craigharmer

OK so I finally went out and shot some HP5 pushed to 1600 at a club just to get a feel for how the film looked (grain, contrast, etc). The results are not amazing, but the grain is VERY tolerable; I almost feel like it hasn't really increased at all from at EI 400. I love the high-contrast look and I think I'll probably be sticking with HP5 pushing for now and just work at fine-tuning my technique.<div></div>

Thanks very much for all the quick responses so far - some extremely helpful advice and samples here!

I need to find a good 35mm film for street/club photography at night that does

not necessitate long exposures. <br>So far the best options I have been able to

glean from here and there are:

<br>

<br>

Delta 3200 (actual ISO 1000)<br>

T-Max 3200 (actual ISO 1000)<br>

Neopan 1600 (actual ISO 1600?)<br>

HP5 Pushed<br>

Tri-X Pushed

<br>

<br>

I've heard that Delta and T-Max 3200 would both give better shadow detail, but

that the overall "feel" of the films can be surpassed by HP5 or Tri-X pushed to

1600 or 3200. Does anyone have some recommendations on which film to start

with, and maybe some sample photos of these films being used for this purpose?

<br>

<br>

I think I'm a little partial towards Ilford films, but I haven't used them in

these circumstances yet and am completely willing to try something new. I'm not

necessarily interested in grabbing all the detail that I can get, I just want

the photos to have a good mood and not be distracting because of the heavy

processing. I will be doing my own development, but I only have Sprint at my

disposal.

Thanks for the very helpful responses so far.

 

I have to say that I stand corrected about the 45mm f2 MD. My initial judgment was not very fair to the lens - I actually went back to my negatives and realized that I had taken some very pleasing shots with it when I wasn't shooting for bokeh (I still prefer hexagonal highlights to pentagonal, if I they can't be avoided altogether) - and until now I hadn't been inclined to bring it along for street photography since I already had the 50mm and the 28mm in my arsenal. It seems that the voice of experience says the 45mm would be a better choice in this arena however, and my next few rolls of HP5+ will probably be shot on the streets with either this lens or the 28mm.

 

But I still love my 50mm f1.4, if only because it's such a fast lens and I really enjoy playing with shallow DOF (some of my favorite portraits use such a thin DOF that the focus begins to go soft even as it reaches the sides of the face - magnificent!). Does anyone have other recommendations for fast Rokkors they have found to produce pleasing bokeh or that are especially good performers for portraiture? Specifically, I would love to get my hands on the 58mm f1.2 MC Rokkor-PG or 85mm f1.7 MC to use for this sort of work, and I would really love to see any sample photos anyone might have from these lenses.

I'm in the market for some new lenses for my Minolta manual focus system and I

was wondering what the quality was between the varying versions of Minolta's own

Rokkor lenses (such as MC vs. MD versions), as well as how the quality of third

party competitors stacked up against Rokkor.

 

Right now I have a 2nd generation 28mm MD W.Rokkor-X f2.8, a 45mm MD Rokkor-X

f2, a 50mm MC Rokkor-X PG f1.4, and a 135mm MC Minolta Celtic f3.5.

 

Performance-wise, I've been pretty pleased with the 50mm (I love the 1.4

aperture and it seems relatively sharp, even when shot wide open), and the 28mm

seems pretty sharp as well. The 45mm however has produced some disappointing

bokeh at times (in part due to its 5 element design that creates pentagonal

highlights) and the 135mm feels only useful when the extra focal length has

absolute priority over clarity.

 

My goals are to get ahold of a quality zoom lens since I have none so far, and

also try to replace some of my current primes with superior designs. Any advice

or comments from experience with these or similar lenses would help me out

immensely. Oh and just as a sidenote, I have been accessing

http://www.rokkorfiles.com/ on a regular basis to answer some of these

questions, but would still like to hear what the general consensus seems to be

in the field. Many thanks in advance.

Hi all, I've been trying to find out information recently about how to take

long exposures (+15 seconds) on my Minolta XG-1 camera, but so far have not

found anything that suggests the on-camera shutter controls can be bypassed.

Would a remote shutter release help me with this, and did Minolta even make a

remote shutter accessory for this camera? I don't know if this device would

actually allow me to open the shutter as long as the button was held down or if

the camera still uses the maximum of 1 second exposure. The manual for the XG-

1 shows that the camera has a "Shutter Release Socket" on it, but that is as

close as I've come to finding out whether this is an option for me or not. Any

help/advice in this area would be greatly appreciated!

 

Oh and as a sidenote, is there any kind of film that anyone has found to be

exceptionally good for long exposures in 35mm? I'm relatively new to the

format so right now I'm still experimenting to see which film gives me the best

results. My next batch of film will be some Fuji Superia Reala ISO 100, which

I've heard can be quite good.