
Caffenol: Developing Photos with Coffee and Vitamin C [video] - lelf
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bhOtTUtPhg
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DiabloD3
I'd never imagine I'd see James Hoffmann featured on HN's front page. If I
knew you guys would have liked him, I would have linked his stuff ages ago.

He recently borrowed a high speed camera and filmed espresso, and, somehow,
produced beautiful art:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wzEiZdcss88](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wzEiZdcss88)

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hardwaregeek
I definitely believe James Hoffmann is a kindred spirit to your average HN
user. He's obsessed with detail, methodical processes and high quality
results. I wouldn't be surprised if he's dabbled in programming or educated as
an engineer.

Plus his hair and clothes game is on point

~~~
flixic
Also, World Barista Champion 2007.

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ignoramous
His routine that won him that (with his own commentary):
[https://youtu.be/_DwZV17bek4](https://youtu.be/_DwZV17bek4)

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nouveaux
This is James Hoffmann's channel. He is very conscientious in his videos,
which is oriented towards espresso and coffee. Besides for coffee, the drink,
he cares a lot about usability, beauty, but also practicality of things he
reviews.

If you tried an espresso, it tasted bad and wonder why people would drink it,
his channel will be enlightening.

~~~
andrewxdiamond
Not to mention he often criticizes products for their sustainability and waste
products!

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eezurr
This is great, but I am frustrated to see the effects of Google's 10 minute
"minimum". The video did not need to be 13 minutes long and the filler parts
were obvious. At scale, this is uncountable thousands of hours of human time.
I dont know if that's important, but it makes the experience less genuine.

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azinman2
What is Google's 10 minute "minimum"?

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mardifoufs
Videos under 10 minutes can only have 1 ad (I'm not sure but I think it's only
short ads too) so you get less revenue per video. The algorithm also favors
longer videos because more watch time means the video is more likely to be
recommended to viewers. But there are rumours that being over 10 minutes
specifically is what matters most to the YouTube algo.

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ginko
Alternative processes are pretty cool, but you still need regular fixer for
fixing the final image. That's by far the nastiest chemical in b&w chemistry
and can't really be replaced. I've once read you can get a similarish result
by essentially storing the film in rather concentrated salt solution for
several hours to days, but that doesn't seem quite practical:
[http://www.filmwasters.com/forum/index.php?topic=7958.0](http://www.filmwasters.com/forum/index.php?topic=7958.0)

~~~
philipkglass
Are you talking about sodium thiosulfate? It's less acutely toxic (oral LD 50)
than table salt in animals, has no known chronic health risks, doesn't persist
in the environment, and is non-flammable.

~~~
jimv206
This is true with regards to fresh fixer but, once it's used it contains
silver which, as reported by, sciencedaily.com:

"We found that silver nanoparticles are extremely toxic. The nanoparticles
destroy the benign species of bacteria that are used for wastewater treatment.
It basically halts the reproduction activity of the good bacteria."

I photograph onto paper, develop with caffenol, digitize after the stop bath
(quickly) and discard the paper so as to avoid using fixer. Yes, there is
silver on that paper but I'm hoping that silver in an incinerator or even
landfill is better than silver in the wastewater.

Back in the day when analog photography was just called photography, there
were inexpensive silver recovery filters available. Now, if you want to use
fixer, try to find a local film lab that will take your "spent" fixer.

~~~
fao_
Well, no. It's illegal (in any coherent district) to put hard chemical waste
(like silver) into the wastewater. you either take it to, as you suggested, a
local film lab, or you clearly label it, build up several gallons of it, and
take it to a chemical treatment factory, or whatever distribution process you
have to get it there. Like NileRed does.

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frostburg
I use Caffenol LC-C for Agfa Copex Rapid (a microfilm stock that needs very
low contrast development). With other microfilms I use dedicated commercial
developers, but it's hard to source the Spur one for Copex Rapid.

[https://i.lensdump.com/i/WNPsAx.jpg](https://i.lensdump.com/i/WNPsAx.jpg)
(Leica M6 TTL, Elmarit-M 90/2.8, Agfa Copex Rapid, Caffenol LC-C)

[https://i1.lensdump.com/i/jY29hM.jpg](https://i1.lensdump.com/i/jY29hM.jpg)
(Leica M6 TTL, Elmarit-M 90/2.8, Agfa Copex Rapid, Caffenol LC-C)

[https://i1.lensdump.com/i/jY2qCQ.jpg](https://i1.lensdump.com/i/jY2qCQ.jpg)
(Leica M6 TTL, Voigtlander Ultron 35/1.7 VM, Agfa Copex Rapid, Caffenol LC-C)

~~~
Renaud
It's nice to see that such a simple process can lead to such good results.

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cesaref
Without a comparison to a commercial developer, it's very hard to tell what
the effect on the negatives are. The roll of 120 he held up looked very dense
to me, and looked like it was suffering from a fair degree of fogging between
the frames. Saying that, if he's scanning the negatives there's plenty you can
do in post to pull an image off of the negative.

I'll stick with Xtol as my developer of choice, but that's just because i've
been using it for such a long time it's a habit rather than an informed choice
from having compared the options today :) Funnily enough it's active
ingredient is ascorbic acid as far as i'm aware (vitamin C).

~~~
Palomides
here's a visual comparison of various developers, including caffenol:
[https://web.archive.org/web/20181022154200/http://fotoimport...](https://web.archive.org/web/20181022154200/http://fotoimport.no/filmtest/filmTriX.html)

~~~
cesaref
Yeah, that's a really handy resource. Shows what i'd expect, with a heavy
grainy look to caffenol, but I can see it being useful if that's your thing

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jacobush
I expected much "worse", the graininess isn't bad at all IMHO.

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war1025
I completely forgot why I was watching this video or how I came across it, but
I found it quite enjoyable. A nice afternoon distraction from work.

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29athrowaway
This man looks like a younger relative of Steve Buscemi. But on a more serious
note, the channel content is great.

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losthobbies
James Hoffman is great. I love his videos they are singlehandedly sending me
deeper and deeper down the coffee rabbit hole

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johncalvinyoung
I was just talking with my girlfriend yesterday about the various reasons for
overlap between coffee nerds (espresso and pourover) and software engineers.
Delighted to see this video here (I usually pick up his video links from
Reddit), though it does come across as potentially _peak_ hipster.

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gmoes
I wonder if Kodak's Ascorbic Acid-Based XTOL Developer was inspired by this
idea.

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galago
Xtol was created in 1996, making it the last really new developer. My
understanding is that one of the design goals was to make a developer that was
less toxic, and that ascorbic acid was part of it. I wish they still sold it
in 1 liter increments. The current package makes 5 liters which means its hard
for me to use before it goes bad.

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js2
Can you separate the two powder packets by weight into 5 parts?

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snitzr
Yes. I like to weight it out on a digital scale and make 2.5 liter batches.
Seal the bag of unused powder with tape.

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person_of_color
Related qn: are there any good guides to building a pinhole camera?

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rafaelturk
MacGyver Feelings

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jakkyboi
James is so cute

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sgt
How is this relevant for HN?

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jakkyboi
Because coffee

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fennecfoxen
[video]

