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Best Black and White portrait film


don_harris

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Hi, I will be doing some black and white portraits in a studio

setting as well as an outdoor setting (mostly bridals) I plan to use

the Tr-X film rated at 200iso. Does anyone recommend something

different? I am looking for high contrast between white and dark and

must avoid the "gray" look. Any recommendations for getting the best

look?

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Don, this might go against the grain, but I've taken some very nice portraits with Agfa Scala 200 B&W slide film. I assume you use 120. Scala is available in 120. It has nice contrast and very good sharpness with little discernable grain. You may want to try a roll or two, as an �experiment�, along with your other film. I bet you will like the results. Good luck on the shoot.
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Sounds like you want to get a little "gothic" for these settings.

 

Tmax 400 pushed a stop will do the trick.

 

For bridals? Hmmmm.... What about shooting T-CN 400 and having color proofs made for a sepia look? The extra contrast of color print paper will intensify the effect your looking for yet still keep the higlights under control and more "elegant" over Tmax 400.

 

//scott

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XP-2 Super is also great for portraits. It handles detail in shadows very well. The sepia option is available too. For proofs, specify 'sepia' or get proofs on b&w paper, or the lab may give you a revolting hodge-podge of purplish, sepia, green, and nearly grey, on different shots from the same film. When printed at normal contrast, its 'creamy' look is suggestive of softness.
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  • 4 months later...
Media is not the only consideration. You have control with the indoor portraits, but outside is a different thing. I would try to shoot the outdoor images in a low contrast situation, the type you encounter on cloudy days. Move your subjects into a shaded area. Then get yourself a small electronic flash. Since you are using medium format, you can control the film exposure with the shutter speed and control the flash exposure with the f-stops. Set your f-stop to be one stop underexposed for the rating of the flash. Then set the shutter speed for the correct exposure at that apurture setting. This will give you a look similar to a single directional light source in the studio, with a high level of ambiant light from a large, diffused second light source. And if the contrast increases too much for your liking, then tip the flash head up and bounce the light off a 3 x 5 index card. Hope this helps.
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  • 18 years later...
Going high contrast for a wedding shoot might be a bad idea. Assuming the bride is wearing white and the groom is wearing black you could have trouble getting detail in the dress and tuxedo at the same time.

I hope your still not shooting film for weddings. I put my film cameras on the shelf 10 years ago and never looked back. My photos are better than ever.

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I hope your still not shooting film for weddings. I put my film cameras on the shelf 10 years ago and never looked back. My photos are better than ever.

 

Why put them on a shelf for ten years.

Sell those useless antiquated hobgoblins to the poor fools still shooting film......

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What are you selling Rick? Come on git it up... sell that old junk n get what you can while the getting is good.

 

This is still an interesting and timeless topic for many. Films and tastes have changed a bit since 1999 too.

 

I know a few old time wedding photographers still shooting today, now using digital but they are offering "silver" B&Ws as a come on... and getting alot of demand for it too.The reasoning, "we want to have beautiful portraits like grand ma n granpa has on the piano."

 

They are charging a primium for individual silver gel prints.The average number is about 6 prints, 8x10 n 11x14s matted n framed.

 

So why not shoot both? The extra work to do the analogs will definitely subsidize your labor.

 

My choice for a nice portrait film for its eveness, TMY-400. Keeps its shadows very nicely while still giving a nice white.

Ive done a few portraits using the RB67 150mm soft focus lens. The whites have such a beautiful glow.

 

 

 

 

 

.

The more you say, the less people listen.
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I hope your still not shooting film for weddings. I put my film cameras on the shelf 10 years ago and never looked back. My photos are better than ever.

 

If you haven't noticed, film is still a "thing." As a professional musician, I've seen many more photographers recently who, in addition to their digicams, are also sporting medium format film cameras. I don't know if this is demand-driven, or photographer's hipster schtick. But it's there.

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Screw those old fashioned, outdated dip pens and quills.

Scary - I remember steel dip pens being issued when I was in grade school, and the highly desirable job of filling the inkwells on all the classroom desks from a big bottle of Watermans. Of course, we were taught cursive (Palmer Method) and graded on penmanship. I still dig out the fountain pen for important cards and letters, few though they are.

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I always keep an inked fountain pen in my pocket. Lately it's been a Mont Blanc 146 from about 1990, although I do rotate around on occasion. It may get rotate dout soon as it was sold to me as a medium(my preferred width) and most likely is, but Mont Blancs tend to run large and it's almost too wide for me.

 

BTW, I keep a few dip pens in my desk. I've managed to get a few co-workers in on using fountain pens, and we share/exchange inks fairly often. Dip pens are a great way to try an ink without inking a fountain pen.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Great zombie thread :-)

 

Love and use fountain pens, love shooting film.

 

Sometimes it even works out for the better. I recently got married and friends shot a bunch of film for me. My mom got sick and missed the wedding. When I visited her hospital room with a stack of prints from those rolls of film, she loved it -- even though the nurses all did a double take when they saw the prints.

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  • 3 weeks later...
If you haven't noticed, film is still a "thing." As a professional musician, I've seen many more photographers recently who, in addition to their digicams, are also sporting medium format film cameras. I don't know if this is demand-driven, or photographer's hipster schtick. But it's there.

A musician? I hope you are not using one of those old and obsolete instruments anymore. You can do it all, and better, on an electronic gizmo.

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  • 2 weeks later...
If you haven't noticed, film is still a "thing." As a professional musician, I've seen many more photographers recently who, in addition to their digicams, are also sporting medium format film cameras. I don't know if this is demand-driven, or photographer's hipster schtick. But it's there.

As a worker backstage in the entertainment industry with an interest in photography, I too have seen lots of photographers lately shooting film and digital. Most of the folks I've seen have been hired by the bands and use the digital stuff for websites, social media and promo work but shoot film for their own satisfaction and in their own interest. Hipster thing or not, its happening. I usually make a point to talk to these people and ask about their gear and choice of film among other things.

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