very LoFi, it's a cool way of doing something with stock that's been abandoned. We've tried it with some modern filmstock too - Kodak TRI-X - and you can get some pretty nice results with that.

[@Igaluit]

Yeah, I guess that's the only way to rescue the film stock. It would give exactly the same result with Ektachrome, since it's colour - don't know what I was thinking.

[@AvantKinema]

Yeah, I reckon it would be worth trying out a C41 home processing kit on Ektachrome to see what kind of colour you get out of it. It's the Kodachrome that is totally obsolete as far as I know because it required very specific developing chemicals which are no longer available.

[@therestorationofdrwho1865]

Can these be processed in C-41? Would that create colours?

[@AvantKinema]

Hi, TRoDW. Kodachrome colour developing involved specific chemicals and processes and, as far as I know, there haven't been any labs who can do it since 2011. So, don't think you'll get colour with C-41 but it might be worth trying it out anyway as an experiment to see what you do get?

[@therestorationofdrwho1865]

AvantKinema-DIY Yeah I've always wondered. Maybe someone's tried it.

[@therestorationofdrwho1865]

AvantKinema-DIY Yeah I've always wondered. Maybe someone's tried it.

[@AvantKinema]

Yeah, I'm sure somebody will have tried it. We tried out C-41 on some other old Super 8 stock and did manage to get some colour. Can't remember if it was an Ektachrome cartridge.

[@edwardwoolley5320]

C-41 Developer would create a black and white image. Unfortunately, Kodachrome didn't rely on dye coupling, which is the mechanism that creates the colour image in the C-41 process. Also the bleach (or Blix) in the C-41 process would remove the silver image after development, which would destroy the image. If you wanted to experiment with using a C-41 developer then I would use a standard Fixing solution (the same used for processing black and white images).

[@Jbraineaterprod]

I've tried this multiple times, and am just getting black film with no image. Does anyone have any idea what I could be doing wrong? Tried with Kodachrome II, expired in 1967 and Kodachrome 40 Super 8 sound cartridge.

[@AvantKinema]

We've only had that happen once, at a workshop we were running, and we never got to the root of what went wrong. We had a participant using an AGFA Family camera which had previously always worked fine. She followed the caffenol process correctly, along with everybody else. The only thing I could think of was that because she had been using the AGFA's "still image" button, that maybe caused some kind of problem. Have you any way of testing that the camera definitely works? The blackness could be remjet which should rub away under water but it's unlikely you would have no images / frames appear whatsoever. Or is light getting into the cartridges too early somehow?

[@Jbraineaterprod]

No way of testing the camera, but it happened with two different cameras, not sure what the chances of that are. I've seen a huge variety of developing times/caffenol variations on the web, if I was under or over developing, would I still get some kind of an image?

[@AvantKinema]

Yes, under or over developing you should get some kind of image, I would think, not just complete blackness. It can sometimes look very dark but, when you shine a light through the film, you can see that there's actually something there in the frames. By the way - don't throw the "dud" films away - you can always experiment with scratching and colouring them...

[@Jbraineaterprod]

Good idea, and thanks for your help. I'll try to shoot a roll outdoors this time. Even though I had a hard key light on my subject, maybe it just wasn't enough light for film that's decades old. I was also measuring ingredients with teaspoons instead of a scale, so I'll use a scale this time as well.

[@AvantKinema]

Definitely worth another shot, Jb.

[@dalehammond1704]

What software do you use to convert your negative Caffenol developed 8mm film into a positive video?

[@rogersimian416]

Hi, Dale. You need to make a digital video copy of the processed film. The easiest way to do this (unless you have access to a telecine analogue-to-digital convertor machine) is to project the film onto a screen and use a camcorder/DSLR/tablet or phone to make a video copy. Import the digitized footage into your computer and use your movie editing software (e.g iMovie, FinalCut etc) to turn the negative footage into a positive. If you can try out the "negative" or "x-ray" special effect in your movie editing software that should do the trick.

[@dalehammond1704]

Thanks. The only problem I'm having is finding an easy to use software that can reverse the negative video I made of the Caffenol developed film. I know there must be one out there. Hopefully even free.

[@rogersimian416]

If you have an Apple product, iMac or iPad, you should get iMovie software free with that. It's not too difficult to learn how to use. I'm not sure about PCs but I'm sure there'll be some cheap or free Windows editing software out there that you can use to reverse the negative video, if you search on Google for "free easy use movie editing softwear windows" or something like that.

[@swimmingintheskiesbyj.paya7589]

Great 🔝

[@danyellerolla]

thanks for sharing this. can you use Ilfesol 3 to develop instead of caffenol?

[@AvantKinema]

Thanks, Rolla. :-) Hadn't heard of using Ilfesol 3 for Super 8 but just found this clip of TRI-X developed that way. If you give it a go, let us know how it turns out... kzbin.info/www/bejne/n5Sqo5Sph5unl9k

[@edwardwoolley5320]

Yes that would work. Basically you can use any black and white film developer.

[@gregorpichler5899]

Nice to see some DIY film developing - however, as this is not clear from the video, you should NEVER pour the fixing solution into the sink, as it is harmful to the environment, especially to aquatic life. Best regards

[@pedromartinsrodrigues6347]

Uauuuuuuuuuuu!!!!

[@dbmxerinca]

That shit going down the drain... into the environment CAN'T be a good thing!

[@alessandrosignorini9556]

Trolled good

[@randallstewart175]

For for it - 6 minutes of your life totally wasted and you can never get back.

[@AvantKinema]

What does "For for it" mean? Just wasted 6 minutes of our lives pondering that.