Developing Black and White Photos With Beer and Other Stuff

Having made a pinhole camera from a beer can (Beer Can Pinhole camera), the idea of developing the image in the same beer from the can appealed to me.

I also found out that coffee and mint can be used as 'home-made' developers as they contain something called 'phenols'. So I tried these out too. The 'recipes' I came across made the developer by adding washing soda and vitamin C to one of these phenol carriers.

After developing the image in a tray containing the developer the photographic paper is rinsed under running cold water and placed in a 'stop' tray for 30 seconds. This is a tray of water with some lemon juice squeezed into it. (Apparently the acid from the lemon juice neutralizes the alkalinity of the washing soda).
The final 'fixer' tray contains salt water. I don't know how effective this is.

I tried a beer and didn't like it so poured it into a bottle and made the can into a pinhole camera. The beer was later used to develop the image.
The beer was warmed by putting the bottle containing it into a sink of hot water. It was then poured into a container and experimented by using: 50 grams of washing soda with 7 crushed vitamin C tablets stirred in.

The covering of the pinhole was removed for 1 minute to take the photo. A darkroom was created in my bathroom as it has no windows in it. The red light of my camping head torch allowed me to see. The image was developed in the beer developing mixture for 2 seconds, it went dark almost instantly. While the result wasn't great, an image was made out and this was encouraging.

Some leaves were attached to some photographic paper with clear tape (to press them flat) and the light turned in the dark room turned on for 10 seconds. After removing the tape, a quick dip in the developer tray resulted in a silhouetted image of the leaves forming.

Another attempt to capture an image with a beer can pinhole camera resulted in just a dark piece of photographic paper. You will probably get a fair bit of that sort of thing, with this sort of experimentation.

The coffee developer mixed used was:
500 mills water
50 gm washing soda
2 vitumn C tablets (crushed)
5 teaspoons instant coffee.

This image was taken with 40 second exposure on a shaded balcony.

This photo was taken with a 40 seconds exposure. It was developed with:
7 minutes in the developer tray using the coffee mixture.
30 seconds stop tray,
30 minutes fixer tray. I had read to fully 'fix' the image it should be left in the fix tray of salt water for 24 hours. It was then made into a positive image by laying it on top of photographic paper, face down, sheet of glass placed on top and then quickly turning the light on and off.

As I had some cat mint growing in the garden, I took a bunch and simmered it down for 40 minutes. It was then strained through some cloth.

3 tablets of crushed vitumn C tablets along with 50 grams were added to the mint solution.

The mint and washing soda solution was poured into an aluminum tray, ready to develop photographic paper. Gloves were worn as the solution shouldn't make contact with bare hands due to its alkalinity. Don't leave the developer solution in the aluminium tray more than a coupleof days as it tends to eat its way through. Same applies to the fixer salt water solution.

In an attempt to find the best exposure time, 4 photos were taken with the following exposure times on a bright and sunny morning:
1. 10 sec
2. 20 secs
3. 1min
4. 2 mins
The resulting images weren't great looking.

After getting some strange results, I realized I had been loading the photographic paper into the pinhole cameras near the door to the bathroom and the light coming in from around the edge must have effecting the paper before it had been loaded into the cans. To overcome this I 'blue tacked' some black cardboard around the door so it overlapped the edge. This still allowed the door to be opened but stopped light coming in from the top and sides. To stop light coming in from the bottom a draught stop was used.

I also stated to test the developing solution using test strips of photographic paper. This is a great learning tool for how long to leave the paper in the developer and to gauge the likely outcomes. I found for example the boost from adding vitamin C to the solution deteriorates over time and that it makes the image a darker shade of black.

I also spray painted the inside of the pinhole camera cans with black matt paint.

A test was made by laying some objects on to the photographic paper and creating an image by flashing the darkrooms light on and off. The image was clearly formed.

These photos were taken with a 20 second exposure on a bright sunny day. They were developed for 20 seconds.
To get the positive image, the negative image was placed face down on a sheet of photographic paper, a sheet of glass (from a small picture frame) layered on top and the darkroom light quickly flashed on and off. The resulting positive image was then developed for 20 seconds in the mint developer solution.

Photo 1.

I was curious to see if any of the ingredients could develop and image by themselves. So I placed a test strip into:

• 350 mills of water with 18 grams washing soda
• 350 mills beer
• 350 mills water with 2 crushed vitamin C tablets

The water and washing soda solution turned the test strip dark grey immediately. There was no change to the other 2 test strips even after 1 hour. So the washing soda appears to be the active ingredient while the beer and vitamin C are likely to be acting as 'enhancers'.

Photo 2.

• Washing soda, beer and 2 Vitamin C tablets (2nd strip just had fresh vitamin C tablets added)
• Washing soda and 2 Vitamins 2 tablets (4th strip just had fresh vitamin C tablets added)

The vitamin C appears to lose effectiveness over a couple of hours and so should be added a short time before developing to give it a boost. I also began to wonder if there was any real difference between using beer compared to just water and washing soda. Maybe the type of beer makes a difference.

Photo 3.

Baking Soda was also tested:

• Saturated Baking soda solution
• 2 Vitamin C tablets added to the Baking Soda solution.

Photo 4.

Taken half an hour before sunset, sun was in cloud. Exposure 20 seconds. A longer exposure is required due to the lateness of the day and not having direct sunlight.

Photo 5.

Taken at night using the balcony's light. Exposure 10 minutes, yet no image recorded.

Both Photo's 4 and 5 are a reminder that photographic paper is sensitive to blue light. So with the sun being behind cloud there would have been a lot less than from direct sunlight. The light of the balcony is of a softer hue so probably would be shining very little blue light.

Photo 6.

I have read that Baking Soda can be converted into Washing soda by spreading a thin layer on a tray and baking it at 200C or 400F for 30 minutes. I wanted to test this as Baking Soda is something commonly available at home while Washing Soda is less common. The change can be seen by looking at the powder - Baking Soda has semi reflective crystals while Washing Soda is dull.

Photo 7.

I don't normally have Vitamin C at home so to test a substitute I tried using some kiwifruit as 3 kiwifruit would have the same vitamin C as about half a vitamin C tablet. The test strips suggest this may work as a possible substitute although the solution was a little thick. It is possible similar results could be achieved using 500 grams of strawberries or the juice of oranges.

Photo 8.

Strip one is the result of a 3 kiwifruit, 20 grams of washing soda (Baking soda converted into washing soda by baking it). Strip 2 is after the solution was in the fridge overnight (A lot of the Vitamin C appears to have disappeared due to oxidation. Strip 3 is of a fresh solution of 2 kiwifruit, 40 grams of baking soda and a little water.

The photo developed in the kiwifruit solution was taken on a very bright and sunny morning, exposure time 10 seconds. It was developed for 6 minutes. It appears the image was over exposed by the harsh sun.

250 grams of strawberries (for their Vitamin C) and some beer (bit of Guinness and Red nut IPA) were blended and 17 grams of Washing Soda mixed in. The image developed in this solution had been taken on a darkish, overcast afternoon with a 40 second exposure. It took a long time for parts of the image to come through (photo 2). Lightning conditions and exposure time and developing solution effect the photo. Developing a test strip before the photo is useful.

Photo 3: The next day I did a test strip, the solution had gone a brown colour - from the Vitamin C being oxidated over night .

Using the 'negative image' app software to convert the image to a positive one it looked OK (Photo 4).

Photos 5 & 6: So a photo positive image was done in the same solution, the first one from a very quick flash on and off of the darkroom light, the next was for about a second. The solution didn't work as well as the night before, with the blacks not been as intense. Probably due to the oxidation of the Vitamin C during the night.

The images started to turn pinkish, this is likely due to the fixing solution (salt water) not being strong enough (not enough salt) and the images not being in it long enough - just a couple of hours.

Photo 7: These were developed in fresh strawberry solution, with 30 grams of washing soda. The last couple had 2 teaspoons of coffee added to the mix. They were there fixed in Ammonia. Disappointing results.

These 2 pinhole camera images are from 5 second exposures of the same object, on a bright and sunny afternoon.

• The first was developed for 20 seconds in 375 mills of water and 20 grams of washing soda.
• The second used 375 mill of IPA beer and 20 grams of washing soda.

I still have a long way to go in mastering taking photos using beer can pinhole cameras and developing the image in home-made developing solutions.

After the photo has been developed if it is not fixed it will turn darker and darker and fade to black over a little while. If it's not in the fixer long enough it will start to go pinkish. I have found leaving the photo in saturated salt Water for 36 hours works well.

I had read Ammonia could be used. I found the fumes were too strong so it should be avoided.

I had also read sodium thiosulfate could be used as a fixer. As this is the main active ingredient in aquarium water conditioners to remove chlorine from tap water via Redox Reduction, I tried using this product - leaving the photo in it for 3 minutes. Seems to work but the white areas of the photo went slightly yellowish, Probably needs to be in for a longer time.

Update: Some more tests using 'Aqua One' were conducted for fixing photos:

Five pinhole images were tested with the following times in 'Aqua one'; 18hrs, 12 hrs, 2 hrs, 30 mins and 10 mins. Turns out Aqua One is only a 1% Sodium Thiosulfate solution. In photography, it is normally used to fix at a 24 percent solution. So, the $12 I paid for 125 mills was way expensive! I have since learnt 2 liters can be purchased for $24 but Sodium Thiosulfate can also be purchased from a swimming pool store. I have seen it available in powder form at $30 for 1 Kilogram.

Calcium Chloride the ingredient of 'DampRid' may also be able to act as a poor Fixer. Apparently, it works better than NaCl (Salt). But salt don't work very well at all. DampRid was purchased to do some tests;