Film Speed "Help"

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Jonathan McGhee

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Jonathan McGhee
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Ive always been one for digital photography, but found an old pentax k1000 slr (Film) in my house today, so off i went got a colour film went out..... thought i had got some amazing pictures, now ive found just as i was taking the film out that ive had the film speed set at 400 when the films only a 200 (colour)

what will this do when developed?????


many thanks
 
I would not worry too much, explain to the lab what you did, anyway modern films have quite a wide lattitude for over or under exposure, so you may not even notice as the processing system often adjusts for situations like this.


John:)
 
Jonathan, simply dont worry. When the prints conme back, you will not even notice the difference. Films can easily be underexposed by 1.5 stop and overexposed by upto 2.5 stop. The machine will adjust the exposure to give prefectly acceptable prints.

You can alternatively send it to Club 35 and tell them to pull one stop; they charge 1 quid extra to do that.

In fact, almost all contax cameras are adjusted to atleast 1/2 stop - if not 1 stop - underexpose. Contax always believed that its better to underexpose than overexpose ( particularly true for slide films really)
 
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The photos taken on ISO/ASA 200 film with the camera's meter set to ISO/ASA 400 will be 1 stop underexposed. Print films will cope with the underexposure and the pics will be useable (might seem a little grainier than usual but they'll be OK at 6x4 size and will take a bit of enlarging) but slides will be rather dark. They may be good enough to scan and get useable prints but possibly not.

As John said in the post above, tell the lab what you've done (and I reckon most of us who have used film have done similar) and they can adjust the development time to compensate for the underexposure. This is called pushing film and is/was a useful trick if you needed a higher speed film than you had in the bag.
 
ujjwaldey8165 said:
Jonathan, simply dont worry. When the prints conme back, you will not even notice the difference. Films can easily be underexposed by 1.5 stop and overexposed by upto 2.5 stop. The machine will adjust the exposure to give prefectly acceptable prints.

You can alternatively send it to Club 35 and tell them to pull one stop; they charge 1 quid extra to do that.

In fact, almost all contax cameras are adjusted to atleast 1/2 stop - if not 1 stop - underexpose. Contax always believed that its better to underexpose than overexpose ( particularly true for slide films really)
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You mean push not pull? if the camera was set to 400iso and the film is actually 200, it will be underexposed and need extra dev time.

I agree about the don't worry, it's not going to ruin the shots or anything, you just won't get as much detail out the shadows as you could've done if it was exposed correctly.
 
thank you so much, ive put the film into asda but it wont be processed until tomorrow, there a few nice pics but nothing really really important, should i get it back n take it to jessops???

thanks again!
 
If you can find a Tesco that does D&P they will develop the film and scan to disc for £1.99 (no prints), Boots I hear will D&P to 6x4 for around £5-7.00, from what I have read elsewhere Asda are good as well. Jessops can be a bit pricey and take some time to do the job, but that could depend on your local branch and who they use to do the processing.

I use Bonusprint for mine, D&P for 24 frames is £3.99+ 80p postage, turn round time about 5 days, scan to disc is an extra 99p.


John:)
 
and dont forget we've got a film section at T.P. as well Jon ,..its just around the corner :)
 
I've just sent a couple of rolls of to Truprint (haven't got them back so not sure on the quality, although I never used to think it was too bad). To develop&print a 24exp film at 6x4 cost me £2.79 including delivery, and they sent you a free Truprint branded 24exp ISO 200 film. Or it's £2.29 for their 'compact size' prints which are slightly smaller than 6x4. To put them on a CD is an additional £1.99, or £2.99 for 2 or more films on CD at the same time.

In most motorway service stations you can pick up the freepost envelopes for sending the film in, normally by the door in a stand with the local attraction leaflets! Or email them and ask them to send you some.
 
Hope that Truprint are better now than they used to be when my mother used to send the family snapshots to them. I've got an entire box of photo envelopes with every shot on the roll having a pronounced magenta caste. Strangely, when i've scanned the negatives (110,35mm and 126 i think) they've all corrected nicely.
 
ujjwaldey8165 said:
Contax always believed that its better to underexpose than overexpose ( particularly true for slide films really)
Click to expand...

Ooh, a can of worms there! I agree that underexposure of slides can give a denser image many prefer (I'd call that correct exposure) but we're talking 1/3rd to 1/2 a stop from the speed on the packet. Underexposure of transparencies at a level acceptable for negatives leads to seriously dark and undetailed images. Slides are especially unsuited to over-exposure but that shouldn't indicate taking liberties the other way!

A rule of thumb for B&W negative material was to over-expose and under-develop, for instance Tri-X shot at 200ASA (1 stop over-exposed) and pulled in development was often treated as 'universal film'. It gave a useful extra stop over standard 100ASA film without grain and contrast getting out of hand.
As fast film technology developed these characteristics became less apparent and avoided blown highlights resulting for over-exposure but old school photographers took printed speed with a pinch of salt as it could vary between film batches.
 
TheBigYin said:
Hope that Truprint are better now than they used to be when my mother used to send the family snapshots to them. I've got an entire box of photo envelopes with every shot on the roll having a pronounced magenta caste.
Click to expand...

Hmm. That sounds very familiar from the brief period I used Truprint at the end of the 1970s. I remember a particularly magenta set of prints of a trip to the Isle of Wight taken with a Kodak 110 Instamatic when I was ten or so.
 
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Musicman said:
Hmm. That sounds very familiar from the brief period I used Truprint at the end of the 1970s. I remember a particularly magenta set of prints of a trip to the Isle of Wight taken with a Kodak 110 Instamatic when I was ten or so.
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:LOL: :LOL: I just got a "black and white" roll (XP2) back from Truprint but the prints have come back "black and magenta"! :bonk:
I don't think anyone would believe that it was supposed to be B&W it's so far off! Not impressed. The colour roll didn't come back too bad though.
 
apparently, we're not alone

PRINTS CHARMING [The Independent, Sunday, 25 June 1995]

The Indy said:
When having those prized holiday snaps developed, how much difference is there between services? We test five


...

**TRUPRINT

pounds 3.59, plus 55p postage, including free film (mail-order; company guarantees film returned within seven days of posting; in our test it took seven days)

...

Packaging: The negatives were not bagged at all, lying loose in the pocket of a flimsy folder. They could easily have fallen out and been badly damaged or smudged.

Quality of prints: The poorest of all; the vast majority of the prints had been underexposed in the lab, making them look washed-out. There was also a slight magenta cast to them. !
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oh, and

Google: Truprint magenta

bottom of page 1 said:
- Claim 20 free digital camera prints From Truprint
2 posts - 2 authors - Last post: 5 Jul 2006
visit http://www.truprint.co.uk/registration for more details ...[COLOR=[B]Magenta[/B] ]
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:LOL:
 
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