lars_arvid_s. Posted July 17, 2003 Share Posted July 17, 2003 Hi, planning to take some summer-portraits of my friends, using my 100/2,8 or 135/2,8. Just wondering which film to choose (of Kodak TRI-X, Fuji Neopan 400, Agfa APX100 and Kodak Portra 400 BW). Have no experience with Neopan, not sure APX100 are fast enough, but these are the films that I can get hold of here. Will be developing in D-76 1:1 (not the chromogenic of course).<br><br>I`m going for pleasing skin-tones, and probably wet-print enlargements up to 30 cm x 40 cm. <br>The question is, what film to choose, and how to rate it? <br>Examples of Neopan 400 would be nice.<br><br>mvh, Lars Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
scott_eaton Posted July 17, 2003 Share Posted July 17, 2003 Actually you should be looking at XP-2 for a chromogenic. Portra B/W is a pain in the ass to print on conventional B/W paper because of it's thick mask. Sticking to 400 speed films; The C-41 chromos are tought to beat for portraiture becuase of their low contrast and smooth dye structure. Next on my list would be either Neopan or Delta 400 with D-76. Tri-X pro next - Great film, but not my favorite for portraits. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
steve_dunn2 Posted July 17, 2003 Share Posted July 17, 2003 <p>Haven't used any of 'em; sorry. From using another Kodak chromogenic (T400CN), I'd be happy to use that one; it's quite sharp, though surely not as sharp as APX100, and very fine-grained. Portra 400BW should have similar characteristics. I've used TMX and the results I got weren't what I'd want for portraiture - too harsh and high contrast. But I didn't develop it myself, and since just about any traditional B&W film can give a wide variety of looks depending on how it's developed, I would expect that with a change in development it could also look good for portraiture.</p> <p>Summer portraits? As in outdoors, lit by summer sunlight (or skylight in the shade or whatever)? 100 shouldn't be a problem.</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peter_langfelder Posted July 17, 2003 Share Posted July 17, 2003 Disclaimer first: I develop in Xtol 1+1, D-76 results may differ. For people I like Neopan 400 rated at 250. It has somewhat subdued highlights and a tonality that I like for pictures of people (people whose pictures I take tend to like them as well). I haven't tried Tri-X, but HP5+ (which is supposed to be similar) was a bit more contrasty, with harsher grain that may be alright for men's portraits, but I find it a bit too much for womens' ones. If you go with the Neopan 400, make sure you don't underexpose by much, in my experience the tonal rendition will suffer (along with shadow detail, of course). 30 x 40 cm is quite large, grain on Neopan 400 or TriX will become quite obvious. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
eric friedemann Posted July 17, 2003 Share Posted July 17, 2003 I'm with Scott. I shoot XP-2 Super at ISO 200 and it prints well in both the digital and optical machines in my store onto RA color paper. I also get super results printing at home. If you hand develop your B&W film at home and are very, very good at it, you may get negatives with a slightly longer tonal scale than XP-2. However, I can match anything I can do with conventional films with XP-2 in printing.<div></div> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cliff_gallup Posted July 17, 2003 Share Posted July 17, 2003 When you rate your XP-2 at 200, do you process at 400 or do you pull? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
eric friedemann Posted July 17, 2003 Share Posted July 17, 2003 Cliff- I rate XP-2 at E.I. 200 for direct flash and other flat lighting situations, then process normally in a C41 machine- no pull processing. You can get adequate shadow detail shooting XP-2 at 400, but the images are quite flat and don't give me good machine prints. This trait has remained the same since I was shooting XP-1 20+ years ago. Hand printing in my darkroom, getting the contrast just right on XP-2 shot at 400 is vexing. At 200, the contrast is much more consistent and less tweaky. One caveat, the image above was shot in open shade that was fairly flat. If I was shooting in very contrasty light- bright sunlight at high noon or rounded light coming from multiple strobes- I would probably expose at E.I. 320. Again, no pull. Regards, Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
r.t. dowling Posted July 17, 2003 Share Posted July 17, 2003 Tri-X is absolutely wonderful if you are going for a journalistic, gritty, "real life" look. This lends itself to street photography quite nicely. For situations where you want to make the subject look as attractive as possible, something like Plus-X 125 might work well. It has a classic, "Hollywood" look. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lars_arvid_s. Posted July 17, 2003 Author Share Posted July 17, 2003 Thanks for the great responses so far! First, I will be shooting just before sunset, I tried this last summer with color film (reala) and I was pleased with the results. Handheld reala at ISO 80 was a little bit too slow, that's why I would like something around ISO 200-400.<br><br> I probably got some T400CN lying around too, didn't think it was much different from 400BW, but maybe there are some differences when it comes to wet-printing them?<br><br>Will probably shoot both C-41 BW and Neopan @ 250, though I always thought Neopan (both 400 & 1600) were more of a high-contrast film.<br> I used the setting sun as a nice "catchlight" when using reala, hoping I can achieve something similar in black/white. Will probably be printing on Ilford MGIV RC satin. <br><br> Thanks for the recommendations so far, although further comments are appreciated <br><br> mvh, Lars Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
eric friedemann Posted July 17, 2003 Share Posted July 17, 2003 If you can settle for Pearl surface, I LOVE the Ilford Multigrade Portfolio for making RC prints. It prints precisely the same as regular Multigrade, but has an extra-thick base. And lemme tell ya, even clients who know nothing about photography LOVE thick papers. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oskar_ojala Posted July 18, 2003 Share Posted July 18, 2003 Remember that pulling a film by a stop will lower contrast, if that's what you need. This is a tough question since much depends on the look you're after, but there's plenty of good advice in this thread. Personally, I'm not very keen on wet printing any 400 speed film from 35 mm up to a size of 30x40 cm, but YMMV depending on your taste. Personally, I'm still a bit undecided on XP2, but I've shot some portraits I liked with it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
moe_p Posted July 18, 2003 Share Posted July 18, 2003 "And lemme tell ya, even clients who know nothing about photography LOVE thick papers" Never mind the quality, feel the width! >>titter<< Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
eric friedemann Posted July 18, 2003 Share Posted July 18, 2003 Moe- Photo papers are like bathroom tissue in that, by feel, people believe that thicker is better. To illustrate this, I will tell a story ... For years, we used Kodak Royal papers in my store's lab. And we had problems with consistency out the wazoo that we believed could be reasonably attributable to Kodak's product. But, one thing to be said for the Kodak Royal papers was that they were extra thick. So we switched to Konica papers, which have been vastly more consistent. Unfortunately, Konica's premium paper wasn't quite as thick as the Royal paper. Within days of the switch, we had regular customers asking why their prints weren't as thick. They hadn't even noticed the Konica brand on the back of the prints. And they weren't complaining about the image quality. They simply had a tactile response to the paper thickness. Regards, Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
steve_dunn2 Posted July 18, 2003 Share Posted July 18, 2003 <cite>I probably got some T400CN lying around too, didn't think it was much different from 400BW, but maybe there are some differences when it comes to wet-printing them?</cite> <p>When T400CN came out, Kodak said it was good for printing both on B&W papers and on colour papers. But it got a reputation for being hard to print on colour papers. When 400BW came out, Kodak said that it was specifically designed to print well on colour papers, and that T400CN was suppsoed to be for B&W papers.</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
scott_eaton Posted July 19, 2003 Share Posted July 19, 2003 The main difference between those two films is the mask. Contrast and density is about the same. If you were to take two shots on Portra B/W and TCN400, and have then have them printed on graded B/W paper (negates the mask), you'd see very little difference. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rothelle Posted July 22, 2003 Share Posted July 22, 2003 I use Tri-X and I rate it @ 250 and some times 320 and I get some of the best photos I've ever seen. I like to develop it in HC-110. The only way you will find out what will work for you is, To shoot a few difrent fill @ the same subject and process yourself and print it. You'll learn more and you'll find out what work for you.<div></div> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dan_smith Posted July 22, 2003 Share Posted July 22, 2003 Choose one, learn to use it and get the results you want. Any film will work if you learn how to use it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
r.t. dowling Posted July 22, 2003 Share Posted July 22, 2003 Dan wrote: "Any film will work if you learn how to use it." Does that mean that I can get great looking caucasian portraits with Velvia if I learn how to use it? :-) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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