film advice

[Marc]

I'm looking to run some film through my Pentax ME Super and was wondering what anyone could recommend for high contrast B&W shots.

Ta

 

[Jakska]

Tri-X pushed to 800/1600 will result in high contrast, but also grain.

You may perhaps be better off shooting using a yellow/orange/red filter? Depending on what light you're in/effect you're after/kind of photography you're doing of course.

 

[Marc]

it would be for people outside. don't mind grain within reason but I'm gonna show my ignorance here and ask what you mean by push.

 

[SparkUK]

This was shot on Ilford XP2 and scanned to a CD by tesco, no other tweaking.....
Not true B&W film but I was pleasantly surprised by it.

 

[joxby]

I was gonna say "pulling" the film is gonna boost contrast, like shoot some 400 @ 100 and then over develop by 3 stops, but its all getting a bit complicated if you don't soup your own b/w.
I find a red filter boosts contrast quite a bit with delta/fp4/hp5, you need to compensate for a stop though...

 

[TheBigYin]

If you're just out for high contrast, then shoot with either a yellow or orange filter, the general purpose ilford films - fp4+,hp5+ are fine, if you want contrast and grain then push the film 1-2 stops. If you're looking for a B&W film you can get processed on the high-street, then you're looking at one of the chomagenic C-41 process films - Ilford XP2, Fuji Neopan 400CN or Kodak T400 CN - to be honest, there's not a great deal between the look of any of these, so buy whichever's cheaper/in stock - the difference between the films is less pronounced than the difference between getting the film dev'ed at boots or max speilman :shrug:

 

[Jakska]

it would be for people outside. don't mind grain within reason but I'm gonna show my ignorance here and ask what you mean by push.

To push a film means to rate it at a higher ISO to what it actually is, ie:
You shoot a 400 ISO film at 800 ISO (so you are under exposing each frame by 1 stop) and you compensate by developing the film for longer. By doing this you can shoot in lower light than you would have been able to, but you do increase contrast and grain.
The opposite can be done (called pulling the film) by rating the film at a lower ISO and overexposing, and then developing for less time. This often decreases contrast and can be useful for, example, you've only got 400 ISO film in bright sunlight or you want a more 'creamy' flat negative.

For people outside an orange filter might do you well, it'll lighten and smooth the skin and clouds and darken the sky.

edit: Argh I type too slowly haha.

 

[Marc]

Thanks for the replies chaps, will look into those.It will be high street processing so I'll certainly look into the C-41 stuff. The last time I used C-41, I had it developed at Boots and it looked awful but don't know if it was me or their processing.

 

[TheBigYin]

it would be for people outside. don't mind grain within reason but I'm gonna show my ignorance here and ask what you mean by push.

Pushing a film 1 stop - taking a film rated at 400 iso and exposing it saying it's a 800 iso. So it gets under-exposed by 1 stop. You then compensate by over-processing the film by 1 stop, so the exposure is correct. BUT the longer processing allows the silver grains to develop larger, giving a more pronounced grain to the shot. Pushing 2 stops, is just doing the above, but at 1600iso and reallly over-developing

Pulling a film is taking things the opposite way, so say, shooting a roll of 125 iso at 64iso, and compensating by giving it a really short development to get the overall exposure right. This gives less visible grain, but usually gives a larger dynamic range in the neg - more grey levels between white-out and flat-black.

Some labs are capable of handling pushed films, some aren't. So, if you're messing with pushing/pulling film, it's best to handle the development yourself.

 

[Marc]

To push a film means to rate it at a higher ISO to what it actually is, ie:
You shoot a 400 ISO film at 800 ISO (so you are under exposing each frame by 1 stop) and you compensate by developing the film for longer. By doing this you can shoot in lower light than you would have been able to, but you do increase contrast and grain.
The opposite can be done (called pulling the film) by rating the film at a lower ISO and overexposing, and then developing for less time. This often decreases contrast and can be useful for, example, you've only got 400 ISO film in bright sunlight or you want a more 'creamy' flat negative.

For people outside an orange filter might do you well, it'll lighten and smooth the skin and clouds and darken the sky.

edit: Argh I type too slowly haha.

Thanks for the clarification. So when you say developing the film for longer/shorter, I'm guessing that becomes a bit tricky when using high street labs?

 

[Marc]

And Mark's just answered that question.

Cheers matey

 

[TheBigYin]

Thanks for the replies chaps, will look into those.It will be high street processing so I'll certainly look into the C-41 stuff. The last time I used C-41, I had it developed at Boots and it looked awful but don't know if it was me or their processing.

As long as you remind them that it's a black and white film, they should be able to adjust their filters and get a reasonably acceptable output. Of course, the easy way is to get it scanned to a cd at the time of process, and if there is a colour cast, it's easily sorted in the digital domain.

 

[Jakska]

Er yeah, probably not best to ask Boots/wherever anything apart from "how much will that be?" as simple questions such as "can I have develop only please?" have stumped the lab monkeys I've talked to in the past!

 

[Marc]

As long as you remind them that it's a black and white film, they should be able to adjust their filters and get a reasonably acceptable output. Of course, the easy way is to get it scanned to a cd at the time of process, and if there is a colour cast, it's easily sorted in the digital domain.

Thanks again Mark. Yeah, will always ask for a CD, you can take a man away from digital................

 

[TheBigYin]

Rather than going for a high-street lab, if you've shot "normal" black and white, you could treat yourself and get ilfordlabs to develop and print for you... they'll handle any of the fancy push/pulling as well - and you'll get honest to god silver gelatine prints as the final output.

 

[Marc]

Er yeah, probably not best to ask Boots/wherever anything apart from "how much will that be?" as simple questions such as "can I have develop only please?" have stumped the lab monkeys I've talked to in the past!

Haha, indeed. I once dropped a film into Boots and got a phone call an hour later to ask if I knew that it was B&W! :bang:

 

[TheBigYin]

Thanks again Mark. Yeah, will always ask for a CD, you can take a man away from digital................

Well - you'll need a digital copy to put your shots in the "show us your film shots" thread, won't you

 

[Marc]

Rather than going for a high-street lab, if you've shot "normal" black and white, you could treat yourself and get ilfordlabs to develop and print for you... they'll handle any of the fancy push/pulling as well - and you'll get honest to god silver gelatine prints as the final output.

Definitely worth a thought.

Well - you'll need a digital copy to put your shots in the "show us your film shots" thread, won't you

Indeed!

 

[SparkUK]

Fabs, I had two c-41 films done at the same time at Tescos, one Ilford XP2 and one Kodak T400 Cn, the Kodak one came out terrible but the Ilford worked really well.

 

[Marc]

Fabs, I had two c-41 films done at the same time at Tescos, one Ilford XP2 and one Kodak T400 Cn, the Kodak one came out terrible but the Ilford worked really well.

Thanks Chris. I don't think I'd trust my local Tescos to develop a cold though.

 

[SparkUK]

My local one seems ok, they've done half a dozen for me this week and that Kodak was the only one I wasn't happy with.

 

[TheBigYin]

Fabs, I had two c-41 films done at the same time at Tescos, one Ilford XP2 and one Kodak T400 Cn, the Kodak one came out terrible but the Ilford worked really well.

Is the Kodak the one with the orange film-base, like colour negative stock - it's that long since I shot anything other than normal B&W, I can't remember. If it is, then it's down to the operator to change the "profile" between the 2 C41 colour films - I know XP2 has a purple/grey film-base, which scans pretty easily, but iirc the orange base does make things a bit more awkward.

 

[SparkUK]

I'll have a look in the morning, though it was more of the actual quality, the Ilford was crisp and nice, the Kodak seemed really soft and just generally unpleasing. As an aside they can't scan proper B&W negatives, both Tesco and Asda have tried for me and their machine won't have it for some reason.