Has anyone made a comparison. Been using PF PMK for a few weeks now and just curious whether DiXactol will give me anything more?

John

-- John Welton (jwelton2@home.com), April 01, 2001

Answers

I think that if you're using VC paper, then, due to the different colour of the stain, DiXactol is the better choice. For me, using VC paper the majority of the time, DiXactol is my developer of choice, and gives me compensated, ultra sharp negatives.

John Henry

-- John Henry (johnh@piperschool.com), April 03, 2001.

I have been using pmk for almost a year and love it. the problem i have with Dixactol is the formula is not published and there is not whole lot of info available on it. G hutchings gives you the formula for pmk if you buy the book or you can get it over the web. and i think Dixactol is more expensive.-J

-- josh (devil_music@usa.net), April 06, 2001.

Printing on variable contrast papers, overall, I'd give the nod to PMK. PMK grain appears finer and tighter. Acutance is pretty much equal. DiXactol does very nicely in the mid values, and I would say *slightly* improves upon PMK, but both are better than anything else I've tried. PMK is far better with high values. Both get very tempermental with underexposure--grainy and harsh.

I print with an Aristo coldlight head, with variable contrast control, so can't speak for the results you might get using a different light source and filter contrast control. One thing for sure, PMK is a lot cheaper. Also, it's here to stay. DiXactol is produced by a very small company and could disappear tomorrow. With any proprietary formula, you never know if it will vary or disappear altogether.

-- Ted Kaufman (writercrmp@aol.com), July 12, 2001.