P3D Black and White Slides part 1

["Brown, Fritz LABS" <brownf@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Only one of my two posts made it yesterday.  Unfortunately it was the one
with the least information.  So I'll have another go.

Nick Merz was writing about his woes in trying to get his lab to cross
process a C-41 black and white film to produce transparencies.  My response
follows:

To get black and white transparencies one has several options, some better
than others.  The first optoin that many people try is cross processing a
C41 black and white film (ie Kodak's T400CN or Ilfords XP2 Super) in E6
chemistry to reverse the image.  The problems with this route include trying
to convince the local lab to do it (there is still an erronious assumption
amongst minilab operators that cross processing contaminates and ruins the
chemicals.  If they are replenishing and maintaining their chemistry
properly there is no problem) and the more significant problem of the base
mask that is manufactured into the film.  Since these films are expected to
be printed on the local drug store minilab print machine,  the films all
have an orange mask to facilitate printing on color paper.  Unfortunately
this remains when you cross process the film (and I believe it turns green
but I havent tried to cross process any black and white C41 film so I cant
say for sure).  This is not the best thing for producing slides.

The second route to producing black and white slides is to use Agfa's Scala.
This is a chromogenic black and white reversal film.  It has to be processed
in Agfa's proprietary process and thus has to be sent away.  For me that is
a problem as I am into instant gratification,  wanting my slides the same
day I shoot them.  But since many people use mailers for their E6
processing, this probably isnt a problem for most pople.  The biggest
problem I have with Scala (and this is my opinion,  your mileage may vary)
is that I have never seen a Scala slide that wasn't flat and uninteresting.
Now, I have a bias towards contrasty black and white so I may be overly
sensitive to it, but the lack of contrast in Scala is bothersome and the
slides dont compel me to give them more than a glance.  I have no idea
whether you could boost the contrast of Scala by underexposing and asking
for push procesing or not.  If anyone has done this I would like to hear
from you just for my own information.

The third route to black and white transparencies is to reverse process a
black and white negative film.  Any black and white silver emulsion film can
be reverse processed to give transparencies.

I'll cut this message here and continue in another posting.