Can anyone tell me the characteristics of all 35mm ilford films?

Hello,

 

I want to know the characteristic of all kinds of 35mm ilford film. I have

never used them before. Can anyone tell me some about them? Thanks!

http://www.ilford.com has all of the data sheets and related information.

They're all over the place, depending on the film and developer. Visit the Ilford site, it's quite good once you find your way around. I like the Delta films for a wide tonal range, and the FP and HP films for sharpness, but details can block up if you don't use the right developer, and for fine printing, I think they tend to be less forgiving than Delta, though probably more forgiving for casual snapshots.

I would contradict Michael's statement. IMO the +-films have a wider tonal range and are more forgiving; the deltas have finer grain and are sharper.

But you may just give them a try. If you start with a standard developer like ID-11/D-76 you can see the difference and you have a good starting point.

 

Good luck, Stefan

Conventional wisdom is that the "plus" films are more forgiving, but I find Delta 400 more forgiving of development variations than any traditional film I've tried. The grain and speed are simply more consistent from developer to developer. Haven't had problems with blocked highlights either, but I use mostly ascorbic acid developers that should mitigate that problem.

I absolutely love HP5 for its minimal grain and clean look, and have used it for a very long time. HP4 gave me fits and others get fantastic results with it. I don't know enough about the delta's to comment.