35mm slide film availability...

[deantaylor]

<p>hello<br>

A beginner to 35mm photography asks about color slide film, as well as the dr5 method<br>

for b/w transparency: http://www.dr5.com/<br>

What is available for 35mm color slides? <br>

thank you</p>

<p>Dean</p>

<p> </p>

[JosvanEekelen]

<p>check this <a href="/film-and-processing-forum/00dGAe">http://www.photo.net/film-and-processing-forum/00dGAe</a> thread. It's about 400 ISO slide film but the links will point you to the right adresses.</p>

[deantaylor]

<p>thanks, Jos!</p>

<p>here is a quote from Ken Rockwell regarding slide film:</p>

<p><em>For color, most pros shoot positive film (slides)....</em><br>

<em>What you see is what you've got, and color consistency is critical in pro photography.</em><br>

<em>Slide film gives us the same colors every time. Slide film leaves nothing to interpretation when printed, projected or scanned, which is why pros who shoot color shoot slides. We get the color we want on-film, and every other stage in the production process will preserve and reproduce these colors.</em><br>

<em>Wedding and news photographers were the only pros who usually shot color negative film, and a lot of that was so they could have the freedom to botch a shot and have the lab correct it later. Careful pros in advertising and magazines always shoot slide film precisely because the colors they imagine while shooting can be reproduced exactly from the slides.</em><br>

<em> </em><br>

Do you share that point of view?</p>

<p>Best,</p>

<p>Dean</p>

[Wouter Willemse]

<p>Ken Rockwell's site is complicated affair - in parts, his advice is quite sound and useful, in parts it's quite the opposite. He has a tendency to exegerate and proclaim whatever he is doing as THE right thing (his current preference seems to be Leicas with film, previously "all all of us ever needed ever" was the 18-200VR Nikon lens). He reviews lenses he never used or owned. I wouldn't take his words ever as the only guidance.<br>

In the quote you give, he implies that all pros shooting colour are shooting slide film. This is very far from the truth; it also more or less implies that pros do not want to do post-processing, but want only the colour "as it was shot". Most pros I know, see post-processing as a normal necessity and walked away from film (except one, but he works mostly in B&W, negatives). Lately Ken Rockwell rants a lot about film being the only real deal, but it really needs to be taken with a huge pinch of salt.</p>

[cbender]

<p>Getting back to your original question, you've essentially got three main stream choices, and a handful of smaller brands. Fuji still makes Provia 100F, Velvia 100, and Velvia 50. If you're just getting into chromes, and the cost doesn't turn you off, Provia 100F is your best bet. Each of these are about $10/roll from the major US shops. If your local shop wants much more than that, consider ordering online. Five years ago the answer would have included closer to 10 options at ~60% of those prices, but those days are long gone.</p>

<p>In the near future (months), Ferrania *may* manage to revive one of the old 3M E6 lines and start producing another 100 ISO emulsion that's based on Scotch Chrome from the mid 2000s (with perhaps others to follow).</p>

<p>The third option is to try and buy out of date film via online auction or from any one of numerous sites that sell outdated film. Since you say your a beginner in E6, I highly recommend AGAINST this option. The film you get will have been stored under varying conditions, and it's unlikely you'll be able to acquire enough of any given emulsion to really understand it. Each time over the past decade and a half that an E6 emulsion I like has been discontinued, I've been quite irritated because much of the knowledge I've gathered in understanding how to use the film is now worthless.</p>

[Jochen_S]

<p>IDK when he wrote that. <br /> Let me try to elaborate a different POV: First: We are no pros right now. As an amateur I shot slides in the 80s to safe on image accessing cost. It was cheaper to cut film and stuff it into plastic frames than to have 4x6"s printed by a lab. Its also much easier to project slides than to present 4x6"s to a bigger audience. - 35mm film looks pretty impressive in projection small prints don't... <br /> For sanity's sake I would sort myself & any other amateur / consumer among the wedding & news photographers (as described by Rockwell). How can we really equal "careful pros" he is writing about? Do you have the time to meter each of your 3 strobes seperately put them all together do a few crucial spot readings followed by a Polaroid or 3 before you finally insert your film holder and burn that ($10 with processing?) sheet of 4x5"?<br /> Are you experienced enough to know how to meter your shots and when to bracket or when not? - IDK where you are coming from, but a slide is like a SOOC JPG without any chance to postprocess it at all. Exposure has to be sot on or its at best usable as a personal memory or you'll lose a lot trying to "rescue" it by other methods.<br /> Color consistency... - Is in my opinion a myth! - Yes you might get it, if you stick to film from one batch and another from the next batch (assuming the processing is done right). But: If you look at the rest of the workflow to a print, things become ridiculous. Is your monitor really calibrated? I guess "no", mine isn't printshops' aren't necessarrily and while we talk calibration: For which purpose? to match your slight on a lightbox? or to display a softprrof of the final print? - Anyhow: I have seen a lot of proof prints and the rest of workflow i.e. film writer + plate copying or plate writer and press adjustments are usdually far enough off to make a sellable result depend on ink zones adjustments during the run; i.e. going for more or less than standard density in the colors and the result is a compromise. <br /> Neither offset nor inkjet printed paper nor anything from the wet darkroom can display the same contrast range as a projected or backlit slide. Sure: a slide at hand gives the chance to compare the print to something...<br /> But: If you want a print to look good you try, adjust and retry until it looks good. - I see no big benefit of slides with doing that. The only trick to remember is trying to tweak everything towards homogeneous looks before you produce.<br /> Slides are a pretty bad idea when you don't shoot enough. - Example: I ran about 3 rolls through my 6x6s thats 36 clicks in total a dozen bearable keepers. - worth rigging up a screen & a projector? - Barely! - An audience would deserve some 200 "keepers". So if you hope to end with a dozen images to show prints are the better idea. <br /> Another slides specific issue: are you working under the same studio light day in day out? Or do you have a filter set and a clolor temperature meter to tweak everything you might encounter towards neutral? - "White balance" isn't a digital specific issue.<br /> Also: slide films are individuals! - Each brand and family inside it and probably speed inside a family has its specific character. You either shoot horses for courses (and end having the wrong one hitched to your camera strap) or shop around & get surprised...<br /> Summary: If you 'll shoot enough slides might be right for presentation via projection. If you are after anything else color be it digital or negative is in your hands anyhow and you should pick what seems most convenient for you.</p>

[Jochen_S]

<p>I do love BW, but I did one roll of Scala when it was a novelty, wasn't too happy about the speed it didn't offer and sometimes wished the old 5x5cm glass plates on which you copied a neg in your own darkroom and processed it like paper were still available... With them I'd like to do slides assuming I could afford them. <br>

To me contrast control for stunning BW slides seems too hard to do. - I guess you'll end either juggling 3 cameras for different contrasts and a spot meter or binning a lot. </p>

[john_shriver]

<p>Professionals used to have to use slide film if they wanted to sell their images to folks who would reproduce them in four-color (CMYK) offset printing (halftone), because the workflow for that demanded a positive transparency as an original. But that workflow is dead and gone, because pre-press is all digital now, nobody does color printing through analog halftones.<br>

Also, for a long time slide films were superior to color negative films. But not anymore.<br>

Now slide films are very high contrast, with lousy scene brightness range. Especially Velvia 50, incredibly demanding on precise exposure. Velvia 50 has very vivid colors, but they aren't particularly accurate, a very warped color palette. (Works great for making the desert southwest look great, which is why plenty of the pictures in Arizona Highways magazine are still shot on Velvia 50.) The Velvia 100 films are less demanding.<br>

If you want capture what the lens sees accurately, with more dynamic range than actually fits in a print, shoot modern color negative films like Portra 160 or Portra 400. If you want higher saturation, and don't care about correct skin tones, try Ektar 100. But you will then need to manage your own scanning and printing path to get good prints -- and that's not a trivial skill to learn. But you can have images every bit as good as were made on slide film, probably better.<br>

If you want a slide to project, yes, shoot slides.</p>

[SCL]

<p>Color slides CAN be great, but often they are not, due to inexperience on the part of the photographer, who often lacks an in depth understanding of light balance, proper exposure, color temperature characteristics of the films and even of the bulb in the projector which is used to project the image. Having grown up shooting slides, I can say they are much less forgiving than negative films, but also they are much less versatile, in that making professional quality enlargements is difficult and expensive, as many of the processes and materials used in the past are no longer readily available. Ken's statements can be compared to the line which begins "Real men only....". Humor and braggadocio - best appreciated by knowledgable photographers while downing a brew at the local pub with their chums. Also, slide films aren't widely available outside of large metropolitan areas unless one chooses to mail order. Worldwide processing for Kodachrome (one of the most popular slide films) ceased a year or two ago, when Kodak ceased making the chemicals and processing equipment. These days, most photographers shoot color digitally, and if they use film, it is often B&W which they frequently process themselves. For die-hards there are still some good choices in color negative films, again, it is not inexpensive to shoot or process, as the local processing facilities at every drugstore, supermarket, or retail photo shop of yesteryear have rapidly disappeared from the landscape. As others stated, there are still excellent color slide films (and I have a couple bricks of them in my freezer) with discernable unique characteristics...but you will pay thru the nose to purchase and process them. Not trying to dissuade you, but understand the economic costs before jumping in.</p>

[chris_williams19]

<p>Well, I for one only shoot only slide film, whether it's color or black and white. I am strictly an amateur when it comes to shooting but I've been shooting film for nearly 4 decades. I guess I use it not because it's better (or not) from other mediums, but rather because it's what I know and I like the consistency. I have slides from my earliest pictures to my last trip 3 months ago. I work in computers for my day job and the idea of spending more time in front of the computer for my hobby doesn't appeal to me. Someday, I might be forced to work only with digital for my photography but until that time, I have some great manual cameras that I enjoy and slide film is what I'll continue to shoot. Your mileage may vary and past results are not indicative of future returns, but hey, it's fun for me.</p>

<p>As far as dr5, I am a regular user of his services for B&W slide work (it helps they're here in Denver and I can drive to drop off and pick up my film). David, who runs the place, can be a bit rough around the edges but I have always gotten great results from his work.</p>

<p>Finally in terms of 35mm color slide film availability, the only folks that are making it these days are Fuji & Rollei/Agfa. Or if you're like me, you have a freezer full of Ektachrome. (-:</p>

[bgelfand]

<p>To return to the OP's question, for current manufacture, this is what is readily available in 35mm color slide films:</p>

<p>http://www.freestylephoto.biz/category/4-Film/Color-Slide-Film?attr%5B%5D=1-3</p>

[deantaylor]

<p>thanks, one and all, for informed--and generous!--commentary! Responses seem to run the gamut, but there is more than enough insight collected in one thread to guide any beginner's film trajectory...</p>

<p>Best,</p>

<p>Dean</p>

[Brad Cloven]

<p>I shoot color slides, and use Provia 100F (decent skin tones, good saturation) for people and Velvia 50 (horrible skin tones, high color saturation) for things. </p>

<p>One thing to notice on slides it their relatively narrow dynamic range. Many of my shots have sections that block solid white and other sections that block solid black. The colors I shoot for are extremely vivid in between those extremes. I LIKE that look. It's kind of a personal signature. I think it is a key reason (among others) to shoot slides.</p>

<p>Anyhow, there are lots of opinions here to sort through. Good luck, and HAVE FUN!</p>

[deantaylor]

<p>[one more...]</p>

<p>as if on cue, here is an explication of the dr5 method from the Film Shooters Collective <br /> (<em>the dr5 process was created in 1991 by photographer David Wood in New York...</em>):</p>

<p>http://filmshooterscollective.com/analog-film-photography-blog/its-not-magic-its-dr5-slides-from-negatives-dr5-lab-4-24</p>

<p> </p>

<h2> </h2>

[Karim Ghantous]

<p>Well, if you were shooting stock, you had to shoot slide film. Or, rather, you had to provide the agency with a positive (and BTW I never got around to submitting a portfolio to a stock agency). It wasn't about accuracy, it was about keeping things straightforward. The agencies would never waste their time interpreting tens of thousands of negatives from hundreds of photographers every year.</p>

<p>And the bonus was that the lab could never mess up your white balance - that was for you to do. :-)</p>

[mark_crown4]

<p>A lot of people have spoken highly of Provia 100F but my favourite as an outgoing E6 photographer is Velvia 100. It handles contrast better than Velvia 50, and is much easier to use when shutter speeds get too low and it works really well with warming filtration and polarisers - skies tend not to block up so much when using the latter as they can with Velvia 50. It is also a very sharp film that rewards good hyper-focal technique.</p>

<p>Get yourself a really good loupe and be amazed at the detail you will get on these E6 films. I can get rolls of this from Ebay for around £9 at the moment which is why I got into it.</p>

<p>Velvia 50 is not a bad film at all. Velvia 100 is more flexible however and may be a better starting point than Provia 100F (which I have always found to be too blue and rather bland to be honest).</p>

<p>Mind you, I wish that I still had some stocks of Kodak EPP100, 100EBX and 100VS to play with..........................oh well.</p>

[AJG]

<p>Karim--the lab could mess up your white balance by quite a bit--just before I stopped having any commercial demand for slides I had to switch labs several times because they weren't replacing or replenishing their E-6 chemistry often enough, leading to a distinctly magenta cast. My cameras, lenses and lighting hadn't changed at all, and neither had my film (legally imported Fuji Astia, not grey market), but the results certainly did. I miss certain aspects of film photography, but the anxiety of waiting and wondering about whether the lab had done it right is one thing I don't miss at all.</p>

[glen_h]

<p>Years ago, color prints were pretty expensive, making slides a lot more affordable. <br>

Starting about when I was in college, I started using slide film. <br>

As years passed, color prints got a lot cheaper (inflation adjusted). After I got married, we had one camera with slide film, mostly used for scenery, and another with negative film for people pictures. (My wife and I both had Nikon FM cameras from before we met.) <br>

One thing not mentioned, though, is that slides scan about as well as negatives. Before digital, prints from slides were a lot harder than from negatives, but now about the same. It used to be that I would shoot some pictures both ways, when I wanted both slides and prints. No need, now.</p>

<p>C41 negatives only, without prints, is usually cheaper than E6 developed and mounted. If it is for scanning, C41 is probably a better choice.</p>

[ric_helm]

<p>Today is 14 June 2015.<br>

I have recently been looking for Chemistry to do E-6 processing. Over the last few months I have found mostly old posts about where to buy the chemistry. I have become almost obsessed with finding the chemistry. After reading about home proocessing E-6 over the last few of years, I have become excited to try it, without a Jobo processor. I am not afraid of the technical criteria required. I learned from a friend,whose obsession for, and known strict processing control, how to do so.. I also once worked at an E-6 lab, once considered the best in the area.<br>

RE: Since Photoworks on Market St "pooched" my test roll. I am not impressed with their processing ability, nor their customer service.<br>

That said. I am simply posting this and will follow up as I find out what still is or is not available. Even if i have to find and mix the raw chemistry. Transparency film has certain qualities that still cannot be achieved through digital means. If you have any solid information that is up-to-date please let me know.<br>

In the meantime, I will post new information as I learn more. Once I find the chemistry, I will be glad to share not the the initial tests, but my progress as I become more familiar with it. (that is anyone else shows interest in this)<br>

may I give an email address on this forum??<br>

Also note: for those of you that used a special B&W processed changing D-76 into a high energy fine grain developer called C-76. The product is still available. Contact me, and I will look up the source that I have.</p>

<p>More to come.</p>