Pleasantly Surprised with Superia 200

<p>10 years ago I was a big fan of Superia 400 and Superia 100, but always thought that Superia 200 was a poor compromise between the two - with the grain of 400 and almost the inconvenience of 100. Either Fuji have changed the 200, or I misjudged it back then, but now I think it may be better than the 400.</p>

<p>Here are some photos I've taken recently with it. I find it particularly good at bringing out colours, without overdoing it...<br>

<img src="http://www.duncandheff.co.uk/Photo/superia_1.JPG" alt="" width="800" height="531" /><br>

Nikon F6 85/1.8, Fuji Superia 200.</p>

<p>It's particularly good at handling highlights while maintaining true colour. The shadows aren't too bad, either, but I find underexposure results in a slight colour shift and extra grain, like many other colour negative films.<br>

<img src="http://www.duncandheff.co.uk/Photo/superia_2.JPG" alt="" width="800" height="531" /><br>

Pentax Super-A 50/1.4, Fuji Superia 200</p>

<p>Despite being quite saturated, the colours remain accurate.<br>

<img src="http://www.duncandheff.co.uk/Photo/superia_3.JPG" alt="" width="800" height="531" /><br>

Nikon F6 35/2, Fuji Superia 200</p>

<p>I was particularly impressed with the way this photo had such accurate colours, particularly in the highlights, yet managed to have such saturation.<br>

<img src="http://www.duncandheff.co.uk/Photo/superia_4.JPG" alt="" width="800" height="531" /><br>

Nikon F6 50/1.4 Superia 200.</p>

<p>Also good with portraits, although it's on the contrasty side for this. Good for portraits in context maybe.<br>

<img src="http://www.duncandheff.co.uk/Photo/superia_5.JPG" alt="" width="800" height="531" /><br>

Nikon F6 60/2.8 micro-nikkor. Superia 200</p>

<p>The other huge advantage is that it seems to be pretty cheap! I'd like to hear what others think, whether you've had good experiences with superia 200, or if you have another film that is a particular favourite (and can maybe post some photos here, too)<br>

D</p>

<p>Why the Surprise? It is a Kodak film for Goodness Sake. :)</p>

<p>Is it possible the results are due to the fantastic metering of the F6? I noticed a difference when I jumped from a F100 to a F6. Did you have that camera back then?</p>

<p>It is not metering... Lord "O" Lord.... It is an amateur negative film.... it is a good film.</p>

<p>Does it benefit notably from slight (1/3 or 1/2 stop) overexposure, in the manner of Ektar? Or do you shoot it at 200?</p>

<p>And, Peter: I have always been amazed and impressed by the metering on my F100. Is the F6 generally agreed to be notably superior? </p>

<p>Funny you should mention the metering - I bought the F6 because of the matrix metering. However, I don't think it's better than centre-weighted with AE-L (which is what I used for all the above shots). The problem is that the matrix metering is good at avoiding over/underexposure, but doesn't expose for the subject, which often results in correct, if slightly bland metering. I think the D3 and D4 are meant to be better in this regard, in that they have face-detection and better AF - linked with the exposure, but I doubt it's still as good as centre-weighted + brain :)</p>

<p>I forgot to mention something else - Superia 200 doesn't like incorrect focus. The grain really comes out and it looks a lot softer than you might expect when it happens (see the second photo above). So the F6 is terrific in this regard.</p>

<p>PS all photos are straight from NCPS without any need for adjustments of any sort - I think they're pretty good at scanning...</p>

 

<p>Oh, and Vince - I've been shooting it at 200, and I find the results are excellent. If in doubt, I always try to avoid under-exposure. The highlight control is excellent, so a bit of over-exposure only desaturates the image slightly.</p>

<p>Vince, Duncan raises some valid points. I guess it's how you shoot.</p>

<p>Because I mostly shoot reversals, overall exposure becomes more important. I can generally fix any minor exposure issue after the scan. I would rather adjust non blown highlights than blown ones. This is where a scanner with a good dmax gets noticed. When projected, I tend to favor slightly under exposed.</p>

<p>As far as $$ value, the F100 is a keeper. I walked into a F6 deal that only had 1 previous owner and only minor use. I would not get one just for this, but it is a nice perk.</p>

<p>The current version of Fujicolor (Superia) 200 does not have a 4th cyan-sensitive layer any more, it appears to follow the already excellent Super G Plus formulation of the mid-1990s. There is no difference in quality (at least upon scanning) between the Fuji-manufactured private label films, the economy-priced C200 and the Superia brand. It is one of the best color negative films ever, which scans particularly well due to its low mask density and pronounced contrast, handles a wide highlight-shadow dynamic range, and shows excellent sharpness and resolution at a still very fine grain, which does not get much coarser in the shadows. And it can be exposed at nominal speed.<br>

I prefer this film over all Kodak amateur films and also the new Portra 160 (not to mention "red rampage" Ektar 100). It does not need the F6, however - even "old" lenses from the 1970s show their true qualities with this film.</p><div></div>

<p>Superia is a fuji film, not kodak.</p>

<p>Eddy I know. ..... :-)</p>

<p>Fair point Peter, I used to do more slide film, but my biggest problem with slide is that they look just too good! I love getting slides back, but the disappointment trying to scan them and having them appear on screen in anything resembling what you can see on the slide is difficult to deal with. My favourite is Fuji Provia 100/400 - hardly any grain, loads of saturation and contrast, but not crazy colours either. I found Sensia to have slightly crass colours, that tend to bright, primary colours, and definitely find superia to be superia in this regard. What slide film do you use?<br /><br />I like the way you can underexpose slide film so much - here's a shot with provia 400 exposed at 1600.. (Not a studio backdrop believe it or not)<br /><br /><img src="http://www.duncandheff.co.uk/Photo/provia400.jpg" alt="" /><br>

Pentax LX 50/1.4 Fuji Provia 400, Epson 4990 scanner.</p>

<p><br />Heinz - that's very interesting, I haven't noticed any difference between C200 and superia either. I was a great fan of superia 100, and find reala is excellent - but ISO 100 just seems too much of an inconvenience... Ektar 100 is an interesting film - I've only used a couple of rolls of it. To be honest, I don't have a scanner good enough to see if it's claims of resolution are true, nor was I printing any to 30x20", but I did find the it to be pretty good. Oddly greens seem to be quite desaturated as in this photo...</p>

<p><img src="http://www.duncandheff.co.uk/Photo/42770002a.JPG" alt="" width="800" height="531" /><br>

Nikon F6 50/1.4 Ektar 100</p>

<p>But I have also had some good results with it...<br>

<img src="http://www.duncandheff.co.uk/Photo/42770004a.JPG" alt="" /><br>

Nikon F6 35/2 Ektar 100</p>

<p>I think I'll carry on using Superia 200 for a while. If I win the lottery, I'll use Provia 400 instead.</p>

<p>D</p>

<p>Duncan, most of my slides are BW reversals. Neopan 400/PX are still my faves. I don't do a lot of colour slides, but I did pick up a box of 5 (Provia 100F) in 120 to keep me moving. The last time was some Velvia 100. It was good and I do not know why I stopped... ;)</p>

<p>It's suprisingly hard to get chemistry here, so I tend to lean towards making my own. I will likely stick to BW reversals and C41 (soon to have the last few bits to start making my own). </p>

<p>A couple of years ago, I took some pictures with Superia 200 using a lowly Beirette VSN toy camera. I only bought it because it was the only film in the store, other than its own generic brand. I was very impressed by the results.</p>

<p>Is Superia the same as the "Press" series of film that Fuji used to sell? the box codes (CH-135-36 comes to mind) were the same on both as I recall. In my newspaper days, one of my freelance wire service friends shot Superia 400 every day. It was cheaper than Kodak but got the job done with good results and his photos were published around the world with no complaints.</p>

<p>My current favourites are Superia Xtra 400 and Portra 160, with Nikon F75, F80 an F100. <br>

But the problem is...</p>

<blockquote>

<p>all photos are straight from NCPS without any need for adjustments of any sort - I think they're pretty good at scanning...</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Duncan, these are definitively very good scans of very good shots. If you do your own scans (as I do) it is very difficult to get the same results as NCPS. I am finding the learning curve a bit steeper than expected with C-41. Slides are way easier.</p>

Craig - I don't know, if you have some, I could tell you what is printed on the negs and see if it's the same code. I've always found superia 400 to be an excellent film - I haven't come across a film that can beat it in terms of colour accuracy, dynamic range and saturation, for a 400. I've used Agfa 100 which had maybe slightly better colour discrimination, but it was a nightmare to scan!

 

 

 

Bruto - I use NCPS because I'm lazy, and I simply don't have the time anymore to scan the film like I used to. However, I was always able to get very good, if low resolution, results from my epson 4990. It took a long time, and extensive use of the curves tool. I used to use vuescan back in the day (with a conservative exposure to prevent any clipping), then the curves tool to reset the min/max in each channel, to get the colour balance right. Then I'd adjust the combined curves tool to bring out the colours, but of course this would throw off some of the colours. It would take me something like 4-5 hours to do one roll of 36 exposures! Now that I've moved from windows to linux, I'm not sure I can even do this easily in gimp...

<p>Fuji color negative amateur films were (mostly) better than the respective Kodak products since 1983, when the "double-structured grain"-technology was introduced enabling a very fine grain even at 400 ASA speed - the Fujicolor HR 400 had the same sharpness and granularity as the Kodacolor VR 100, according to a contemporary test.<br>

The Fuji press packs contained essentially the same films as the amateur Superias, and in particular the Press 800 was very popular among photojournalists (this speed had been marketed as photojournalism film before its introduction in single packs).<br>

In a test published in 2004, Fujicolor C200 (apparently the post-Superia generation) had the widest latitude from - 1 5/6 to + 3 5/6 f-stops. The top-priced and short-lived Kodak Royal Supra 200 tested in 2003 apparently was slightly sharper, but with a narrow latitude of - 1/2 f-stop at the short side. <br>

Scanning may enhance the grain, and the Super G Plus generation (without a 4th color layer) was introduced on the market before film scanners would set new requirements for grain homogeneity. I recently had the fun to process 2700 dpi scans of the current Fuji 400 ASA film through a de-noising software to obtain the detail and smoothness of a 50 ASA film - cheaper than switching to Portra 400... </p>

<p>Fuji used to make a film they called True Definition 400. It had reduced saturation and contrast. Basically, it was designed for scanning. It was a response to Kodak High Definition 400. I think both are now discontinued. </p>