Ken,
Very curious and interesting that two directly opposite methods should be taught.
Clearly, your method was successful, so there's no doubting that it does work. I was warned about the danger of dragging the emulsion across the base of the tray, which seemed reasonable. Perhaps it doesn't matter after all. The most dangerous thing might be the film itself, as the corners are very sharp.
My first experience of developing anything was large sheets of X-ray film in deep tanks on hangers. This was for quality control of steel castings and welded pressure vessels. It worked perfectly well but when I tried hangers for 5x4 film, I seemed to get the topmost edge a little more developed than the rest. Clumsy technique, perhaps?
A footnote: I looked up AA, which seems to be traditional on LF forums. He uses two trays of developer, placed flat on racks in a water bath and his shuffle consist of moving the stack from one to the other. He warns against sharp corners and fingernails. He does say "emulsion up." but I think we've established that this is a matter of personal preference. No need to follow AA blindly, or we'd all be wearing one of those curious dangly things instead of a tie. Some members of this forum don't even have a beard!
He also suggests having a tank of running cold water to cool the fingers between shuffles, but this would have been in California.
Very curious and interesting that two directly opposite methods should be taught.
Clearly, your method was successful, so there's no doubting that it does work. I was warned about the danger of dragging the emulsion across the base of the tray, which seemed reasonable. Perhaps it doesn't matter after all. The most dangerous thing might be the film itself, as the corners are very sharp.
My first experience of developing anything was large sheets of X-ray film in deep tanks on hangers. This was for quality control of steel castings and welded pressure vessels. It worked perfectly well but when I tried hangers for 5x4 film, I seemed to get the topmost edge a little more developed than the rest. Clumsy technique, perhaps?
A footnote: I looked up AA, which seems to be traditional on LF forums. He uses two trays of developer, placed flat on racks in a water bath and his shuffle consist of moving the stack from one to the other. He warns against sharp corners and fingernails. He does say "emulsion up." but I think we've established that this is a matter of personal preference. No need to follow AA blindly, or we'd all be wearing one of those curious dangly things instead of a tie. Some members of this forum don't even have a beard!
He also suggests having a tank of running cold water to cool the fingers between shuffles, but this would have been in California.
I, also, have a set of 10x8 tanks & hangers that I use occasionally for minimal agitation techniques with Pyrocat-HD. But, I haven't used the tanks in a while since I started with Steve Sherman's EMA development style. The problem for me with any development technique is temperature control because my indoor temps during the summer months get pretty warm. Therefore, I generally use the Jobo during the hot spell as I can refrigerate water to do the initial setup of the tempering bath, and then I float a block of ice in the upper trough to help the Jobo maintain proper temp. Ah, the things we all go through for our art!