Best Film for Portraits (and Worst)

[mercury]

the title says it all. i'm just wondering what you consider to be the

best and worst all around b/w films for portraiture. lets say for

35mm, and for 120 and then all around. do you think format affects

the over all look (ie Tri-x grain on 35 as compared to 4x5)? i'm just

curious about your oppinions. thanks.

 

-pat

[photobyalan.com]

The best film for portraits is just about anything in 8x10 size.

 

Tri-x or HP5 would be perfect in that size.

 

Tri-x is a little to grainy for my taste for portraits in 35mm, although it's nice in 120 and larger.

 

You can't go wrong with Plus-x in any size.

 

Kodak Portra 400BW is a very nice portrait film in 35mm and 120.

 

I also like Fuji Acros 100, although I have limited experience with it, and only in 120 size.

 

I've also learned that it's not a good idea to get too hung up on what film you're using. Your lighting technique, lenses, exposure, film development and printing techniques are going to have a much more profound effect on the final product than your film choice.

 

Oh, for color portraits, I'd choose Polacolor in 20x24 size. Spectacular but sort of expensive ;)

 

Fuji NPC/NPS/NPH are good color portrait films, and somewhat more widely available.

[chris_waller]

I shoot portraiture mainly on 120. I like Ilford Delta 100 (rated at 50 ASA) and HP5+ (at 160 ASA) devved in Ilford Perceptol at 1+3 dilution. I also like Fuji Acros (rated at 50) and devved in Agfa Rodinal at 1:50 dilution. Kodak 100 Tmax and Fuji Acros are both good in 35 mm.

[ed b.]

Delta 400 or T-Max 100 in 120.

[michael_goldfarb]

Don't forget Agfapan APX 100, it's a great portrait film. Even better than Plus-X... and this from a lifelong Kodak chauvinist!

[conrad_hoffman]

Depends on what you want. A high key female portrait in the studio might work well on TMX. A dramatic male charactor study (think Hemingway by Karsh, though I don't know what film was used) can benefit from an ortho film. A middle of the road do-anything choice might be FP4+ in any format.

[ed farmer - mount laurel,]

Best: Tri-X, 120 or 4x5, in PMK.

Worst: TMax 400 in anything.

[curt_hagenlocher]

<i>Worst: TMax 400 in anything</i><p>

Which just goes to show that anything is possible. <a href="http://www.heylloyd.com">Lloyd Erlick</a> has done some very nice portraits in TMax 400, exposed at EI 200 and developed in 1+2 Xtol.

[lex_jenkins]

Based on the work of other photographers, Pan F+ appears to be an excellent choice.

 

Based on my own experiments, FP4+ at EI 64 and processed appropriately is excellent.

 

Tri-X and HP5+ tend to be a bit grainy in 35mm at their nominal speed for traditional portraiture. Rerate and process them appropriately and they're excellent choices.

 

APX 100 has excellent tonality and fine enough grain even in 35mm to be useful for traditional portraiture. TMX has (or had) finer grain, but would be a bit more difficult to work with for portraits.

 

Based on the large format work I've seen from others, TMY could be useful. It's simply too grainy in 35mm for acceptable enlargements beyond 5x7.

[bryan_weiss]

Best in my opinion is Efke 25.

 

Worst is TMAX

[scott_eaton]

The Lloyd Erlick link above didn't exactly improve my opinion of TMY 400. I mean, the guy's composition work is great and full of character. I just found the tonality a bit, well, I could tell it was Tmax, and that's all I'll say.

 

For 120 I'm partial to either Delta 400 or Tri-X pro depending on the individual and what I'm trying to convey.

 

For 35mm it's either Acros 100 or TMX - I hate grain.

 

The above though assumes you are doing your own processing, otherwise this is an acedemic comparison. XP2 is then the way to go.