Developer differences

[StephenM]

It was this post in another thread that started me thinking:

B/W ?......well, there are so many developers and different ways to develop B/W neg film that I suppose we're really talking about a combination of elements rather than just the film itself, but for the sake of the thread, Delta 100 and Fuji Acros, although I've become partial to APX in 35mm recently.

I began to wonder how much effect the choice of developer really has on the results or would have on the results for me. Broadly, developers come in fine grain, high acutance and speed increasing variants, with each type having a trade off against the other qualities. Now, given that I hate grain and never enlarge to the point that it becomes visible; hate fuzziness and never enlarge to the point that it becomes visible; don't photograph things where I need a high film speed; and use a film format large enough that I can happily print to the sizes I want (typically 12x16/A3 20x16/A2) does the choice of developer actually affect the outcome in my case, or would they all be pretty much interchangeable so far as the results went? Convenience is a different issue, of course.

I've been developing films for over 50 years and in that time have used very few developers. In fact, if we ignore experiments with developers used for only a couple of films or so, I've only used Unitol, Acutol and Rodinal (so far as I can recall). (Experiments made with Promicrol, Acutol-S, D76, Microphen and possibly a few others.)

Am I correct in thinking that a change wouldn't make much practical difference when considering the final print?

 

[MatBin]

If you are happy with what you have used so far then why complicate matters by using somerthing else?
Matt

 

[StephenM]

I wasn't contemplating a change, so much as asking whether I'd see any difference in the print. In other words, is it the case that given my working methods with regard to degree of enlargement, every developer under the sun would give indistinguishable results.

 

[joxby]

Other nuances exist that are irrelevant to magnification, such as tonality and the way it is distributed, extended detail in the shadows or highlights, some of which can be maximized at the printing stage assuming it appears in the neg in the first place.

This was posted by Mohain 5 years ago, its page 88 of the show us yours, although we are not partie to the particulars of the processing post scan, I've not seen anything similar since.
But then not many peeps soup with Prescysol so I dunno..