Chemicals/films. Which ones ?

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stevewestern

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So, I collect a camera next week.
I am only in the UK for a few days, so want to get a few films and some chemicals to bring back with me.
What would be good to try to start ?
We have plenty of light - often harsh sun, and at this time of year, fairly low in the sky. I want to try some landscapes, so what film, and then what developer - what difference do different chemicals make ?
Some films must be lower contrast, some higher - same with chemicals, so what do you know ??

Thanks

Steve
 
Fuji Velvia:love:, I cant write Fuji Velvia:love: without :love:
I've used a lot of 100, its beautifull, saturated colours, kinda warm, not exactly realistic but great for scapes/general stuff.
Not great for skin tones in portraiture, but I dont care I'd use it anyway.
They say 50 is better, I've never had any.
Fuji Provia 400 is nice faster slide film, more accurate colours.

B/W..errm, I use a lot of Ilford, but just recently I've been using some Fuji Neopan, its pretty smooth, 1600 is grainier but the contrast in it is beau, only seen it in 35mm tho.
Default roll is Neopan 400, the Acros 100 is smooth as slug snot.
Ilford 3200 in dark holes, like churches, grainy but you can shoot handheld when tripods are banned.
You will have to edit your scans as though you were printing
 
Tri-X is nice, you can push it fairly easily and it doesn't die, plus the pushed grain can be quite nice.

Ilford HP5 is also nice, can be pushed a bit, Delta I'm not too fond of, looking at geting some Fuji tomorrow I think.

I've not tried any of the colour process black and white films, and tbh i don't think I'm likely to unless i cant get any chemicals for an extended time.
My only experience is with one shot developers, Ilford LC29 and Rodinal. LC29 is a fairly standard developer, can be used for most "normal" negatives. Rodinal is a bit more contrasty (i think) and tends to give more grain, but with TriX it is nice grain.

Colour wise, Velvia is a nice option if you like the high saturation look? I've got a couple of rolls of 120 film I need to get processed so I can't really advise you yet.

Fuji NPH is quite a nice medium speed colour neg film, Kodak Porta is ok, comes in 2 flavours, NC (neutral colour) and VC (vivid colour). They are ok but not my film of choice(I got a load free and pretty much wasted it testing a couple of cameras, so I can't honestly say it was a fair apraisal though).

Basic advice though is buy a couple of B+W films (TriX and HP5 would be my recommendation) and a basic developer and have a play :banana:.

also, as you have very brght sun and probably contrasty scenes you may find it hard to nail an exposure that covers all aspects of the scene with tranny film, maybe try colour neg as it has a much wider exposure latitude.

also also :bonk: bear in mind I'm still learning so everything above could be complete and utter rubbish :eek:
 
Velvia 50 ISO is fantastic, it has an almost 3D quality sometimes. I've used it quite a bit and I love it, especially in late afternoon sunlight like we both get. You'll need to send it to a lab though. B&W I can't help with, I haven't had any for years (maybe it's time I did then eh?).
 
The old B/W favorite is Ilford FP4 developed in Ilford ID11.

From memory you can dilute the dev 1+1 or 1+3.

I would assume you would use a slower (100 asa) in your part of the world, which is what I would rate the FP4 at.

ID11 comes in powder form but it's no hassle to mix up, probably last longer in your climate too. http://www.ilfordphoto.com/products/product.asp?n=28&t=Film+Developers

also this site :http://www.digitaltruth.com/devchart.html

gives loads of dev times against differing films
 
ah bugger ^ man's right, never thought about that.
If I'd have thought on, I have some Ilford Microphen, I think its powder that you mix, I dunno, I've had it a year and haven't even looked at it yet.
Thats what you'll have to get if your flying, powder to mix.
 
raathistle said:
I've not tried any of the colour process black and white films, and tbh i don't think I'm likely to unless i cant get any chemicals for an extended time.
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If you intend to manipulate negatives digitally one of the best things about C41 B&W is that it scans great compared to B&W. You can also use hardware IR dust removal with C41, which you can't with proper B&W.
 
zeroeseight said:
If you intend to manipulate negatives digitally one of the best things about C41 B&W is that it scans great compared to B&W. You can also use hardware IR dust removal with C41, which you can't with proper B&W.
Click to expand...


Can you explain a bit more please - why do cC41 films scan better than 'true' B/W films ?
Cheers
 
There is no reason why conventional B&W film should scan worse than C41 dye based films. I've scanned both in my time and had no problems with a properly set up scanner. I suspect the coment here refers to Digital Ice dust removal.

The system scans the neg ( or Trannie) twice. Once normally and again using an IR light source. Photographic dye is transparent to IR but dust and a lot of scratch marks aren't.
Software within the scanner compares the 2 images. Where the IR scan shows dust etc, this is removed digitally. Conventional silver based B&W film is opaque to IR and shows as one huge area of dust spots, which the software blindly removes, giving you a blank image.

Fortunatly most scanners with Digital Ice or similar software have a switch to disable it
 
Chappers said:
There is no reason why conventional B&W film should scan worse than C41 dye based films. I've scanned both in my time and had no problems with a properly set up scanner. I suspect the coment here refers to Digital Ice dust removal.

The system scans the neg ( or Trannie) twice. Once normally and again using an IR light source. Photographic dye is transparent to IR but dust and a lot of scratch marks aren't.
Software within the scanner compares the 2 images. Where the IR scan shows dust etc, this is removed digitally. Conventional silver based B&W film is opaque to IR and shows as one huge area of dust spots, which the software blindly removes, giving you a blank image.

Fortunatly most scanners with Digital Ice or similar software have a switch to disable it
Click to expand...

Hi Chappers
you forgot to mention the huge drawback to digital ice scanning, thats the time it takes to do. a normal scan at say 3400dpi might take a minute or two, add the ice and you can go take a shower, and / or put the kettle on. my pc is no slouch but the ice runs the processor at 100% for AGES (y)

dave
 
Yup Dave you're right, DI will take longer than a normal scan. Also the type of scanner will have a big effect on the scanning time. However think of all the time you've saved not having to dust bust in Photoshop;)
 
On a 4490, ice was next to useless, it took forever and never really did the job, particles/scratches/whatever were just blurred out a bit, in places it softened the image.
Trouble is, we set ourselves such high standards, I expect ice is great if your scanning in bulk and aren't gonna look too closely at the results.
I just take greater care with flatbed glass and the film itself.
Dust is a fact of life, I learned to live with it...
 
steveinspain said:
Can you explain a bit more please - why do cC41 films scan better than 'true' B/W films ?
Cheers
Click to expand...

I just found in my limited experience that the scanner seems to pull out more tonal range from C41. The fact that I seem to get a more limited tonal range from silver halide is probably due to my shooting/developing/scanning techniques. The grain for a 400 iso C41 film is also really fine.

Prior to trying C41 B&W I didn't really think much of it, but I was pleasantly surprised with it when we had to use it. I also used it on holiday to avoid having unprocessed film going through xrays by having it developed locally. I don't think C41 is better than B&W, it's just another useful option to have.
 
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