Photo Utopia

Agfa Portrait XPS 160

2011-02-03T10:20:00.014Z

This particular film is no longer in production, so you'll have to excuse this post for a certain level of sentimentality as Agfa Portrait was probably my favourite ever film.

I think the film was first introduced in the early 1990's a part of the 'Agfa Triade' which consisted of three emulsions Ultra 50 which was a high contrast & saturation film, Optima 100 which had a normal saturation and Portrait 160 which had a lower contrast and saturation. Later they added an Optima 200 as well and dropped the 'Triade' moniker.

Here is a schematic of the layer structure:

Agfa Portrait had a very natural colour rendition and because of its lower contrast it captured white wedding dress detail even in the brightest of conditions. I also remember it having excellent latitude to over exposure with detail in overexposed areas easily recoverable four stops over, it couldn't be underexposed I'd say half a stop at the most.

I used this film mainly for weddings where the aforementioned detail in the whites coupled with very nice skin tones nearly always gave great results. I think it is one of the most natural colour films I've ever used.

I found a small amount of this film which expired 2007 on a well known auction site and just had to go on a little trip down memory lane and have had fun revisiting an old favourite.

I had forgotten the peppermint flavoured 120 roll seal :)

Found Film — 127 Kodacolor VR200

2011-01-28T11:31:00.002Z

First a confession, I was given this film about 5 years ago, promptly put it in a draw and forgot about it.
It is a Kodak VR200 in 127 format dating from somewhere between 1982-90. I think the Kodak VR range were the first to use the T grain type emulsions, and were superseded by the Gold range in the late 1980's
Often people who find old colour films decide to process in B&W as either the process is no longer available or they think the colours will have faded anyhow.
As I have been processing my own C41 I decided there would be no harm loading up the old film, and as you can see by the following images they aren't too bad considering the film was loose wound and at least 20 years since exposure.

This looks familiar, probably East coast-possibly Sheringham or Cromer

It looks like a bed and breakfast holiday on the East Anglian coast, probably taken with a folding camera.

Processing Your First Colour Negative Film

2011-01-20T13:57:00.007Z

Its not as hard as you think!

In these days of ever shrinking film market we often find ourselves looking for a good photographic lab for colour work which can sometimes be hard. So if you can't find one why not have a go yourself? There are some excellent kits now available from Tetenal, Rollei and Fuji-Hunt.

Quite a few of you will already be processing your own B&W so already own most of the equipment needed.

Hold on I hear you say-isn't colour processing complicated?

Processing colour negative film is as easy as B&W in fact in a lot of ways it is easier. The equipment you need for C41 negative is exactly the same as B&W with the exception of the thermometer which will need to go up to 40°C.
As the development time is the same for all C41 films 3 mins and 15 seconds the only hard part is keeping the developer at the standard 37.8°C ± 0.2°C
My method for keeping the developer is to use a water bath which I heat with a cheap fish tank heater which keeps the solution at the required temperature.
I use a 1L C41 kit which has three baths, Developer, Bleach/fix and Stabiliser (final rinse)

Here is my method:
I place the developer bleach-fix and stabiliser in the plastic washtub which I then fill with warm water at about 35°-40°C (around 100°F) I then switch on the tropical fish tank heater which maintains the temperature.

Then load the tank as you normally would with B&W film.

The chemicals need time to come up to temperature and stabilise, so put your thermometer in the developer bottle and keep an eye on it, the C41 developer is rated at 37.8°C (100°F) but half a degree either side won't matter.
Once up to temp, fill a clean container with water at 38-39°C this water will be used for pre-soaking the film, which will help to keep the developer up to temperature by warming the tank and ensure the developer goes evenly over the film.
I pre-soak for two mins and while I do this I get ready my timer ( a watch with second hand is fine) and a pen and paper to note the passing time.

Pour out the pre soak water (it will be a coloured liquid, which is normal) and slowly pour in your developer (should take 15 seconds) and start your timer and initial agitation of about 15 seconds-tap the tank to dislodge bubbles.

Important Note: It is easier to use the agitation stick with some models like the Patteson System 4 you can keep the thermometer in the tank by placing in the centre of thestick. If you use inversion method after the initial agitation the air inside expands so you'll need to crack off the lid to let the warm air out-or risk leaks!

Keep an eye on the time as agitation should be every 15 seconds either by 2 inversions or twists of the agitation stick. During this time I prepare another jug of water at 35°-39°C which I use as a non standard wash to prolong bleach life.
The developer time for fresh solution is 3 minutes 15 seconds, so after the 3 min time take off the lid and slowly pour your developer back into the holding bottle(a funnel can help here), then put in my previously prepared first wash (you can use acid stop bath) which should be at the same temperature (within a degree or two) as your processing solutions.

Agitate the wash/stop for 15-30 seconds then empty. Next pour in your Bleach-fix which should be over 35°C (as close to you developer temperature as possible) and agitate for a full minute then tap.
Remember to release the air if you use the lid and inversion

Prepare another jug of wash water at least 35°C.
Further agitations at 30 second intervals until the 6 min bleaching time is completed (you can't really over bleach-fix.
When finished pour the bleach into its holding tank and pour in your warm wash water and agitate for 1 minute, pour out the wash then re-fill with another warm wash and repeat until you've done this step five times.
Next pour in your stabiliser-don't agitate! just leave for one minute before taking out your film and hanging to dry.
N.B The stabiliser is the final bath, no further washes or wetting agents should be used.

That's it you're done! I actually find it easier than B&W, give it a go practice on cheap film/test shots until you're confident, but colour is nothing to worry about.
Here is an image developed from a Tetenal kit:

Notes:
Developer is the most critical step, keep the temperature as close to the target 38°C as you can. Developer times should be extended by 15 second after every 5 films, a 1L kit should do 12-15 films.
If you process a lot of 400-1600 films take the lower figure of 12 as they exhaust the developer faster-you kit should have more information.
Quite a few of these kits say "for rotary processors' but can quite easily be used for normal tanks as long as agitation is given every 10-15 seconds (not all commercial processors have constant agitation)
Developer changes colour from honey-gold to pinkish brown this is normal, in well sealed bottles should last 4-6 weeks its main enemy is air.
Keep developer away from all other chemicals especially bleach if you contaminate the developer with bleach-discard it (follow your countries laws about disposal)
Bleach likes air just before use, in fact commercial labs pump air though the bleach to condition it- I shake my bottle before use to get air in the solution.
Extend the bleach time to 10mins after you've processed 10 films.
Stabiliser will go from clear to pink during use-this is normal.

©Photo Utopia 2011

Ensign Ful-Vue

2011-01-05T12:40:00.001Z

The Ensign Ful-Vue is an English box camera manufactured by Houghton-Butcher. Early pre-war versions were simply a box with a larger than normal viewfinder. The copmpany re-designed the camera in 1946 giving it an 'aerodynamic' look which still looks quirky today. The version above is from about 1950 and is a Ful-Vue II with a flash socket just to the right of the lens.

The body is made of pressed steel making the camera robust but quite light, the viewfinder is a separate unit also made of pressed steel. The shutter housing is made of a Bakelite type material held on by three screws making shutter and lens removal easy (more later)
The left hand side has a locking knob which when twisted to 'unlock allows the right hand side panel to be removed for film loading/retrieval.

Inside is a baffle and film holder, the Ful-Vue takes standard commonly available 120 film and has a red window for viewing frame advance.
All simple stuff, one shutter speed and aperture mean little control coupled with a simple lens that has three position scale focus 2, 5-3 and 6 to ∞ (I'm assuming feet).

My camera when it arrived had what I call a 'lazy shutter' in other words it had an intermittent non firing, but armed with some help from a Flickr member 'Full-Vue' I was able to take apart and clean the shutter.

After cleaning and re-assembly the shutter works fine, I didn't lubricate the simple mechanism I just gave it a polish.
In the winter in the UK with a box camera you really need a 400ISO film as I'm betting the shutter is about 1/60 and the lens probably f8 or 11.

The above was shot on a very dull cold day on Fortepan 400 developed for 1hr in Rodinal 1:100 stand.
I like the camera for its 'quirkyness' and simplicity, the big viewfinder looks great almost like a TLR in size and brightness, and for the times when you want a simple box with a lens-fun!

©2011 Photo Utopia

In Praise of Rodinal (Part 1)

2010-12-06T11:24:00.005Z

History
Rodinal in one form or another has been available to photographers for over a century. Originally produced by Agfa it can now be found in many different guises Adox/Calbe/Foma RO9 all basically now the same developer.
In fact Rodinal has become a bit of a cult developer, some even make their own using Paracetamol

Rodinal is one of my favourite developers, it is compensating when mixed in larger dilutions like 1:50 or 1:100 this also makes it very economical and to cap that it seems to last forever without going off.

(although this is only true with undiluted solutions, once diluted I'd personally use the mix within the hour).

While most other developers are useless when they go a dark straw colour, Rodinal remains useable regardless of colour – I have used the stuff when it was black, just take a look at the picture at the top of this article.
I can find no difference in developer activity between new bottles and ones where the solution is the same colour as Cola!

I first used Rodinal in the early 1980's when I worked with a photographer who demonstrated its qualities on a roll of APX developed at 1:50 shot on his 1950's Rolleicord.

At the time I thought he was quite mad as he decanted the tiny amount of black liquid from what looked to be an old brown glass medicine bottle with rubber stopper.
His results were wonderful, with a long range of tones and very sharp, it wasn't long before I had purchased my own bottle (though it came in a plastic bottle)

Rodinal apart from lasting longer than most photographers life spans, also has the advantage of being very economical as it can be used highly diluted 1:50 (1 part concentrate to 50 water) being my favourite; but anywhere between 1:25-1:200 can be used as long as you don't use less than 10ml of concentrate according to Agfa guidelines.
In reality those are pretty conservitive and I use 5ml as my minimum, and this seems to work well as my developer tank needs 500ml for a 120 film so the maths isn't too hard.

Above is the classic combination of APX developed in Rodinal 1:50

Recently the producers of Rodinal have lost the right to the name as a trademark, I have it on good authority that it is produced in the same factory in Germany but is now known as R09 'one shot' the new label seems to state it quite clearly:

Produced as Rodinal for Connect Chemicals (ringed in red) for any that harbour doubts. In part 2 I'll give some more examples of Rodinal in practical use as well as possibly showing some tests of how it differs from other developers, results from pushing film, and why I feel it makes a good choice for stand development.

Found Film: 1970's Ilford FP4

2010-11-26T13:13:00.003Z

Every so often I'm given a little photographic archaeology project, films that have been left in cameras or draws, for over 60 years in some cases!

The film I've been given this month is a roll of 120 Ilford FP4.

The film is still in production as FP4+ but this roll probably comes from the early production 1970-79 from the packaging.

What developer to use always inportant with old films and I favour Rodinal or HC110 as they give lower base fog which tends to be worse with films that have been stored for many years.

I processed this film in Rodinal 1:50 (10ml concentrate in 500ml water) for 15 mins with agitation of one inversion per min.

The film had about five 2¼ square images, two of which were of a boys hockey team at the local park the rest of someones back garden.

Looking at the hair, clothes and the fashion I'd guess these were taken between 1974-76 which means they have been sitting waiting for processing for 35 years.

The camera was probably a folding type as the images were left to right along the film.

I'm guessing the camera owner was probably the guy lying down in the second shot.

I wonder why people leave these undeveloped?

Filmwasters

2010-11-22T14:17:00.003Z

The Filmwasters are a group of individuals who share a passion for all things film. They have forums, both audio and video podcasts, print exchanges etc.I'm a member of the forum myself, and can attest that they are a friendly bunch who have a wide range of photographic interests from toy cameras, Polaroids alternative process etc.

Take a look at the Filmwasters

Scanning with the Epson V500

2010-11-16T12:52:00.002Z

Like most film photographers I need to scan my images in order to post them on forums or to my Flickr account.
This tutorial centres around getting good quality output from a very cheap consumer scanner the Epson V500. There are better scanners but for web display and even small prints from medium format its a pretty good scanner.
I'm also going to scan with the free software that comes with the scanner,keeping it as simple as possible.
Firstly set the software to work in 'Professional mode' this ensures you have control over the important settings. I use the software though Photoshop TWAIN module so images jump into PS after scanning– it can also be used as a stand alone program.
The important settings are set out below:

I feel the most important settings are:

Scan in 48bit (24 if your image editor only works to lower bit depth)

Resolution at 1200 gives output that can be used either for small (up to 8") prints or web images. At time of writing I feel that 1200 is the most useful setting for scanning as 2400 doesn't yeild much better images but increases scan times.
Set the original and destination (output) athe the same values–this should be the default.
In the adjustments section I disable unsharp mask and gran reduction as I prefer to do manipulation in Photoshop.

After you have made your pescan a viewing box opens, at this point the scan often looks sub-optimal so the first thing I do is highlight the image area I wish to scan.
Next I hit the histogram adjustment button which is the second one in the adjustments pallete:

This brings up another pallete which looks like this:

Notice The histogram window at the top? That represents the tones in the pre-scan scan, if you look carefully you'll see the white triange (lightest tones) has a little information to the right. In other words it 'clips' the highlight tone and if you look at the actual image you'll see actual image shows the clipping as missing or 'blown' highlight detail.

To remedy this you take the white triangle and move it to the extreme right of the histogram info, like this:

The whole image looks dull, but the upside is that most of the info will now be scanned. If you hit the 'show output' button you will see a histogram of the final image that will be imported into Photoshop.
From there you can make all the adjustments, levels, colour, sharpening etc

This tutorial isn't supposed to be scanning 101 just a guide to what works for me, trying to set the black and white points to avoid clipping and doing most post in PSCS.
The finished image can be seen at the top of this post.

© Photo Utopia 2010

Found Film Photographers

2010-11-10T14:40:00.016Z

I've decided to do a regular feature on photographers whose work I like or admire who still use film.
One of the most often asked questions is why do you still use film-isn't everyone using digital?
That seems to be the perception, which of course is quite wrong, there are many photographers using film because of its unique qualities– I hope to find a few gems to share.

First up to the plate is David Richardson who came to my attention though his Flickr page.
He is based in London, England and has what I would describe as a retro glamour style.
I asked him about his Photography, here is a short interview:

Photo Utopia: Why shoot film?
David Richardson: "I started shooting film for an exhibition I was part of. The theme was travelling light, so I got photos of a friend semi naked on the metropolitan line. After that I used digital a bit more for shoots I was doing but there was always a significant difference in the quality between them. In the end I wished some photos I'd already taken were film. So I didn't want to compromise in the future"

PU: What are your favourite film stock/s?
DR:"I shoot mostly portraiture so Kodak Portra NC is my favourite choice. But sometimes other films offer something different. I used ancient 25 year old film for the band Kap Bambino as I wanted a grungy aesthetic. Tri-x is gorgeous and I love using natural light and grain so I go for iso 800 films when I can".

PU:What photographer do you admire most?
DR: "I am a massive fan of Bob Richardson and Anders Petersen are my favorites. I am also very into Nick Waplington. But it changes from day to day".

PU:How long have you been shooting film?
DR: "Well my girlfriend at the time got me a Yashica T5 at a flea market in Amsterdam around Xmas 2008. I still love that camera, it's a toughie!

PU:What are your future plans?
DR "I wanted to sort out an exhibition and get an agent and I guess keep going on and enjoying. I'm in the middle of editting my first music video on super 8. So more of that too"

Thank You David.

Here is a link to David's impressive Flickr gallery.

Link To David Richardson on Flckr

Autumn Colours

2010-11-03T18:32:00.000Z

These are just a few images taken during October with my Rolleiflex 3,5F some with the Rolleinar 2 close-up lens (a must for Rolleiflex/cord owners) The above chestnut leaves were taken on Kodak 400 VC

This 'Fly Agaric' was taken under a tree with very little light hand held at 1/15 sec on Kodak 400 VC film

This tree shot was taken on a very dull day on Fuji 800z film. The following shot is of the same tree taken just a day later with Fuji 400H.

And finally English Apples taken on Fuji Superia 400

Words and images © Photo Utopia 2010

Book Review: Making Kodak Film– by Robert L. Shanebrook

2010-09-25T09:18:00.011Z

I don't normally review books, so please excuse my awkwardness but I feel this particular book is very important because it is as far as I know unique.

If you're reading this blog chances are just like me you're still using the odd roll of film or two, and if you're slightly geeky about it you've probably wondered about how that roll came into existence.
If so this book will certainly answer any questions as it covers film production from the manufacture of the base, the emulsion and perforating and slitting and packaging.
The book is clearly presented and very well written with over 150 photographs and illustrations showing the machinery and production methods at every stage.

The book itself is a soft-back about A4 size the paper and printing is very good quality.

I liked the images of the silver ingots showing them being put into the Nitric acid and also the confectioning machinery showing how films were perforated or this case the image below rolled with paper backing for 120.

(image of the book showing 120 film slitting and confectioning)

The author Robert L. Shanebrook worked at Kodak for 35 years and must have spent quite a lot of time putting together this book, the photography is excellent as is the annotation and overall layout.

In fact I can't think of I'd criticise, the book is an invaluable reference for anyone interested in film.
If you'd like a copy of this book it's only available from the author at his website:
http://www.makingkodakfilm.com/

So all in all a quite wonderful book and I have enjoyed it immensely. It is a fantastic reference which I think Kodak should give to every member of their sales team especially customer support.

© Text Mark Antony and images Robert L. Shanebrook.

New Fujifilm Medium Format Camera

2010-09-24T14:28:00.008Z

Fuji Has just announced that it plans to release a new medium format camera. The camera is called the GF670W and has a wide angle 55mm ƒ:4,5 Fujinon lens and has the capability to shoot 6x6 or 6x7 it also accepts both 120 and 220 film.

The shutter is a leaf type that has speeds 4-1/500 sec + B, features aperture priority as well as manual exposure modes and has an ISO range 25-3200.

Its not everyday a new film camera is released and after the sucess of their GF670 folding camera (known as the Voightlander Bessa outside Japan) it proves Fuji is committed to the medium.

Kodak announces new Portra 400 film

2010-09-15T06:40:00.011Z

Kodak Have recently introduced a new 400 ISO film to their Portra range here is what their blurb:

"The new PORTRA 400 is the world’s finest grain high-speed color negative film. At true ISO 400 speed, this film delivers spectacular skin tones plus exceptional color saturation over a wide range of lighting conditions"

The film actually replaces both existing 400 speed films in the Portra range Portra 400NC and 400VC and colour saturation wise falls between those two films, the grain is supposed to be finer than it's predecessors so obviously incorporates the technologies from their Vision movie films.

I think if this film lives up to Kodak's promises it should have a colour saturation similar to Fuji NPH only with slightly finer grain, which will make it a very competitive product.

Like most photographers I see this as a consolidation, the loss of NC and VC will be less of an issue to those who work in a hybrid workflow, and if it helps Kodak to keep turning out better and better products albeit in a smaller range-that's Ok by me.

Portra 400 should be available in November, as soon as I can get my hands on a sample I'll do one of my mini reviews to see if the claims made by Kodak are substantiated.

Here is the Kodak web Page:

Kodak Portra 400

Human Rangefinder

2010-07-30T10:16:00.005Z

As you probably know at this blog we occaisionally use old folding cameras like the Zeiss Ikon and Ensign Selfix.
The biggest problem with these cameras is that some of them just have albada viewfinders, that is there is no focusing aid such as a rangefinder.
I'd like to share with you a great tool that allows you to make a custom RF just by placing some details into field on a webpage.
This generates a PDF which you can print, cut out and store in your camera case(I laminated mine too).
Here is the link.
http://tomchuk.com/rf_hfd/index.php

Here is how mine looks for my Ensign

It works by holding the card at arms length and opening your left eye and lining up a vertical with the '0' line, close the left and look though your right, note the number that the vertical line now passes through–that's your distance.
I'd like to thank Thomas Achtemichuk for this great tool!

Film is Expensive?

2010-07-25T15:40:00.012Z

Film

An often repeated claim I hear goes like this: I don't use film anymore as the whole thing has become too expensive, or some incredulously saying 'do they still make film'?

I'm finding quite the opposite, firstly consumer colour film is far cheaper now than it was when I first started photography in the 1970's

This Week-End just for fun (and my upcoming holiday) I decided to take out £10 and see how many rolls of film that small sum of money could buy.

First stop was Boots the chemist, a British High Street chain whose photographic departments often have minlabs as well as a small stock of film.

I noticed on the shelf they have their own brand 200 36exp 5 packs for £8.49 and Fuji 200-24 for a little less.

They also sell slide film and Ilford B&W and a few single use recyclable cameras although they don't publicise this on their website (c'mon guys).

This particular shop had some short dated Fuji 'Holiday Pack' for £1.99 for 5 rolls I bought all they had which was 2 packs (10 rolls) at a total of £3.98 not bad...

Next a short trip to Poundland which unsurprisingly has a ticket of a pound for any item. Here I found Kodak 200-24 and their own single use recyclable cameras each (drum-roll) £1

My price cap for the afternoon was £10 so I bought 5 rolls of the Kodak giving me change of £1.02 which I used for the car park-15 rolls of film for less than £10.

My haul can be seen in the picture at the top of the post.

Processing

On the High St there is still quite a lot of choice regarding processing most chemists and supermarkets offer processing from as little as 99p up to about £5.00 or so depending on the service I have the 99p develop only which has been fine quality wise apart from the cutting into 4s

Prolabs have become much more thin on the ground, generally they use dip and dunk machines that take longer to process a roll and cut into 6's develop only can range £3-5 this becomes pricey if you need to post them.

I use a cheap minilab for 35mm and pay £2 for them they cut them in 6s and do a nice job.

Cameras

The choice here is huge, the rush to digital means yesterdays consumer compact is mostly worthless, recently I have purchased a Pentax Espio zoom 35mm compact for 50p! I have seen Canon sureshots Olympus trips and the like for 5-£10.

Lower end SLR of 10-20 years ago like Zenith and Praktica can be had for similar money, while mid tier SLRs like the Yashica FXD, Fujica STX 1n and Ricoh KR 10 can be found for £20.

The cheaper first tier cameras include the excellent Olympus OM1 and Canon EOS 650 of which I've seen many examples under £50, lots of choice with very high quality.

Modern AF cameras like the Nikon F100 and Canon EOS 1 can be found for a few hundred and make excellent occasional film use bodies for those with digital equivalents.

So film can be relatively in-expensive and should be though as a pay as you go model, especially if you don't shoot many images and enjoy just shooting and forgetting only to re-find that image 6 months later.

A camera like an Olympus OM1 will deliver great images for many years and gets a 'sensor' upgrade every time a new film comes out, something like a film compact can be slung in your cars glove-box taken to the beach and can be cheaper that a single use camera.

Fun with POP

2010-07-22T07:18:00.015Z

Printing out paper or POP as it is often reffered to has been around since the 1880's and is one of the first gelatin based photographic papers.
POP has a very slow photographic speed, that is you need quite a lot of light to make an image, so much so that it can be handled for short periods under indoor lighting.
The normal method for printing an image is to put the paper into a printing frame (I used a photo frame) and contact print negatives by placing them on the paper so they are sandwiched between the glass and paper–this keeps them nice and flat.

What you see above is all the equipment you need to make a print, the only extra things you'll need are a tray of water and sunlight.
Firstly in subdued light place the negative into the frame and lay the POP emulsion side down against the neg, then snap the back of the frame in to hold the paper agaist the negative–you may even like to put some card packing in to hold the negative against the paper.

I am using a 4x5 negative in order to give a good image size, negatives can be made from any image by inverting B&W images in photoshop and printing on transparent film

The next step is to place the frame outside in sunlight, I have found that a bright slightly overcast day gives the best results, trial and error being the best method of exposure, my times are normally between 5-15min the shorter time would be in bright light the later in open shade.

You can tell when the exposure is nearing completion as the area that was paper white begins to turn a plummy brown.

When taken from the framethe tones can be anything between yellow-red to purple-brown, and in this state the photograph isn't stable, that is bright light will fog it.

In order to 'develop' the print it must first be briefly washed to remove the excess silver nitrate which gives the image a better stabilty, and also causes the image to turn yellow/red and become slightly lighter.

The resulting image can be fixed in plain hypo for further image permanence this can further lighten the print and change colour.

My personal preference is for the plum colour, and I have scanned the image straight out of the frame to keep a digital record.

Many people have suggested to me that gold toning will give a cooler brown result and I'll probably have a play with that.

It should be noted that since I bought this paper that Kenmere have discontued it, if you would like to try it you'll have to make your own paper or try the similar modus of cyanotype like papers made by this toy company I feel another blog post coming on....

Early Kodachrome film test

2010-06-30T20:48:00.003Z

The following is an amazing test of Kodachrome colour movie film from 1922, of course its silent but quite beautiful.
This test predates the commercial introduction of the film by about 12 years, and is possibly the earliest colour movie film-certainly the earliest I've seen.
Later this year Kodachrome will be no more, thank you Kodak for the wonderful historic emulsion, I'm glad I got to shoot it.
Enjoy the film.

My Penultimate Kodachrome Roll

2010-06-10T13:14:00.011Z

After Kodak anounced that they were deleting kodachrome I had three rolls in my fridge. I had all sorts of ideas about grand last projects but in the end I gave one roll to a friend who hadn't used the film before and shot one roll on the spring flowers and my children.

Here are some of the shots from that roll.

All of the above were taken on a Nikkormat FT2 with 50mm Nikkor H and 55mm Nikkor Micro.

I just posted off my last roll which I shot at the beach, it felt strange to post the last yellow mailer (in Europe Kodachrome has mailers which go to Switzerland) Kodachrome was the first colour film I shot and I have hundreds of little yellow boxes, I feel happy that the last roll was of my children.

Kodak Release Ektar in Sheet sizes

2010-02-17T16:58:00.003Z

Kodak have recently announced that they will introduce a 4x5 and 8x10 sheet film size of their popular Ektar 100 emulsion.

Now large-format photographers will be able to enjoy the impact and flexibility that EKTAR 100 brings. With ultra-vivid color and ultra-fine grain, it's the ideal choice for creating high magnification enlargements for commercial display.

It will be available in April.

Adjacency effects in B&W film development

2009-11-22T20:20:00.040Z

There are many types of density anomalies that can be recorded in the silver photographic image, flare and other optical chain faults, as well as turbidity within the photographic emulsion during exposure. This article concerns itself with a group of anomalies that occur during processing, these are commonly referred to as adjacency effects.

The image above is a small section of a lens test chart, when photographed on B&W film the transition from black to white can be represented by a square wave form thus:

Obviously the representation above is what would be recorded by the film in ideal circumstances, in reality the action of the developer causes a peak (A) and a trough (B)

These density anomalies happen during development, at the border of a high/low density areas where the exposed part of the film diffuses bromide (which is a byproduct of development) into the lower density region causing a trough to form (B) as the bromide has a retarding action.

The developer is exhausted in the area of greater exposure causing developer to leech from the lower density area to the higher one, this causes a peak to form (A)

The enhancement of density at the edge of the dense area is known as the border effect the depression at the bottom is called the fringe effect.

Together they form edge effects seen in prints that are known as Mackie lines.

The figure above shows that the increase in density becomes greater as the lines on the chart decrease in size, this is known as the Eberhard effect.

Strangely this effect slows at around 0.1mm and then from that point decreases.

As the lines decrease further the area between them is retarded with respect to the rest of the image and this produces a lower density that is known as the Kostinsky effect.

Studies have concluded that adjacency effects occur with all developer types and that in practice there is little difference between them.

It should be noted that agitation (or rather a lack of or reduced agitation) can make a difference. It has been reported by some users of Rodinal that using the developer at high dilutions combined with minimal agitation can result in increased edge effects.

These are probably produced by macro bromide effects as bromide is the main cause of developer retardation and a byproduct of the development process.

© Photo Utopia 2009

Rolleiflex 3,5F

2009-10-30T07:18:00.001Z

Last year I bought a Rolleiflex T and re-acquainted myself with using a TLR and although not the perfect camera (what is)? it is one that works well for me with my style, I like square images and find composing in that format helps me to find a focal point.

The first TLR I used was a 3.5F with a Schneider Xenotar lens, which at the was the company 'training' camera, most of the photographers used Hasselblads because of the inter-changeable backs and lenses, the TLRs were considered 'learner' cameras.

So here am I twenty plus years later finally investing in what most see as one of the classic TLRs.

Xentotar vs Planar

The Rollei TLR during its long history was supplied with either Schneider or Zeiss lenses, depending what or whose web pages you read both a claimed to be superior, I have owned a F2,8 Planar a Tessar and two Xenotar models and can comfortably say at around F11 it will be hard to tell any of them apart. Conventional wisdom has it the Xenotar is sharper in the centre while the Planar is slightly better at the edges at wider apertures.

All I can say is that all the lenses used on the Rollei are excellent, quite capable of producing stunning results.

Operation and comparison with my Rolleiflex T

The fist thing I noticed was the F is heavier than the T, and feels slightly more substantial and robust; not a great deal more but no doubt the internals gears etc are also more robust, talking with service technicians confirms this.

The thing I like least about the T is the way the shutter speeds changes, the mechanical linkage has a less 'direct' feel, sometimes I even feel a slight slippage when changing apertures/speeds.

In contrast the rotating wheel used on the F feels very positive and accurate.

This camera has a built in Selenium light meter, it still works and as such is a welcome addition but I wouldn't like to trust its accuracy for really critical work.

One of the disadvantages compared to the T (and Rolleicord) is that the F has a 'bay II' bayonet fit, this means that accessories like lens hoods and my favourite close-up lenses the Rolleinars are all much rarer and expensive.

During the first few rolls I also found another feature that I like. If you push the F&H logo on the hood then look through the eyepiece on the back of the hood you get a focus magnifier, you cant see the whole field of view and its inverted (upside down), but the focus is more accurate using this method.

Here below are a couple of shots from the Rollei on the new Ektar 100 film not for any other reason than I like the colours...

This one is against the light

Summing up I find the F an excellent camera, not as a cheap way to get into MF photography, for that I'd recommend a Rollei T or even a Rolleicord/Yashica/Autocord.

What it will bring you is a camera that in my opinion is one of the classic designs of all time, if you forced me to pick one camera to use for the rest of my life it would be this one.

Kodak Ektar 100 in 120

2009-10-14T12:36:00.000Z

It is now over a year since Kodak announced the 35mm version of this film, after which many photographers asked for it in 120 size. After a few months Kodak obliged releasing a 120 version. I have a review of the 35mm emulsion here Ektar 100 35mm

So why review the medium format size?

My feeling after over 6 months of use (about 10 rolls) that the two are slightly different in character, I'm sure that its not just the format or the cameras, I actually think they behave in a different way.

First of all some tests that as normal centre around a Kodak No13 colour chart taken in a shaded area, first taking a 1 per cent spot meter reading from a grey card then taking -2 N and +2 exposures
The -2 has a slight lack of shadow detail, but just as with the 35mm shows an acceptable result, slightly more grain and lower contrast with a slight colour cast .
he normal was the easiest to scan and wet print, good colour and contrast greys remained neutral
The +2 has better shadow detail, but seems to have a blue/magenta cast which although can be filtered was in my opinion not as neutral as the normal neg
In bright sunlight colours are saturated,but detailed, slightly more conventional than the 35mm Ektar emulsion but in the same ballpark.
This shot and the following shot were made in quite dull conditions and for me this is where the results are different from the small format version. I would have thought that colours would remain fairly saturated, but in fact what I got from the two rolls shot on this day would be similar to what I would expect from Kodak Portra 160. I know what you're thinking that in some way they are under-exposed or possibly processing may have been different.
Seeing these results raised doubt in my mind about firstly my Minota spotmeter which checked out fine and then with the processing. In later trials though I tested the film in both cloudy and full sun and can confirm that the 120 film has slightly more muted colour when the weather is dull. I can say that I haven't come to this conclusion lightly and have actually re-written and put back this review until I felt that I had repeated consistent results from different cameras, processors and conditions.

This shot was taken in shadow and was to see how the film rendered skin tones, overall Ektar impresses me how it boosts reds and blues and yet gives quite natural believable skin tones, it does this with both versions of the film in a similar manner, I'd imagine it would be a great choice for fashion photography.

Something I've noticed though is a slight tendency for cooler colours in the shadow regions, this in my opinion is more so with the 120.

My overall conclusions are that this version of Ektar is similar yet not exactly the same as the 35mm version. So if you need a very fine grained film with good (yet not over the top) saturation especially in the red and blue parts of the spectrum this film is well worth a try.

1930's Zeiss Ikon Exposure table

2009-10-10T15:08:00.008Z

I found this old 1930's Zeiss exposure table in my loft recently, it has little value apart from photographic history, having bought an Ikonta of similar vintage recently its nice to have some period documents.

One thing I did note of interest is the DIN, Scheiner and H&D film speed values and their equivalents which may be of use to someone trying to work out speeds of 1930's films.

Above is the 'how to use' instructions and a reminder of some accessories available for your Zeiss camera.

If you'd like to see the text more clearly just left click the images to open at 100 per cent view, the text should be easily viewable.

Silver and filamentary growth

2009-10-05T13:47:00.005Z

The above is picture of a developed silver crystal that during reduction has transformed into a filamentary mass. This is quite common with most modern developers and film types, and is especially true of fine grain developers of the MQ and PQ type.

What I'm often asked is what causes the filamentary growth? why don't the grains always keep their original post exposure shape?

I'll try to explain.

When a silver halide grain is exposed to light electrons move within the crystal with extreme rapidity. Some of these electrons are 'trapped' in lower energy areas of the crystal such as defects or impurities, the trapped electron makes a still more efficient trap for other electrons and so on.

In this state the silver is said to be a 'latent image' and needs a developer to magnify it.

During development the charge that has been concentrated at the traps is highly negative and especially so at the tips which attract positive ions from the solution.

A needle like protuberance is formed which rapidly turns into a filament, such filaments have a large surface for their volume giving plenty of opportunity for developer ions to be adsorbed along its sides forming a flat ribbon like structure.

This results in a very strong negative charge at the tip of the filament which attracts silver ions, which when they come in contact with the tip are neutralised to give metallic silver and therefore even more rapid filamentary growth.

I hope that this explanation helps those who have asked how these filaments are formed.

Zeiss Ikonta 520/2

2009-10-04T10:43:00.004Z

The Zeiss Ikonta was designed by Dr August Nagel shortly after which he left Zeiss to form his own company Nagel Werke who eventually became part of Kodak and made great cameras such as the Retina.

The camera above is a 1932 model with 105 mm F4,5 Tessar lens which because of the age is uncoated, despite this it is a well renowned optic and during the time of manufacture one of the best lenses available.

The shutter is a Compur 'leaf shutter' type with speeds 1/250 down to 1 second plus B & T, in which the T setting is used by hitting the release once to open and again to close and is useful in dark conditions when on a tri-pod, probably would make a nice astro photo 'star trails' setting for several hour long exposures.

The apertures run from F4,5 to F32 and are changed using a lever under the lens.

On the back you can see two red windows, the left is for advancing the film 6x9 (8 exposures) the right is used in conjunction with an insert (nearly always lost) to give '645' (16 exposures)

Also in the picture you can see the Albada view finder which is used for framing only, the focus point being guessed- you needed a Super Ikonta model for rangefinder focus.

Inside the back is an advert for Zeiss 'Pernox' film

Operation

When you consider how old this camera is (it was produced in the year Hitler came to power) it works very well, all speeds seem to work, the bellows is without holes and the Tessar is free of scratches.

The uncoated Tessar is pretty sharp, probably short of Rolleiflex or Hasselblad Zeiss lenses by a margin but impressive considering the age and very useable in but the most demanding conditions.

The camera is quite a challenge compared to modern SLRs as pretty much everything is guessed, the focus distance, the exposure, the shutter is manually cocked before exposure the wind-on has no lock making double exposure a danger should you forget to advance (also nice for some effects). The alabada finder although yellow with age is reasonably accurate for infinity work closer work is more problematic.

The lens has a minimum focus of 5 feet which makes it none to useful for head and shoulder type portraits full length being the best you can hope for:

The above is a shot on closest focus at around F8, note the chopped of feet due to parallax error.
This image was a real test, loaded with ISO 100 film guessed exposure of 1/25 at F4,5 at roughly 25ft distance- actually turned out surprisingly well.

You can clearly see the wires (see enlarged section top right) in this shot of the Jewelers shop proving the old Tessar is quite up to the task for most infinity type work. I'd not be quite so happy to shoot portraits because of the 5ft minimum focus. Finally just a colour shot, Fuji 400H 1/250 at F11

In all I really liked the Ikonta, will probably look for a later Super Ikonta with a coated Tessar ultimately.

I now have quite a collection of folding cameras, and really like the big negative small package they are great cameras available in some cases for very little money (I paid £18 for this one) and despite their very manual operation they can be fun.

Ensign Selfix 16/20

2009-08-07T21:23:00.033Z

Ensign was the trademark of the British company Houghton-Butcher Ltd a company with a long history of camera and plate making. In the early part of the 20th century they were the largest British camera maker, and at its height in the 30's the Wathamstow works employed over a thousand people. After the war they found themselves with bombed out factories and in a poor financial state so joined forces with Ross the lens manufacturer and the camera factory was moved to the Ross Clapham Common works. The Selfix 1620 pictured here is a mark II model from around 1950 with a Ross Xpres F3,5 lens and has a negative size of 6x4.5. Model I cameras had an Ensar lens later ones had a built in finder rather than the alabada one the top model sported a Rosstar lens.

The camera is of excellent build quality, quite comparable to either Voigtländer or Zeiss, and has an interesting and quirky design.

First off is the shutter release which is on the left side, which in itself isn't too bad except on the right (where you'd expect the shutter release to be) is the lens board door.
Furthermore if you look at the image above of the shutter button you'll notice a central pin. The pin is designed to depress with the shutter button unless you forget to cock the shutter!- let me explain.
If you wind on the camera and forget to cock the shutter which is a lever near the aperture when you depress the button the pin pricks your finger to remind you 'please don't do that' One can only wonder in this litigious day and age how this feature could be even considered or what sort of designer would create such a feature? was he forced to sit on a spike as a child and just getting his own back?

The lens is a Ross Xpres F3,5 which I've been told is comparable to a Tessar both in design and quality. he Epsilon shutter seems to have a similar range to a Prontor. The Selfix doesn't have a rangefinder so is as manual as you can get but after a while guessing both distance and exposure aren't as problematic as it would seem.

Here is a 100 per cent view of the centre:

Certainly not bad, quite up to the standard of Zeiss or Voigtländer

The image below shows the inside, special things to note are the key ways for the roll which meant that the camera can use 120 or 620 type films the bottom of the holder is sprung and when pushed down makes a plunger release from the button making for easy loading.

The following picture is just to show the size relative to my Leica, its not trying to suggest a preference for either. But it does show the relative advantage of a folding camera– medium format film in a small package, coupled with a good lens makes a very decent picture maker.

The Ensign Selfix is a great little camera if you stumble across one in a junk shop or car boot, it has its quirks (the finger pricking pin) and its main disadvantage is lack of rangefinder meaning you have to guess distance.
Also on a personal note it is the first British camera I've owned, and I remember my grandfather telling me about his Ensign 'bellows' camera.

Found Film: ILFORD Selochrome

2009-08-07T21:05:00.019Z

This roll was given to me by a local camera shop who hoped that I could get some images from the 40 year old film.

The film as you can see was loose wound and placed in a Kodak Verichrome pan box, then put in a draw and forgotten about by the owner who decided to process it this week!

Having never used Selochrome before and not being able to find much info on the internet regarding developer times I decided to give the film a time of 20 min at 1:50 dilution, 20°c in Agfa Rodinal which I feel is a good low fog developer.

The lady who the film belongs too seemed to think it came from a simple box 'Brownie' camera and from what she tells me about the two girls (her daughters) these images were taken around 1967 judging by their ages.

Although edge fogged due to loose winding and the backing paper has reacted slightly with the film in some way (probably moisture) the images are pretty clear and overall base fog is low enough for either conventional printing or scanning.

Another nice surprise 'Rip Van Winkle' film.

© Photo Utopia 2009

Voigtländer Bessa 1 Folding Camera

2009-07-01T20:25:00.044Z

The Bessa I wasn't the first Voigtlander to have that name there was an older pre-war Bessa too which I have an article on here: Link
This particular Bessa was manufactured between the late 1940's up until the late 1950's and is a well made camera that uses 120 film and can give either 6x4.5(with insert) or 6x9 size negatives.
The Model I has a simple finder that lacks a built-in rangefinder, the camera I purchased has a small finder that mounts in the shoe on the top which in practice is pretty easy to use- you just transfer the distance to the lens.

The Lens is a Vaskar F4,5 which is a triplet design, some cameras came with the Skopar F3,5 which is a Tessar type which probably gives better performance optically.
To open the camera just press the button near the wind knob (pictured below) and pull the drawbridge until the mechanism clicks.

Loading the film is pretty easy just place it in the cradle and pull the backing paper to the spool on the left, turn the wind knob and close the back.
The back has two windows, the right hand being the 6x9 and left one for 6x4.5. A centre knurled disc operates a guard which should be closed to stop stray light and has an 'x' to show it is closed it should be kept closed unless you are advancing the film.
The Bessa appears to have a neat anti double exposure device which makes it impossible to fire the shutter without winding. After winding the shutter needs to be manually cocked with a lever before you can take a picture.
So how does the camera fare in a real shooting situation? Although much slower in operation than the Bessa II (coupled RF version) or indeed most SLR cameras it can be used quite quickly set to either the hyperfocal distance or even infinity and stopped down to F11 in practice its just wind and cock shutter then shoot.
The following is a shot just set at infinity 1/250 at F11

Vaskar lens at F11 Fuji Neopan 400 in Rodinal 1:100

A 100% crop of the frame showing the impressive sharpness of the 3 element Vaskar

I must say I was surprised by how good the Bessa is, the three element Vaskar is a good picture taker, and although the camera is slow in operation compared to modern cameras once you get a shooting routine things are relatively straight forward.

All of which is nice but why bother using one in this century? After all bellows cameras belong to the same era as Bakelite radios, Flash Gordon and the Great Depression why should a modern photographer bother?

The best answer I can give is the biggest advantage of folding cameras is that when folded they are relatively small for their negative size and can be stored in coat pockets or shoulder bags or placed in a car glove-box for that 'unmissable' travel shot.

Below is an illustration of the size of the camera when folded in my smallish hand.

So in all I find the Bessa a far more practical camera than say my Fuji 6x7 RF despite its age and if you can find one with bellows that are in a reasonable condition it should give years of service.

One last shot on Fuji 160:

It could be that the folding camera is due for a comeback? In 2008 Voigtländer introduced the Bessa III retro?- you bet, but also a lot more practical that you'd think.

Words and Pictures © Mark Antony Smith

Kodachrome: A celebration of a legend

2009-06-24T08:23:00.025Z

Kodachrome was born in 1935 the product of two musicians Leopold Godowsky and Leopold Mannes giving the phrase to Kodak employees 'Kodachrome made by God and Man'

Initially for 16mm movies with 35mm Stills following a year later. The film was the first really easy to use (no filters or glass plates) colour film which made it popular with serious amateurs and professionals especially with the then relatively new Leica cameras.

But the main reason for its success was its wonderful colours. Here courtesy of Simon97 are some images made before the second world war at the world fair in 1939:

Most peoples vision of the 1930's is a dull grey these wonderful images show otherwise rich bright colours and tones that would become part of the post war portrayal of the American dream

Kodachrome in the 1930's was expensive; the equivalent of about $50 per roll in todays money which meant that it was used mainly by enthusiasts for important subjects like weddings, travels abroad and family occasions.

Over the next few years the film cemented its position as the number one colour film also being used by National Geographic to bring the colourful Kodachrome world right into the homes of ordinary Americans and people worldwide.

During the 1950's and 60's Kodachrome was at its peak in popularity, used to record many of histories defining moments; The conquering of Everest, Kennedy's assassination (16mm cine film) pictures of stars like Marilyn Monroe and Brigitte Bardot- Kodachrome was the colour of the 1950's and 60's.

During the 1960's the speed of the film was increased with the introduction of Kodachrome II the film became much easier to use for the average enthusiast 'snapper' of everyday family life, a Super 8 cine film was introduced at the same time.

By the late 1970's early 1980's people started to move away from slides and slide shows to the easier and faster colour print films for documenting family holidays; 1 hour mini-labs were starting to become common and professionals started using E-6 films like Ektachrome and Fujichrome.

As we moved into the 1990's Kodachrome had fallen out of favour, faster versions like the 200 ASA version and the introduction of 120 roll film versions aimed at professionals couldn't stem the tide and by 1998 Kodak started to close some Kodachrome labs and centralize their operations. Ten years later there was only one lab left to process the film and just a single speed in Kodaks product portfolio KR64.

The ultimate demise of Kodachrome was inevitable and started long ago, as a photographer I can only thank Kodak for keeping it going so long as I've been able to document my own children's early lives with a medium that has a proven longevity. I personally would have liked to see a '75 year birthday' but I expect Kodak are putting all their available efforts into the new modern 2 electron films they have recently introduced.

The end of an era, but I've a feeling that those slides will outlive most people reading this.

Kodachrome: born 1935 -expired 2009 aged 74 after a long and productive life. It leaves a treasure trove of social history and has touched the lives of millions of people worldwide.

All images and text © Mark Antony Smith 2009

Found Negatives

2009-06-23T22:10:00.011Z

After some thought I think the above is the correct way round and the image below is reversed, I can't find a city hall in Lancashire that looks like this, possibly it's another municipal building.
During my little jaunts I sometimes come across interesting photographic items. Recently while at a car boot I found some old negatives lying among a pile of old cameras. They were 127 Kodak Verichrome Pan negs

They look to have been taken sometime in the early-mid 1960's and I think they were taken in a northern English city posibly Manchester or Liverpool, I really like the young lady holding her hand over her face-she has a mischievous look about her.
I think the woman on the far left is the relative/girlfriend of the photographer as she shows up in the next frame

Who knows where this frame is, but its certainly not a northern English town.

Lovely shots, when I find photos like this I often wonder what happened to the people

Kodak 'Retires' Kodachrome

2009-06-22T12:00:00.007Z

Some sad news today, after 74 years of production Kodak will be retiring their iconic Kodachrome film:

The Kodak announcement

I'm not sure why it is that Kodak have chosen to end the film after 74.5 years thus missing a golden opportunity for a 75 year publicity of the bringing of colour film to the masses.

Surely delaying the announcement and having a 'Happy Birthday Kodachrome' year in which they could run competitions, have online galleries - a celebration of their achievements. They could have then deleted it at the end of the year letting the film go with a bang rather than just fading away in a very un-Kodachrome manner.

I feel its unfortunate that they have deleted it just six months short of the 75th birthday. I guess Kodak had to decide on whether there was going to be a new coating, stocks having dwindled in their supply chain and they now feel that they are going to concentrate on their newer technology films like Ektar 100.

Kodak have a tribute on their blog A Thousand Words

My Tribute will follow....

Early Colour Processes: Autochrome

2009-04-28T11:32:00.025Z

In a previous post I have explored the early colour methods using RGB filters to make colour images.
In this post we'll be looking at the first commercially viable colour process- Autochrome.

Autochrome was the first generally available process for colour photography and was invented by the brothers Auguste and Louis Lumiere and was first commercially marketed in 1907.
The plates were made by mixing potato starch grains which were dyed three colours red/orange, green and blue violet. These were then coated onto a glass plate with the gaps filled by 'lamp black' a type of graphite, they were then sealed with a varnish after which a orthochromatic monochrome emulsion was added.

You can see from the image above the emulsion 'relief' on the reverse side of the plate. the following image shows the plate just held up to the sky.

The image is actually quite dense, when originally shot a slide like the one above shot indoors may have taken several miniutes to expose, even outdoor shots in sunlight may have taken a few seconds.
The colours are wonderful though, to think this slide is one hundred years old this technology must have been fantastic at the time.

Above is a close-up view of the grain structure which has been described by some as pointillist, but I quite like it- Autochomes certainly have a unique look!
The slide in this post was bought on ebay for a few pounds and is a lovely slice of photographic history. The original may have shifted slightly in colour or the orange-red look may have been characteristic of the slide at the time of development.
I have attempted to 'correct' the following image using the wonders of modern technology, not sure if I like it any better...

One thing is for sure Autochrome was a wonderful process.

Phenix DN60

2009-04-16T22:16:00.003Z

It isn't everyday that a new film camera is announced, so here is the latest in a dwindling breed.

The Phenix DN60 which boasts specifications of a mechanical shutter with a top shutter speed of 1/2000 sec and 1/125 flash sync and film speed of up to 3200 ISO.

It has the Nikon F mount so can use most Nikon lenses, it also has depth of field preview and what looks to be from the photo at least, fairly good construction with a metal top plate and lens mount all for £190.

I had never heard of Phenix but apparently they are the biggest manual camera maker in the Far East more detail here at their importers First Call Photographic

Kodak Ektar 100

2009-03-28T13:28:00.014Z

Kodak Ektar 100 according to Kodak: Featuring ISO 100 speed, high saturation and ultra-vivid color, EKTAR 100 offers the finest, smoothest grain of any color negative film available today.
Quite a boast, how does it achieve this speed/finest grain?
The answer is it borrows a technology from Kodaks Vision movie film stock called "2 electron sensitisation" This doesn't mean that it is just a re-packaged movie film far from it. Kodak has been working on the problems associated with the Vision line like poor keeping qualities and more efficient chemical scavengers in order to make the technology suitable for stills use.

What is 2 electron sensitisation?
Here is how the development team explain it:
"Here we describe a new concept for increasing the efficiency of photographic systems, two-electron sensitization, which makes use of the chemical potential stored in the oxidized dyes. In conventional photography, subsequent reactions of the oxidized dyes are not controlled and may in fact include counterproductive return electron transfer reactions (recombination). In the two-electron sensitization scheme, an appropriately designed electron donor molecule, X−Y, that is added to the photographic dispersion transfers an electron to the oxidized dye to give a radical cation, X−Y•+. The X−Y•+ then undergoes a fragmentation reaction to give a radical, X•, and a stable cation, Y+. The radical X• is chosen to be sufficiently reducing so that it can inject an electron into the silver halide conduction band. In this way, the oxidised dye, which is a strong oxidant, is replaced by the radical, X•, which is a strong reductant. The two-electron transfer scheme has the potential of doubling the photographic speed because two electrons are injected per absorbed photon. Photographic data demonstrate that increases in sensitivity by factors approaching 2 can be obtained.".

Phew! so what does that mean for your photography? Simply put the film should have finer grain and slightly higher sensitivity than films without the 2 electron method.

Photographic tests
The following four images were taken mid afternoon, the top chart is in part shadow the bottom is in almost full sun.
Four photographs were taken in quick succession, the meter reading was taken from a grey card placed in the centre and a Minolta spotmeter F was used to find the correct exposure.

The film was taken to a local chemist and put through their 1 hr Fuji minilab. If you want a larger image just left click the pictures.
As you can see each image has a white paper in it with the respective exposures N (meter setting 100ISO) +1 with the lens opened 1 stop, -1 lens stopped down from normal by 1 stop, and -2 which was stopped down 2 stops from the normal frame.

At first glance an impressive result, the spread between +1/-2 is quite acceptable for normal photography if you have a simple camera without meter or use sunny 16 'guess' exposure method this film should give you enough latitude.
Looking at both the negatives and minilab prints along with the scans it is noticeable that at the -2 setting the shadow detail is beginning to block up, if you look in the shadows of the vine under the top chart texture and detail is not as well defined as in the N frame.
At the other end of the scale the +1 frame looks very good so good that I wish I'd taken a +2 frame as well.

I have read many suggestions that this film should be rated at a lower speed than 100, in my experience that has not proved to be the case. I think it would be best to work at box speed initially and do your own tests with cameras and the conditions you use to find your own personal speed index.

Colours are quite saturated especially in the red and blue parts of the spectrum, but somehow seem to give good skin tones, quite a difficult thing for emulsion engineers to achieve or so I'm told.
The following image was taken on a very dull day in winter.

The above scene is the sort of thing Ektar excels at, giving nice 'punchy' colours without overcooking, the magenta bike is pretty accurate as is the shade of pink in the girls boots.

Grain is very fine especially for a colour negative, I have printed a couple of shots to 8x12 inches with no apparent grain, when I get the chance I'll try to print one larger optically to see how far the grain holds up.
The 2 electron sensitisation really gives fine grain, I'll bet we see it introduced into a few more films before too long- Ektar 400 and 1600 would be nice!
Here is a final shot of a garden landscape the colours are pretty accurate as this was taken on a bright cloudless day, the sunlight in the UK can be pretty yellow and the shadows long on sunny winter days.

I have now used 5 rolls of Ektar and can say Kodak have a winner on their hands here, since I started to write this they have announced that Ektar 100 will now be available in 120 format which personally I use much more than 35mm.
I think Kodak have shown with this film (and the updated T-Max) that they are committed to providing film users with high quality materials- film is not dead!

© Text and images Mark Antony Smith 2009

Filmwasters

2009-03-20T10:33:00.005Z

Here is a link to a site called Filmwasters.com The site was formed by five like minded individuals. Here is a quote from their about us page:
"This site is dedicated to showcasing and promoting the creative side of film-based photography. It is a 100% independent operation designed, managed and financed by 5 friends and it is our likes, dislikes, enthusiasms, prejudices, limitations and energy that will inform its make-up"
It has a forum, a guest gallery and a podcast.
take a look.

Sad News: Franke and Heidecke file for insolvency

2009-03-03T09:57:00.007Z

According to sources on the internet (though no statement appears on their website yet) Franke and Heidecke GmbH have filed for insolvency.
Founded in 1920 by Paul Francke and Reinhold Heidecke, they are famous for the production of the Rolleiflex camera which was introduced in 1928.
Recently the company has introduced (along with Sinar and Leaf) a digital medium format system called the Rolleiflex Hy6 which used their 6000 series lenses.
I have always enjoyed using Rollei cameras especially the Rolleiflex which is probably my favourite camera, and find it sad news indeed especially as the Rollei TLR has just celebrated its 80th birthday.
I guess film TLRs and a niche MF market along with the current financial crisis means the majority shareholders no longer feel they can pump the millions needed to keep Rollei alive (I think they have already put millions of Euro into the company infrastructure).
I wish the majority shareholder and the Rollei employees well and hope that the situation is resolved soon.

How it works: Kodachrome

2008-12-12T19:16:00.001Z

The film structure

Kodachrome is a non substantive emulsion which basically means it has no built in colour couplers, it at time of exposure is effectively a monochrome film.
The following description is a simplified explanation of the emulsion structure, the actual engineering is slightly more complex.
The film basically consists of four separate coatings which are all monochrome.
The top coating (nearest the lens) is a blue sensitive emulsion, similar in spectral sensitivity to the types made around the turn of the last century in other words it is 'blind' to the green and red parts of the visible spectrum.
Under the blue sensitive coating is a yellow filter, which has a crucial role to play in the function of the emulsion.

The next layer is a blue/green sensitive coating, with a sensitivity rather like an othochromatic mono film, but because of the yellow filter above it in the stack only the green part of the spectrum is recorded.

The last layer is one with an extended red sensitivity, with a trough in the green part of the spectrum rising in the blue wavelength (which is again filtered)

Our Kodachrome film is a complex mix of different spectral sensitive materials and filters, that crucially must have similar photographic speeds or else the resulting images will have colour casts.

When the film is exposed the images are formed in the separate layers (effective RGB) but in order to give a colour positive image these need a special process that has to be both complex and accurate, in fact at time of writing there is only one such laboratory in the world, Dwayne's of Kansas USA and all Kodachrome whever shot in the world goes to this one Lab.

The Kodachrome Process
The following is a simplified version of the process, with some of the washes, intermediate baths and stabilisers omitted.
The first bath is an alkaline wash to convert the 'rem-jet' anti-halation backing into a water soluble form, which is then removed in the pre developer wash.
The first developer is a standard Phenidone hydroquinone B&W developer which gives a monochromatic negative image in each of the layers, after which the film is fogged by red light through the base (bottom of the stack) making the bottom red sensitive coating developable.
Next comes a cyan developer which fully develops the red layer the oxidised colour developer combines with a cyan coupler to form a positive cyan dye image.

The cyan developer bath of a Kodachrome processor

The film is then exposed to a blue light (through the top of the stack) which because of the yellow filter only fogs the blue sensitive layer, the film now goes through a yellow developer which fully develops that emulsion and the oxidised developer and yellow couplers form a yellow dye image.
All that is left now is the green layer which being sandwiched between the integral yellow filter and the already developed red layer is hard to fog with light, so is chemically fogged in a reversal/magenta colour developer which forms a magenta dye image.
Next the yellow filter is then removed.
After the above has taken place all the silver has been fully developed so can be conventionally conditioned, bleached, fixed washed and dried in the normal manner.

© Text Mark Antony Smith

Fuji Neopan 400

2008-12-04T08:39:00.003Z

Fuji Neopan 400 is a film I've always liked, but somehow seems for me at least to have been a third choice after Tri-X and HP5.
Thats not to say it is inferior to either of those emulsions, far from it! Everytime I've put a roll through I've been impressed by its grain structure and tonal graduation.
I first used the emulsion in the 1980's and one of the things I noticed was the clear base and high accutance which are quite unusual for a fast film.
The characterisics of this film are fine grain for the speed, more so than HP5 or Tri-x and rated at EI 200 and given reduced development gives very fine grain and long tonal range (without the flat look other films can give)
Compared to HP5 the tones look a little harder and more defined against the smooth 'creamy' look of the Ilford emulsion. This gives a more modern look siuted to dynamic subjects in low light, saying that it's not bad with portraits either...

Leica M4-P, Elmar F2,8 Fuji Neopan 400 rated at 400 developed in Rodinal

Over the last few weeks I've been using it as my film of choice in my Medium format cameras, and in that format the film is hard to beat, and gives a really fine grain and nice tonal range with good shadow detail.

The Artist Zacron, Rolleiflex T, Fuji Neopan 120 rated at 400 developed in Rodinal for 11 mins

Neopan is a very fine grained film for a 400 ISO, so much so that even with 35mm developed in Rodinal is quite satisfactory although you may prefer smaller formats in a developer like ID11/D76, in 120 grain and tone with Rodinal is wonderful.

I feel that this film has a unique look, kind of a 'steely sharpness' coupled with fine grain and at least in my country very reasonable price making it a bit of a photographic bargain.

© Text and Pictures Mark Antony Smith

"If cows didn't like mustard we couldn't go to the movies"

2008-11-19T23:34:00.008Z

The above quote is from C.E.K Mees the great 20th Century film emulsion expert, a fascinating man (how many people have a crater on the moon named after them?). Apparently Dr. Mees noted that gelatin made from cows that ate hot tasting plants yielded better quality gelatin which gave the films a higher sensitivity.

Dr Mees wrote "The Theory of the Photographic Process" which I'm currently reading, you can read about him here: Kenneth Mees Wiki.

If you are interested you can make your own emulsions from advice here on APUG

The articles are written by Ron Mowrey a photographic engineer who worked at Kodak for over 32 years.

Here are some emulsion noodles (mmm nooodles)

© Mark Antony Smith

The Great War in Colour

2008-11-08T13:32:00.012Z

Like most people my overriding image of the first war is black and white, a war fought in shades of grey. These pictures are shot on a early colour film called 'Autochrome' when I first saw the pictures of the French soldiers above I was amazed that they fought in beautiful light blue uniforms I'd previously imagined that they would be grey.

Building bridges in no mans land.

I love this image, just beautiful. I call it a centime for your thoughts.

Autochrome was the first commercial colour process, patented in 1906 by the brothers Auguste and Louis Lumière. The process was an ingenious one, using potato starch grains dyed different colours coated very thinly on a panchromatic mono emulsion here is the Wikipedia description of the material and its process.

Beautiful images of a very turbulent time in European history, this post is made on remembrance day 90 years after the end of the war in which these photo's were taken.

Spare a thought for the sacrifice made, by men and women from all sides.

Found Film: ILFORD HP4

2008-11-02T23:14:00.010Z

Ilford HP4 was introduced in 1965 as a replacement for their HP3 emulsion, although the two were available concurrently until 1969 when the earlier emulsion was phased out. HP4 was rated nominally at 400 ASA when processed in ID11 and 650 when developed in Microphen and was priced at 4/6 (23p). The emulsion was replaced in 1976 by HP5.
This film was given to me for processing by Phillip of Phillips cameras on Fye Bridge in Norwich, who has been the source of a few previous 'found film' posts.
Adox found film
Kodak Tri-x

I made the decision to process the film in Rodinal at 1:25 at 20c for 7 mins with 2 inversions per min agitation. No pre-wet was used and fixing was for 5 mins in Ilford fixer.
The film showed a fair amount of base fog which is normal, along with a mottled effect probably due to dampness.
There is only one image on the film:

Immediately after this shot is a large over-exposed frame, my guess is this was a camera test and after exposing the first frame the shutter 'stuck' and this roll was shoved in a draw for 30+ years until passed on to me.
Not a great find, but some of the info may be useful for others finding old rolls of HP4

Words and Images © Mark Antony Smith

Clumps and Chumps (or why film isn't binary)

2008-10-20T16:35:00.023Z

There has been much talk on the internet about how many pixels it takes to out resolve film, the answer is 'it depends'
Many 'experts' have put their point of view across, some are disastrously wrong, certainly on a factual level.
here is one such assertion from Michael Reichmann:
Clumps and Chumps

"A very fine-grain film has grain particles that are about 2 microns in size. A typical DSLR has individual pixels that are about 6 microns in size. Ergo, film should outresolve digital. Right?
Not so fast! Here's the catch that many testers trip over. Grain particles are binary. An individual film grain can only be either black or not-black, on or off, exposed or not exposed. Sort of a binary device. A photo site (pixel), on the other hand, has a range of thousands of brightness levels, because it's an analog device. (Curious isn't it, that at this level film is binary and digital is analog?)
What this means is that it takes a clump of between 30-40 grains of film to represent a full tonal range, (similar in concept to the dithering done by inkjet printers to produce continious tones), while on a sensor each individual pixel can reproduce from hundreds to thousands of tonal levels."

Now for some facts.
Film emulsions are generally Ag/Br/I atoms combined into crystals from about 1 - 10 microns in size which are stacked in layers and dispersed randomly throughout the emulsion. They contain millions of atoms and many sensitivity specks which consist of sulfur and gold.
When film develops, it can form anywhere from 3 silver metal atoms minimum up to the entire grain, and grains can be stacked, and therefore the dynamic range of density is analogue in nature and virtually infinite. For practical purposes, it ranges from 0.1 - 3.0 density units in a normal negative B&W film.
Still need convincing?
Here's what's wrong with Michael Reichmanns essay.
Film grains are not binary, not even close they actually are made up of millions of silver particles that when looked at closely resemble a wire wool pad, the more photons of light that strike the grain the denser the filamentary structure becomes and the amount of light passed by that structure varies, the structure also develops randomly.

How Film Works:
Before exposure the structure of each grain consists of Ag+Br (silver bromide) atoms and sensitivity specs (sulphur and gold) the Ag atoms are positively charged (missing an electron) which is how they are bonded to the bromide atom.
When a photon of light strikes the silver atom they lose their positive charge and separate from the bromide atom, they are now silver ions and move (within the grain) towards the sulphur 'sensitivity' specks to form a filamentary structure, the more silver ions the denser the structure.
During development these structures are converted into metallic silver which is black, the bromide atoms are absorbed into the developer, fixing removes the silver atoms that weren't struck by any photons, leaving that part of the grain clear.
Here is an image (45,000x magnification) clearly showing the filaments and 'wire wool' like structure of the developed grain:

The image above pretty much nails the lie that film is binary or as Michael Reichmann put it:-
'An individual film grain can only be either black or not-black, on or off, exposed or not exposed'.

The film grain in the above picture shows that grain can be both black and clear at the same time as well as each filament differing in density, filamentary in varying degrees, letting different amounts of light pass though the grains themselves, being stacked up to 10 layers deep to give different tones.

Hardly the description of something that can have only 2 states, as would be the case if they were binary.

In his book 'The Fundamentals of Photography' C.E.K Mees states:
"Any silver deposit in the negative will let through a certain proportion of the light which falls upon it. A very light deposit may let through half the light, a dense deposit one-tenth, a very dense deposit one-hundredth or even
only one- thousandth".
I think Mr Reichmannn has made the common mistake of confusing the silver atoms that move towards the sensitivity specs with the grains themselves, coupled with not realizing that those grains are not opaque that and according to all the text books even the darkest grain will pass some light.
An easy mistake to make, I just wish his post was less 'pithy' especially considering his quite considerable errors, but I'll give him the benefit of the doubt and suggest a little research.
Here is a list of the books and references I have used for this article:

The Theory of the Photographic Process– C.E.K Mees and T.H James

The Fundamentals of Photography C.E.K Mees

The Science of Photography– H. Baines
Kodak Technical Document H1
Advice and help from Kodak research Europe (many thanks guys)
Information and help with writing this article Ron Mowrey

Here's a link to a paper by Nestor Rodriguez (Senior Technical Associate at Eastman Kodak):
Color 35mm film questions
Quote:
Q: What are the main differences between the way images are recorded on film and digital, aside from resolution?

A: "Film is analog, like the human eye. It sees and records continuous tonal gradations between black and white.

Edit: I have been asked to mention by a photographic engineer that the clumps and chumps article focuses on monochome film in order to make a more 'black and white' argument. It needs to be stressed colour film works in a similar way to mono initially but has a least three colour records, with the grains in each record being removed leaving a dye cloud which varies in size and density depending on the amount of photons that hit the parent grain. So in colour film grains(or rather dye clouds) vary in density (as in mono film) and also colour depending on the record they are contained in, not something that fits the 'on/off switch mentality of the 'clumps' argument

Ctein Dye Transfer Print Sale

2008-10-10T09:06:00.012Z

Above are two works for sale by Ctein one of the finest Dye Transfer print makers in the world, if you want to see high res versions please click on the images.
For those of you who don't know Ctein or his work here is an explanation:
Ctein who am ?
Dye transfer is a process that delivers the best colour fidelity and longevity of any material available today, the depth of colour and the range of colours it can display are unmatched by any other process, Cibachrome, pigment ink-jet and even silver Fiber based B&W can't match a DT for depth.
The big downside is that it is a very time consuming process, expensive and difficult, there are very few people who make DT prints worldwide and Ctein is one of the best, so an offer to own a high quality print from one of the best exponents of the art at an incredible price (I can't believe he is making anything on these) is something not to be passed up.

You can find out how to get your Ctein print on Mike Johnsons blog (The online Photographer)
Ctein print sale on the Online Photographer blog

The offer is for a limited time, and runs out on October the 19th, so get them while you can....
The offer has now ended, and was very successful Ctein will now be busy printing...
Images © Ctein text Mark Antony Smith

Pushing The Envelope

2008-08-11T09:20:00.000Z

In a recent post I looked at Ilford Delta 3200, and was especially impressed with the emulsion in its 120 roll film format.

One of the biggest problems with pushing film is that the rule of thumb is the more you push the higher the contrast. Of course developer choice is critical but all films have their limits, especially if you need a long tonal scale or reasonable grain.

I've found that Ilford Delta has probably the best tonal range of any super fast film (over 1000 ISO) I've tried, so how far can I push it before picture quality is compromised?

Over the past months I've been using quite a bit of Delta, first off at 3200, and after being impressed by the tonal scale I've then progressively racked up the speed; these shots are rated at EI 12,800

These images were taken in pretty dark conditions, so much so I had little confidence and only shot one roll (oh ye of little faith)
Average shutter speeds were 1/15 wide open at F3,5 the film was then developed for 18 mins in Ilford Microphen a speed increasing developer.
Undeterred and impressed so far I decided to go all out to 25,000 EI, the following shot had the this lighting set-up.
A 15" laptop on the ebay.com homepage was paced on a table at waist level 1m (3ft) from the face, the room was totally dark. This should give you a rough idea how little light i had to play with.
My spotmeter reading from the lighter side of the face suggested 1/15 f3,5 (adjusting for EI 25,000 as my lightmeter only goes to 6400) so I decided to set 1/8 wide open to set the highlight on the face on zone VI.

Obviously an extreme case with little or no shadow detail, grain and contrast seem to have help up pretty well - all things considered.

The image above is of a 'rood screen' in a Norfolk church, although quite dull inside the church the window in the background and the detail in the screen are easily discernible something that is hard to do with extreme pushing which tends to increase contrast.
The film base had a much higher level of density (base fog) than normal with a slight blue tinge, but hardly surprising given the 25 min development time.
My conclusion about this film is that it is a wonderful tool to have in the film photographers camera bag, exposed and developed with care can give astonishing results.
The best quality will be obtained by using a speed increasing developer like DDX or Microphen.

© All images and text Mark Smith

Rolleinar Close up Lenses

2008-07-16T14:38:00.017Z

When I sent in my Rolleiflex for its service to Brian Mickleboro, I had a chat to him about my use of the camera. I said my only criticism is that I'd like it to focus a little closer, Brian suggested I try a Rolleinar close up lens.
Brian explained-Rolleinars come in three versions 1 for head and shoulders, 2 for close crop of head shots and 3 which is for very close up subjects like flowers etc.
Here's what they look like on the camera:

Rolleinars normally come as a set of two the thinner being the taking lens, i say normally because earlier versions are 'three piece' with two identical diopters that are interchangeable and a wider parallax lens that can be paired with either of the thinner lenses.
The wider of the two lenses goes on the top (viewing) lens and it is important that the red spot faces upright for parallax correction:

Performance:
I know what you're thinking, putting extra glass in front of the lens is a bad idea for the quality minded photographer right?
Not with these little wonders it isn't.
So what of the performance? Well to sum it up these close up lenses work very well, surprisingly well would be an understatement.
Here is a close up of my daughter shot at 1/60 F5,6 on Adox CHS 50 ART (EFKE KB17) with a Rolleinar 1

The 100% crop

I'd say that for the money (I paid £10 for the Rolleinar 1) that every Rolleiflex/Cord owner should have one in their camera bag, the performance of the lenses is very good indeed and makes them a 'must have' accessory.

© All text and images Mark Antony Smith 2008

Rolleiflex T

2008-06-23T22:07:00.022Z

The Rolleiflex T was originally designed to fit between the budget Rolleicord and the Rolleiflex F models.
The 'T' designation is understood to stand for Tessar as the camera is fitted with the cheaper 4 element lens often found on Rolleicords rather than the Zeiss Planar or Schneider Xenotar found on the 'F' models.
Some say the T really stands for (T)heodor after its designer Theodor Uhl whose sevices were apparently dispensed with after the bean counters at Rollei saw his handiwork.
That didn't stop the camera becoming a success with a production timeframe of 1958-76 and about 127,250 units being made.
My version of the camera comes in grey leather and judging by the serial number was produced in the early 1960's as a rule of thumb most grey cameras are early (pre 1966) a majority of T's are black.
A list of serial numbers can be found here
should you wish to date your Rollei.

The picture above shows the easiest way to tell the T model from a distance, it is the only Rollei with the shutter button on the side.
Even though the camera is positioned between the budget 'cord and the pro 'flex it certainly has more of the Flex's 'genes'
I've often seen people give the advice to get a Rolleicord over the T as the lenses are pretty much equal and the cords are cheaper, I'd advise that prospective purchasers should get a T as they are much better in daily use.
Below is one of the main reasons I prefer the T to my Rolleicord

The view above graphically illustrates how much brighter the T is compared to a similar aged Rolleicord, no doubt later Cords have better screens but I've always found them duller and slower to focus.
The Tessar lens is a design classic, less elements than the Planar and by some accounts not as sharp at the edges, but for the Portrait type work that TLR's excel it is a wonderful lens.

Both of the above images were taken within minutes of ripping open the box, they were taken on Neopan 400 with guessed exposures.

Edit:

I've had the camera and just love it if you are teetering on the brink of buying a Rollei just do it!

I recently saw this quote on a Photo forum:

"Get a Rollei. Life is to short to have spent it with photography without a Rollei".

©Text and Images Mark Antony Smith 2008

Cheap Photography (Nikkormat FT2)

2008-06-23T09:12:00.003Z

Recently I chanced to come across a Nikorrmat FT2 for £25 .
The camera was made in the mid 1970's a time where mechanical cameras were the norm, most being assembled and tested by hand.
Looking at the camera it seems to have been hewn from on solid lump of steel, it has hard un-egonomic (by todays standards) edges that give it a very rugged purposeful look.
In the hands it feels very solid, and has the precision instrument feel of a very expensive hand made mechanical device, and feels remarkably comfortable in the hands.

The shutter sounds absolutely wonderful, noisier than a Leica (just) but has just about the most positive feeling release of any manual camera I've used. The design of the shutter is a Copal square with metal blades and speeds 1-1/1000 + B, flash sync is 1/125.

The speeds are located round the throat of the lens mount á la OM1 which takes a little getting used to if your previous camera had the speeds on the top plate.

The top plate has a minimalist feel without the speed dial. The control from right to left: wind-on lever (also switches on the meter) frame counter and stop down button.

To the left of the prism is a match needle meter which I'd imagine might be useful for macro work or street shooting.

Next to the meter is the serial number and the re-wind crank is in the normal position.

On very welcome feature of this model is the mirror lock up situated to the left of the lens mount, to the right is the mechanical self timer which seems to take around ten seconds, maybe slightly less.

Mounted on the camera is a 50mm F2 Nikkor H, which seems to slightly pre-date the camera but nonetheless is a very capable performer with very sharp good contrast, flare free images.

One problem with this model is that over time the meter seems to either become erratic or stop working, I'm told there is a resistor that needs cleaning or replacing.

The camera I purchased seems to have a non operational meter, which doesn't worry me as I'm used to using a spot meter with most of my film cameras.

Overall the camera is a joy to use, and as these cameras seem to be going for very little money this is a chance to buy something of real quality for pennies.

Like I stated in a previous post, if I could write a note to my younger self about to embark on the start of my photographic odyssey it would be get this camera, and a Rollei TLR.

finally a couple of pictures with the 50mm F2 H

Kodak gold 200

© Mark Antony Smith 2008

55mm F3,5 Micro Nikkor

2008-05-27T19:12:00.012Z

If I could give a note of advice to my 14 year old self about to embark on buying my first camera, it would be buy a Nikkormat. The lens I'd pair it with would be the 55mm Micro Nikkor, sure the lens is slower than the average standard and a little larger than most but its versatility is pretty much unmatched.
At infinity the Micro Nikkor holds its own against any 50mm especially at apertures F5.6-11 but the amazing trick is the close focus, most 50mm lenses focus down to about 45-50cm the Nikkor seem to keep going and going right down to 24cm at which point it delivers a 0.5x magnification (it needs a extension tube to reach 1:1)

For me this makes the lens very useful, in fact it stays attached to the camera 80% of the time and has replaced the 50mm HC as my main lens which is no mean feat, it really is that good.

Another feature of the Macro is the deep set front element making it very flare resistant, no need for a lens hood here!

Very nearly the perfect lens for most uses, its only limitation is the small maximum aperture which can also mean harder to focus under dull conditions and it also rules the optic out for low light work.

Above is an illustration of the length of the barrel at infinity and minimum focus.

Conclusion:
This lens is pretty much a must have for any Nikon manual focus user, if you have a camera that needs AI then the later 55mm F2,8 micro is just as good.
It can replace the standard 50mm F1.4-2 for pretty much everything but low light shooting, at infinity it's as good as my 50mm F2 H•C (and that's very good)

The ability to get down to half life size is something after using this lens for just a week that I can't do without.

I found this well used example for £40 at those prices all I can say is– Get one!

Here is a shot at F5,6 at the close focus.

Film Is Not Dead....

2008-05-19T20:17:00.005Z

I've stumbled on this site I'd like to share with anyone who hasn't seen it.
It called Film is not dead it just smells funny They have a good selection of analogue photographers and display some quite lovely work.
Here is what they say about their site.

"A place for photographers who are NOT using a digital camera.
With this web site we are trying to give analogue photographers a place to show their work to the world.
We do not hate digital photography , for our daily work we use it all the time.
But after using digital for a few years we are slowly going back to analogue.
There is more life in it, it’s more vibrant, not flat not “dead”. And the process of using film is so interesting, challenging and rewarding.
So let this be a showcase for photographers who think that “ Film is not dead it just smells funny"

I hope you enjoy their site, its good to know there's a few others out there who are gradually going back to film....
N.B
After a short time dead the link should now work the site seems to be called the International Analogue Photographic Society (Film is not dead it just smells funny)
Enjoy

Developing your first B&W film

2008-05-15T14:15:00.006Z

Developing your first film may seem a daunting task, but if you follow this simple 'how to' guide the mysteries of the photographic alchemy will soon be striped away.
Question one: What equipment do I need?

Well actually surprisingly little, here is a list with essential items in Italics:

A daylight developing tank with spiral
A thermometer
A liquid measure (1 litre)
Developer
Fixer
A child's medicine syringe (5-10ml)
Stop bath
Wetting Agent
Film weights
Dark Changing Bag

Rap on Equipment Choice
There are many types of developing tank, some prefer steel, some plastic, I'll give you the name of the one I use: – Patterson
I think they make a good product with easy to load spirals, I would recommend buying a tank that holds a 120 rollfilm as even if you don't own a MF camera you can process two 35mm in one go.

Rap on Developer Choice
Just about everyone has their favourite 'brew' but I recommend until you get on your feet a simple just add water, use and discard (one shot) developer, good starter developers include:

Agfa Rodinal
Ilford Ilfosol S
Patterson Aculux

These developers come as liquids ready for dilution and use, once you have developed your film they are disposed of.
This type of developer is in my opinion the easiest for the first timer, as it is a mix it use and dispose.
It will also be helpful to start with the manufactures time and agitation, if you can't find a time for your developer/film combo try the Massive Dev Chart

Tightwad alert
You'll notice above that some items are considered essential (italicised) and others are actually not considered needed to get you there.
Stop bath, although desirable can be substituted with water, wetting agent with normal washing up liquid, weights with wooden clothes pegs, and the dark bag can be dispensed with by using a cupboard or wardrobe at night with the lights out. My first film was loaded in the cupboard under the stairs, with a coat placed at the bottom of the door to cut out the light.

I have all the stuff, what do I do with it?
First do a dry run, practice loading a blank film firstly in daylight, then in your dark area – is advisable to sit in your dark area for 5 mins before loading as it must be completely dark! Your eyes should not see anything, not even your hand in front of your face!

Tip: During re-wind try to leave out your film leader so you can cut off the tongue (save it for tip2) then feed the first 4 inches or so into the reel in daylight-see image below:

Once you feel confident you can load your film into your tank in total darkness. After the film has been loaded the rest of the process is in the light:- Yeah

Prepare your chemicals according to the instructions, use the thermometer to make sure the developer is at the correct temperature normally 20°c, (68F) stop bath and fixer should be approximately the same temperature as the developer.

Pour in the developer slowly making a note of the time (a second hand on a watch is good for this), initial agitation is normally continuous 30 seconds or so depending on developer, then give the tank three sharp taps on your work surface.
It is good practice to keep a tally of the time passed, and remember to keep the agitation consistent and not too vigorous as consistency is key in the world of processing.
Once you have nearly finished development get ready to pour out the chemical about 15 seconds before the final developer time, and pour out slowly.
Next step is to pour in the stop bath, or if you're like me plain water as I only use stop bath if the dev time is less than 5 mins.
After rinse/stop pour out carefully and now pour in the fixer.
Fixing time for most films in fresh solution is quite short say 2-3 mins T-Max type films need a little longer and come out pinkish if under fixed.
Tip2:
If you use 35mm film use the tongue that you cut off prior to loading the film, put it in a small beaker of fix, take the time it takes to clear and double it, that will give you a total fixing time for your film.
Once you have fixed your film pour the liquid back into the container and leave the tank under running water for at least 10 mins, if possible empty the water and agitate to help wash the film.
After washing is complete put in your Photo-flow (normally just a few drops)- if you are really cheap a drop of washing up liquid. This will give you film a nice finish and help avoid 'run marks' during the drying process.Remove your film from the tank carefully and hang it somewhere to dry, a shower is a good place I clip my films with a clothes peg top and bottom so they dry nice and straight.
That's it! you're done, just be sure to cut your films and sleeve them in archival sleeving and store them safely and they should last many years.

2008-04-08T22:18:00.010Z

Trichrome

Just another try at the RGB process from B&W film (see previous post)
Shot on a Fuji 6x7 rangefinder using Fuji Neopan 400
If you have a colour aware browser you can see the original here:
correct colours
© Mark Antony Smith 2008

Olympus Trip 35

2008-03-19T22:19:00.027Z

If any camera can claim to be a 'Volkscamera' then this one has to be fairly high on the list with over 10 million made between 1968 and 1988.
The camera is a very well built, totally automatic exposure (no batteries as it has a selenium cell round lens) and scale focus. The lens is a 40 mm F2,8 Zuiko probably a 4 element Tessar clone. Round the lens is the ASA/ISO ring that is marked 25-400 which should cover most films you'd want to use.
When this camera was a current model, it was very cheap and often came in kits with a flash and a roll of film.
If you get one in good working order today, expect to pay £5-10 (about $10-$20) as a rough price guide slightly more or less depending on condition.

And a 100% crop

A really impressive little performer, not quite up to 50mm prime lens standard but very close all things considered, very sharp 8x12" (A4) prints will be no problem.
The on board auto exposure is remarkably good also, probably good enough to use slide film! (although I've not yet tried)
Certainly this model gives a better image than its price point would suggest and coupled with ease of use would make a great first camera for a child or just for pocket carry everywhere use.

Another shot this time late afternoon:

I bought this camera for my seven year old son, and he loves it. Its sturdy build coupled with ease of use and excellent results make it a bargain.

Just a note:

If you wish to buy a trip this guy has some very nice ones, some with custom leather from £30.00!

Link 'Tripman"
© Mark Smith 2008

Kodak Royal-x-Pan

2008-02-18T20:54:00.009Z

I recently chanced to come by a roll of this iconic film. The film is out of date by some margin (expired 1976) and also a reject roll given to a Kodak employee.
I believe at the time of release that this was the fastest film produced by Kodak, with an ASA rating of 1250.
Exposing it 32 years after it has expired I really didn't expect much after all fast film generally doesn't keep well and depending on storage could be completely fogged and will certainly have reduced speed and higher base fog.

I decided to rate it at 100 ISO to account for the lost speed and develop it in Rodinal 1:25 for 6 mins one inversion every 30 seconds.
I also exposed it on a nice bright clear day in order to maximize the contrast.
here are a couple of images from the roll.

On the whole i am actually surprised to find that the film could record anyhting at all years after the 'best before' date.
The base of the film had quite a high level of fog and also there were some spots on the emulsion caused probably by storage over the last 30 plus years.
So if you find a roll of out of date film why not give it a try?

© Mark Antony Smith 2008

Ilford Delta 3200

2008-02-12T16:40:00.006Z

Ilfords Delta 3200 is one of the fastest films available, along with Kodak T-Max 3200 and is a modern tabular (T-grain) emulsion, from Ilfords website:

"Ilford Delta films use a new crystal structure called Core Shell. These new technology crystals capture light more efficiently, offer a smoother tonal range, finer grain and greater sharpness than conventional technology films. The ultra high quality generated by the DELTA PROFESSIONAL films however, requires a bit more care in exposure and processing".

According to Ilford, Delta 3200 has an ISO speed rating of 1000 for daylight exposure when developed in their standard ID 11 developer.
Why call it Delta 3200 if it has an ISO speed of 1000?
Here's a quote from Ilford:

It should be noted that the exposure index (EI)
range recommended for DELTA 3200 Professional
is based on a practical evaluation of film speed
and is not based on foot speed, as is the ISO
standard.
So basically its a 1000ISO film that can be pushed and give good results at EI 3200.

Good image quality can be obtained between EI 400- 6400 and can be pushed to EI 25 000.
One of the huge benefits of Ilfords emulsion over the Kodak T-Max 3200 is that the emulsion is available in 120 size making hand held low light medium format photography a possiblity.
For more info Ilford have a PDF that lists developers and processing times.

So armed with a few rolls I set about taking some low light images at a local night club.

I rated the films at EI3200 which in the conditions I found myself shooting at 1/15- 1/60 at F3,5-4 so it was pretty dark here are some photos.

From memory the above shot was 1/15 wide open at F3,5

This shot was 1/60 at F4
Here is a 100% crop to show grain character.

My first thoughts were Wow look at the tonal range, grain is a little pronounced in the mid tones but pretty good for a film rated at this speed.

Of course these were shot on 120, so tonally they are going to be better than 35mm, ditto grain.

My experiences with the 35mm version are that its is best rated at 800- 1600 EI and developed in Microphen or DD-X where tonally it seems to be ahead of the competition with just slightly more apparent grain, rated at 3200 and processed in Rodinal gives a very gritty look.

I really like this film, especially in 120 where low light hand held portraits are certainly a possibility and as it's the only game in town (please note Kodak and Fuji) at this speed. I can't recommend it more, so if you shoot low light in 120 try this film you won't regret it!

Text and images © Mark Antony Smith

Fuji 6x7 Rangefinder

2008-02-07T16:39:00.000Z

I have wanted one of these Fuji RF cameras for years, if you have been a reader of my blog you'll know that I also use a Pentax 6x7. As much as I like the the Pentax I've always thought it was a little on the heavy side, and in the year or so I've been using it I've rarely found a need to change lenses and found myself using the 90mm for 80% of shots, so its biggest advantage over the Fuji was negated for me. Being a Leica RF user and very much enjoying shooting with RF cameras the Fuji is an obvious upgrade. So when the above camera came into my dealer with only 38 on the roll counter the Pentax was exchanged.

First Impressions

My camera is a MKIII version, and has the ergonomic plastic cover rather than the more substantial looking metal case of earlier Fuji RF cameras. If you squeeze it a slight creaky sound can be heard, I think this is what makes people feel the later cameras aren't as well built. Personally I feel that its just the plastic grip and the overall feel of the camera in your hand makes it worth the creakiness.

The Fuji 6x7 and 6x9 share the same body and lens (90mm F3,5 EBC) the only difference being (apart from negative size) the frame lines and film advance mehanism. The finder has a gold type focus spot and the viewfinder has a slightly blue tinge to contrast with the spot which helps focus. The frame lines move with focus to correct with parallax athough I'm not sure how accurate they are especially when at closest focus (1 metre) One thing I have noticed is that the hood when extended can be seen in the bottom right hand corner of the viewfinder, which is a slight distraction.

Loading the camera is pretty easy, there are two red buttons inside the back that when pressed allow the film to be placed in the camera very quickly. Advance is double stroke, one full and the second stroke is about half (presumably to cock the shutter)

The lens is fixed with a leaf shutter and a 67mm filter thread. The aperture is at the end of the lens under the built in hood (which must be in the out position to change speed/F numbers) I remeber the Olympus OM system had the aperture ring in a similar place. Stranger still is that the shutter is also positioned there, but when you get used to it it's OK and quite fast in operation.

So far I'm finding the camera to be well balanced and a good all round performer, the optics are very good, operation quick, and size and weight manageable for such a large format.

Here are some shots:

The above was shot on HP5+ developed in Rodinal 1:50 for 9 min

more to follow

Scanning B&W film

2008-02-02T20:56:00.000Z

Scanning is a bit of a black art, so many different settings, scanning options, scanner types etc.
This blog entry concerns itself with the mechanics of obtaining the best scan from any machine, flatbed or dedicated film scanner.

It is not meant to be the ultimate scan guide, but is just the method I use that gives me what I feel are good results.

Scan software
Whether you use the software that came with your scanner or an after-market solution like Ed Hamricks Vuescan which supports a wide range of scanners here are a few tips.

The settings in your scan software will vary but what you should look for is a dialogue a little like this one:

This is the curves dialogue and should look like a 45° slope with the black and white points away from the centre (the small triangles at the bottom) Below is the same scan but with a histogram.

Note the setting of the black and white points as not to clip the histogram.In other words set the black and white points near but not touching the histogram. Most scanner software even gives a preview and we are looking for a flat image like this one:

Getting the info from the film into the file.
Normally this means scanning with little correction, just getting the whitest point a very light grey and the darkest point almost black it also helps if you scan as 16 bit greyscale as when the time comes to edit the file we need as much info as possible.
The important thing here is to preserve as much information as you can from the film and the resulting histogram will look similar to this.

Above is the levels dialogue, which shows the values in the image as a histogram, that is as if the values have been 'piled up' like bricks.
The most common tones are the highest spikes, but what we are looking for here is the values to be placed in the centre, with nothing 'clipping' from either end.
At the left hand side is the black point and the right is the white, the centre is the grey point which changes the density.
Normally we pull the two extreme ends towards the centre thus setting the black point and the white point.
The image above is exaggerated but what I look for is no clipping of white or black values or from the top of the 'hump' I find this gives a good compromise between clipping info and maximizing the tones in the final image.

Once you have set these three points the flat looking file we started with will now start to look as we envisioned.
The Histogram will now look flatter and wider and if we scanned in 16bit should have no info missing with its tell tale 'comb' effect on the histogram.

This should be the effect on the image, a slightly punchier result with black and white tones in the places they should be

Even though our scan now looks a lot better our next step will consolidate and hopefully add a little 'snap' without clipping too much info.

What I have found is that applying the unsharp mask tool in Photoshop with a high Radius setting and a low amount setting–say amount 30 Radius 60 (although these will vary from image to image) will give a contrast sharpen with pleasing results.

This makes our flat looking image a little more 'dynamic' looking without having to resort to the ordinary contrast tool which is a lot coarser in its action.

The original image is side by side for comparison

Final 'tweeking' including spotting and final sharpening and in the finished shot below the application of a warm tone duotone created in photoshop to give a chlorobromide paper effect

Fortepan 100

2008-01-10T01:37:00.005Z

Forte were a Hungarian photo materials manufacturer, I say 'were' because as of last year (2007) they ceased trading.
So rather than this being a test of a going concerns product it will now be only of historical interest after the remaining stocks are used up.
I believe the Forte factory was originally built by Kodak as part of a European expansion program in the early 20th Century. I would imagine that after the war the plant now being in the Eastern Bloc meant that Forte were put under government control, but there doesn't seem to be much about this on the internet (I'll slot info in here as/if I find it).

I can only source the film in 120 Rolls and have no experience with the 35mm so this test was solely shot on 120.
I started by exposing at the box speed of 100ISO and developing the film for 10 mins in Rodinal at 1:50.
The resulting negatives looked pretty high in contrast, and a little low on shadow detail even for the bright lighting conditions.

Looking at the 100% crop, grain seems OK not as good as FP4, APX or Plus-x but acceptable.

You can tell that this film is old technology even compared to 1970's Kodak or Ilford emulsions, I would imagine that the film is similar to films from the 1940's or 50's which is not a bad thing if you want a slightly 'retro' look.
To be fair to this film it was very cheap, and I originally bought it to put in my 1930's Bessa for which it was perfect.
But if I were to use it in a modern camera I would rate it at EI50-64 and drop the development time by 20% (8 mins 1:50 in Rodinal) in order to cut the contrast and improve shadow detail.
I still have a few rolls left so possibly I'll add to this test my results with amended exposure and development times.

OK I've tried about 6-7 rolls of the Fortepan now and I have to say I really like it!

I bought the last 10 rolls from Retrophotographic although they still have some 400 left (at time of writing– Feb 08)

I think the settings that work for me are rating it at EI 64 then developing in Rodinal 1:50 for 8 ½ mins.

Here are some images:

Colour Images from B&W Film

2007-12-08T22:03:00.001Z

Norwich Market– B&W Tri-x-panchromatic film

What? I hear you say, surely thats the wrong way round?

No the title is correct, I'm going to demonstrate how to make your favourite monochrome film into a true colour image.

The whole idea behind this post came in a Eureka moment whilst showing a photographer the channel mixer method for obtaining better black and white from colour images in Adobe Photoshop.
Colour digital camera images are normally made up of three mono images one representing red one blue and one green. When these are combined the information makes up the colour image.

I explained to the photographer, 'each channel is rather like a b&w photo taken with either a red green or blue filter over the lens' and then it struck me I could do it the other way and use a normal mono film like say Tri-X or Ilford Delta and get colour results.

If this all sounds far fetched and you doubt my sanity (don't worry I do too) other photographers have used similar methods over 100 years ago (not with Photoshop though). One particular example is Russian photographer Sergi Prokudin-Gorskii who made some very fine colour images in the period 1905-1915.

So how is it done? how do you make colour Tri-X-Pan?

First of all you will need a red, green and blue filter to put over the lens, your favourite black and white film and possibly a tripod.

Load the film as normal, screw in the red filter and take your first shot (remember to compensate for reduced light if you are using a non TTL camera) then carefully unscrew the red and replace it with green, then repeat for the blue.
I find it easier to do in RGB order so that I can identify the frames later.

Process the film as normal, you should have three slightly different looking negs.
These now need to be scanned in greyscale, saving each image with an R or G, B so that later you can remember which one is which.

Red Filter

Green Filter

Blue Filter

The resulting files should all have exactly the same pixel dimensions i.e 3000x2000.
Next open each one of the 3 in photoshop and then with the red open click on the channels tab and select the merge channels option from the palette
The merge option wont appear if your photos don't have the same pixel dimensions.

Next the RGB option needs to be selected.

After that it will confirm the 3 images you'd like to merge.
My first result looks OK the wind moved the trees during exposure causing some 'off register' colour fringe but I think after a little more practice, possibly a tripod and no wind would yield a better result:
Ladies and gentlemen I give you colour Tri-X

The above 'experiment' just makes me realise how good the work of Sergei Mikhailovich Prokudin-Gorskii and others that used this process really is, and I'm pretty sure that armed with a tripod and finer grained film that I'll give this another try.

Here if anyone is interested is my try on a finer grained film (Agfa APX 100) and a tripod.

Taken just after dawn the main problem here is that slow film, little light and filters mean an exposure of 1/2 sec at F2,8
I like the shot anyhow which is of a ship used as a shed by bait diggers, I particularly like the brand new red windows which still have the retailers stickers in the centre!
And a final one closer.

All in all an interesting process and one I shall play with in the future
EDIT: Since drafting this post I've become aware of others who are using similar techniques one such person is Henri Gaud whose blog Le blog de la Trichromie is an interesting read.
All Words and images © Mark Antony Smith

Film Tests

2007-12-05T13:13:00.008Z

Here is an index of film tests on Photo Utopia, each being a link to the test of that particular film.

Adox (EFKE) CHS 25 Art

Adox (EFKE) CHS 50 Art

Adox (EFKE) CHS 100 Art

Agfapan 100

Agfapan 400

Fomapan 100 'Classic'

Fomapan 200 'Creative'

Kodak T-max 3200 (TMZ)

Kodak Ektar 100

Kodak T-Max 3200

2007-10-30T11:50:00.000Z

When doing the test for this film I had to make a couple of decisions, mainly because I use this film quite often for low light situations, but rarely at the box speed and also because its one of the few films I don't care for developed in Rodinal due to its grain structure.

I personally feel rated at 1600 and developed in T-Max developer gives the best results overall with respect to shadow detail and grain.

Above image TMZ rated at EI 1600 processed in T-Max developer

In fact Kodak state in their datasheet that TMZ can be rated between EI400 and EI 25,000 with their developers XTOL and T-Max. I can't imagine what it looks like at 25,000 but rated between 800-1600 it is good enough especially with the T-max developer, which tends to smooth grain and gives the best tonal range.

I decided to rate this film at 3200 ISO (box speed) and process in Rodinal 1:25 for 8 mins.

Below is a shot taken on a very dull day after a storm had brought down a tree:

There was very little light, I can't remember the exposure but I metered for the shadows in the tree on the left and closed down two stops from that reading.

The image below is a 100% crop of the shadow detail on the right hand side, and clearly shows

the cygnet riding on the mother swans back. Grain although quite visible is certainly unobtrusive considering the rated speed and developer choice.

Which brings me to what I feel is the films main weakness – its tonal range.

If I had rated it at a lower EI say 800 I'm pretty sure that both shadow detail and overall tonal graduation would have been a whole lot better, thats not to say that it performs poorly just I feel that unless you really need the extra stop you'll benefit from rating at EI 1600 or even lower, then developing accordingly.

If you need to rate this film higher then use the Kodak developers, rather than Agfa Rodinal which probably isn't the best developer for fast film.

But for those situations where you need speed or the light is low, P3200 (T-Max developer) are a pretty useful combination, although the films real speed is 1250-1600 in my opinion.
© Images and text Mark Antony Smith

Kodak Release New T-Max 400

2007-10-09T19:28:00.000Z

The Title says it all really, Today Kodak published a press release on their website here confirming the release of the new Tmax 400, according to Kodak it is the finest grain 400 speed film in the world.
T-MAX 400 now stands alone as the world’s finest grained and the world’s sharpest 400-speed black-and-white film, offering photographers a level of clarity normally only available from a 100-speed film.

Soon as I can get my hands on some I'll do a test, I'm not sure how long until the film is at retailers, Kodak seems to say December.

One thing is for sure this is big news, especially for those who like myself love traditional photography.

Rollei 35

2007-10-05T16:34:00.000Z

As you can see from the image the camera is about as tall as a 35mm film box and just over twice the width, weighs about 12oz (340g) and is of pretty high build quality certainly up there with most of the 1970's 'semi -pro' cameras like the Nikon FM, Canon A1, Olympus OM1 etc.

When the Rollei 35 was introduced in 1966 it was the smallest full frame 35mm camera in the world. However even though it is only roughly the size of two film boxes the designers still manged to design a camera that gives the user complete manual control.

The small size however leads to some design quirks especially with control placement. The film advance lever is on the left, shutter and aperture dials are on the front and the re-wind lever and flash hot-shoe are on the bottom plate.

Loading a film is done by sliding off the back and placing the cartridge in the right hand side, threading and advance are similar to other cameras.

Operation is hardly 'point and shoot' firstly the lens needs to be extended from the body and twisted to lock before use, the focus is not by a range-finder but by scale focus "guesstimate" the lightmeter on this model is always on and only turned off by putting the camera back in its case (rectified on later models) Aperture and shutter dials are twisted until the needle is aligned with a red lever.

The shutter is mechanical, and works without batteries 1/2 sec to 1/500 sec + 'B' (only down to 1/30 on Triotar model) and being a 'leaf' type flash sync is available at all speeds.

Despite its 'Quirkiness' the Rollei has a couple of strengths, firstly all manual control, secondly first rate lenses.

Lens Choices

The Rollei came with three different lenses, in order of increasing quality:

Triotar F3,5 (3 element cooke triplet)

Tessar F3,5 (4 element Zeiss classic)

Sonnar F2,8 (The Classic Zeiss design)

Actually for a short time some had a Schneider lens similar to the Tessar.

The following are results from the Tessar

Tessar F3,5 at F11 – Fuji Neopan 400

And a 100% crop showing detail

'Yes you can have your cake and eat it Daddy'

The above shot of my daughter was shot at F3,5 and shows the Tessar to be a very good performer, with good contrast and fair sharpness even wide open, they say the Sonnar is better- that must be a very good optic indeed as the results I'm getting from the Tessar are pretty much on par with a SLR lens of the era and certainly better than most compact Point and shoot cameras.

My opinion of this camera after just a week of using is that despite some design quirks it offers a taste of true photography.

That is that it give complete control over settings (and creativity) that P&S cameras rarely give, is a full frame camera in a package that will fit it most peoples pockets, has a build quality that means it will give good service for many years.

Adox CHS 50 ART

2007-09-29T14:54:00.001Z

The Adox brand has a very long and slightly complicated history that I've already covered in my CHS 100 ART review.
CHS 50 is basically the same as KB17, I'm informed that the Adox films are the same as the EFKE emulsions that have been available for many years, in fact I have used this film many times over the past 20 years so pretty much knew what to expect.

The above picture was taken in very bright sunlight mid afternoon and despite the fairly high contrast light the tonal values have held up well. This could be down to rating the film at 32 ISO and developing in Rodinal 1:100 for 18 mins.

The 100% crop shows a fine grain, high accutance much as you would expect from a medium/slow emulsion.

The image above shows how well the film/ developer combination handles a high contrast subject, the water was almost black with a very low reflectance, while the brick and cement was of a very high tonal value, and the film has rendered the subject very well.
I have some caveats to note with this film though, it does not like to be pushed, or under exposed and to some extent doesn't have the latitude of some modern emulsions. Also with the wrong developer can tend to be somewhat contrasty, with less shadow detail and burned out highlights.
But with care this film can deliver lovely tonal range, reasonably fine grain and high accutance overall I'd say it's probably (so far) my favourite film in the Adox range- well worth a try.

Text and Images © Mark Antony Smith

Developing Film in Coffee

2007-09-21T01:41:00.000Z

Yes the title is correct, I'm going to show you how to develop an ordinary B&W film with instant coffee granules.
Here is what you need:
1 Jar of instant coffee
1 packet of washing soda crystals
Developing tank, liquid measure and thermometer.

Firstly, when you shoot the film lower the ISO by one stop, in this case I'll be using APX 100 (Jessops pan) rated at 50 ISO.
Load the film in the developing tank in the normal manner.

Next prepare the coffee developer.

5 heaped teaspoons of instant coffee (one per 2fl oz/60ml)
2 level teaspoons of Washing Soda crystals (NOT baking soda).
300ml (10 fl oz) water at roughly 25 deg C

A heaped teaspoon looks just like this

Firstly dissolve the soda crystals in the water, their purpose is to 'unlock' the developer ingredient present in the coffee granules.
Next put in your coffee, stirring well to ensure that the coffee has been dissolved fully.
You will notice that there are a few bubbles in the mixture and bubbles aren't good for development, so leave to stand for a few minutes but no longer than 10 as the mix must be used within 30 Min's.

Pour in the mixture and agitate slowly for the first minute, then tap the tank a couple of times to disloge any air bubbles.
The process time is 30 mins so its handy to have a watch, pen and paper to note the passing time.
Agitation used was one inversion every 30 seconds.

After 30 Minutes, rinse with plain water and fix in the normal manner.
Here are the negatives:

Slightly milky looking and brownish (due to staining action of developer) and also quite low contrast but certainly printable.
If you need further convincing here are some of the images.

Nice tonal detail, good grain and sharpness and although I don't think it will replace Rodinal as my main 'brew' I think you can see for yourselves that coffee is a more than capable developer.
A stimulating thought?

All Pictures and Text © Mark Antony Smith

1930's Voigtländer Bessa

2007-09-12T11:33:00.001Z

Voigtländer have a long history producing both cameras and lenses. The company were founded in 1756 manufacturing optics and in the 1840's started making Daguerrotype cameras, so they were making cameras at the very start of the photographic industry.
The Bessa 'folding' camera was produced between 1931-49 and took 120 film, giving a negative size of either 6"x9" or with an insert 6"x4.5" there are later Bessa Models, Bessa 1 & 2 I have a review of the Bessa 1 here: Photo Utopia Bessa 1
These cameras also came with different lenses, this one has the cheapest 'Voigtar' 105mm F6.3 the better lenses were the Skopar and colour Skopar.

The framing is done by either a simple folding metal frame (seen on the right in the above photo) or by a small window from waist hight just like the Kodak Brownie.
Focusing is done with a scale, portrait, groups and landscape each marked with a red dot and also distances marked in feet.
The shutter has a very basic range of speeds 1/25 1/50 and 1/125 plus B & T. This was OK in 1930 but in these days of blisteringly fast film of up-to 400 ISO slightly restrictive.
I believe that the models fitted with the Skopar had a better shutter range.
The aperture values are F6.3- F22 which obviously helps with the slow shutter in bright light.

Above is the frame counter window, which is a simple clear red plastic the second window is for the smaller 6x4.5 size.
The film is advanced by turning a metal 'key' and there is no frame locking or winding stop, so you'll have to be careful not to double expose.

In this view we see the back open showing the spool retainer, which is quite neat making the camera pretty easy to load.

The above view is of the camera folded showing on the left the wind on 'key' and at the top right the fold down shutter release.

This type of camera can be found for very little money in thrift shops and jumble sales, and considering how well made they are (it will outlive me I'm sure) they represent a nice project.
They certainly make you slow down and think; wind on- shutter-aperture-focus and are actually great fun to use especially if you have the facility to develop your own negatives.

Above is an image taken from a roll of Fortepan 100 (formal test of that film soon) and as you can see the result is pretty acceptable considering the age of the camera and un-coated lens, certainly the 6x9 neg size helps as does the fact it was shot at F11.
In fact i like the feeling of 'antiquity' that the lens gives as its quite low contrast but detailed.
One other caveat I've found is it takes practise to fire the shutter without blur as the top speed is only 1/125 and the fold down shutter release is quite 'clunky' if I was to use this camera regularly I'd use a cable release.

Images and text © Mark Antony Smith

Found Film:1960's Kodak Tri-x

2007-08-22T21:10:00.001Z

Next is another iconic film Kodak Tri-x-pan. I know a little more about this film, it came from a professional photographer and was shot in a 1960 Rolleiflex link
Here is the film:

I processed the film in stock ID11/D76 for 9 mins. I had some idea of the content as the photographer has written on the paper seal 'Warrington & snow scenes.

Sure enough on developing the images there were several snow scenes of a house and some shots of a seed factory.

A close up of the people and seed sacks.

The close-up shows the name of the company 'Gartons' and a google search quickly showed me that there was indeed a Gartons of Warrington seed factory, although they are no longer trading.
Here is another shot of the factory

And finally a shot of the house in the snow

Possibly the photographers house?
I think this film was shot between 1960-65, I know the camera was a 1960 F3.5 Rolleiflex and I think (though can't be sure) that Kodak stopped using metal spools for 120 in the mid '60's
© Images and text Mark Antony Smith 2007

More found film: 1950's Adox KB17

2007-08-18T15:11:00.000Z

After my successful soiree into the world of processing ancient film, a couple of people have given me some more films to try, first up is the iconic roll film Adox R17.
As you can see from the image above Adox still produce film and you can compare 1958 box alongside 2007 packaging.

I have blogged about the history of Adox in a previous post link so I'll not go over that ground again here.

Inside the box the roll was wrapped in a red foil, I'm not sure if this is original, but it seems to be the correct width and colour, so I have no reason to doubt Adox used foil and the picture above is representative of the product.

Above is the roll taken out of the foil, it has a metal spool and on the backing (not visible) the word 'EXPONIERT' which means exposed in German.

I decided to process the film in Ilford ID11 at the recommended time for KB17 which is 6.5 mins.
Here are the images:

There has obviously been some slight damage from the backing paper over the last 50 years, but overall these images are surprisingly good.

They definitely come from the correct timeframe for the film which was dated AUG 1958, judging from the clothes.

From this shot a calendar can be seen, the date March 1958

A window view, clearly England, I'll try to find out where and who these people are.
More to follow....
© Images and text Mark Antony Smith 2007

Last of the 1940s film

2007-08-03T00:49:00.000Z

Simply beautiful

This is the second roll, much better than the first with less fogging. One thing is for sure this guy was a very good photographer!
more later...

© Mark Antony Smith

Looking for clues

2007-07-31T23:35:00.000Z

More images from the 1941 Agfa Ultraspeed bought on ebay.
The reason for the hiatus between developing the next batch was in order to get a more suitable developer, and after seeking advice from a few people (thank you) i settled on Ilford ID11 (Kodak D76) at stock dilution.
The main reason for this was to minimise grain and as it was pointed out to me that it is similar to Agfa 17 the developer recommended on the enclosed data-sheet.
anyhow here's some images:

Cherry eater
and

There are more on my Pbase account (link in sidebar)
Well I think I've found where these images were shot. On the wall under the 'Naval' banner is a smaller banner which says 'Camden Post Office Club' I think it is highly likely that it is Camden NJ that we are seeing as it is only a short distance from Reading PA (where I bought the film)
We know when, what City, who...
I'm digging..
So far I may know one name the man seated in the lower picture, I'm waiting for confirmation from a local historian
keep digging..
© Mark Antony Smith 2007

A Latent Past

2007-07-13T10:15:00.000Z

It's been nearly twelve hours now since I first saw the images on my 1941 Agfa film, I'll be honest I haven't slept much, so many things going on in my mind.
I have 5 images that I'm guessing date from the period 1938-1941, I've scanned them but haven't really worked on them.
here are those images straight from the scanner:

I call this image "Sons of the Desert"

This one: Gentlemen, There will be no war with Germany

Those are so far my favourite images, if you want to see more then I have a gallery here
One thing is for sure the original photographer was very good at catching the moment, I'd love to know who he was!
Edit:
I've e-mailed the guy who sold me the film to find out how he acquired it, to find out what City or town it was from. I'll then try to contact family history people in that City to find out who the people are.
Its a long shot I know but one I feel I have to take, who are these ghosts?
Further Edit:
According to the seller it was from Reading PA, so if you live in Reading Pennsylvania they might be your ancestors!

All images and text © Mark Antony Smith 2007

Agfa Update

2007-07-12T21:24:00.000Z

Well, I opened up the tin in order to do a clip-test.

Inside was the film, a corrugated card insert and these instructions on a pamphlet:
Click on the image for a larger view, to make texts readable, here is the other side:

I hope some of the info above will be useful to someone:

I cut off a length of film about 6" and loaded it into my spiral no problem the film felt OK and travelled into the spiral very easily.
I then prepared the developer and fixer. I used Rodinal at 1:25, pre-wet for 1 min at 20 degrees C then developed for 5 mins with gentle agitaion for first 30 sec then every min thereafter.
It was then fixed for 3 mins in fresh Ilford Fix.
No stop bath was used just a small rinse in water.

After a small final rinse about 5 mins, I opened the tank...
At first I was disappointed as the film looked completely fogged, but as I held it to the light I saw to my surprise there are IMAGES.
Badly fogged either by age or light at sometime (who knows when in the last 60+ years) but there are images of people.
The film is drying as I'm typing this and I'll try to scan and post them later....
But for now here is a copy from DSLR and a Macro lens:

and closer crop:

Ghosts...
All images and text © Mark Antony Smith 2007

Agfa Ultra-Speed

2007-07-10T11:31:00.000Z

If you read this blog regularly you'll know that recently I found a roll of Agfa-Speed Ultra on Ebay. The film is a little out of date.... well it actually expired in 1941 which makes it ancient history film-wise.
It was made by Agfa-Ansco in America, Binghamton N.Y to be exact, and according to my google seaches had a Weston speed of around 80.

Here are a few photos:

Above is the Warranty and Warning
Next a rear view of the tin showing the Agfa logo

Lastly a side view.

I shall atempt to use the film in my Leica with vintage Elmars both 50 & 90 mm, I doubt anthything will come out as the film will probably be fogged, but it will be fun (and it's a lovely old tin even if the film is Kaput).

If anyone has any more information about this film, such as a confirmation of film speed or even development time suggestions for Rodinal, it would be most welcome.

Low Tech Fun

2007-06-24T21:29:00.000Z

This photo was taken about fifteen years ago, with a Cheap Russian 6x6 camera called a Lubitel 166B. The Lubitel (Russian for amateur I'm told) has a cheap plastic build and a simple triplet lens that gives a wonderful soft look that is great for portraits.

The idea behind this shot was to give a feel of the 1950's- so film choice was important too, the emulsion used was the now unavailable Agfa Portrait 160. The film was one of my all time favourites with a really nice low contrast natural colour that made it my standard film for weddings and portraits.

Agfa Portrait also had another desirable (for me at least) character, in that if over-exposed by more than 3 stops the film would allow halation to occur softening the highlights and killing contrast (and fine detail).

The picture above was overexposed by guesstimate about 3 stops to give the aforementioned effects and I think it worked pretty well. Today you could use Kodak Portra NC a film that gives a similar natural colour palette.

Cameras like the Lubitel and Holga are considered by some to be toy cameras, but for me they are very important tools that not only are fun to use but can give very satisfying pictures quite unlike anything produced by 'high-tech' cameras.

2007-06-07T14:00:00.000Z

Attention Googlers!!

I have noticed in my site stats that quite a few people are looking for info after being sent here by Google.
These people tend to stay for a couple of seconds, as unknown to them this site has over 40 pages, and if its not the first or second item their time is up (and they're off).
I have two things to help:
Firstly, in the sidebar is a search box entitled 'Search this blog' Hopefully this will allow you to find what you came here for.
Secondly, a common reason for people hitting this site via google is when searching for a film development time, I have placed a link to help in the sidebar called 'Film Dev Times'.
This will send you though to the "Digital Truth" Massive Dev chart, where you just select your film and developer combination.
Hope this helps–
Regards
Mark Antony

2007-06-07T13:00:00.000Z

Canon 35mm F1.8

About a year ago I was given a Leica M4-P, as it had no lens I had to make a decision on which lens would suit best.
I had been using a IIIc with 50mm F3.5 Elmar so obviously a similar lens seemed to be the ideal choice and I ended up with a 50mm F2.8 Elmar.
Fast forward a few months.
Although I enjoyed using my M4-P and it has become my 'take everywhere' camera and I enjoy using it immensely, I slowly began to find the 50mm (46°) angle of view a bit restrictive. I'm not sure why, possibly its because of the frame-lines that make you aware of the quite narrow angle, or possibly I found a lot of situations where the need to step back increasingly occurred.
So the hunt was on for a better 'standard' and like a lot of Leica M users, I decided on 35mm.
I honestly tried out quite a few, both Leica lenses F1.4 ASPH and F2 non ASPH, CV Skopar and two Canons- the 35mm F2 and the 35mm F1.8
Of course I rated the two Leica lenses and the 35 1.4 in particular is a very well corrected lens and amazingly sharp even at the edges wide open.
I did find that the Leica lenses were prone to flare in very bright light so a hood is almost essential for most conditions.
The CV Skopar is an excellent lens especially when you consider the price compared to the Leica lenses and is a very compact lens although a little slower at F2.5.But in my opinion it's size advantage is somewhat negated as it too seems to suffer from flare, so will need a hood.
The Canon 35mm F2 is also a great lens, probably marginally better than the Skopar (which is a copy of the Canon) and very similar in performance to the Pre-ASPH Summicrons of similar vintage.
I kick myself a little here, as I tested this lens, saw the results were good but when I returned to the shop it was gone!
Because these lenses are secondhand, I'd have to wait for another 35mm F2 or go for my next option.
The Canon 35mm F1.8, predated the F2 version is slightly larger and black and chrome finished rather than black and has an infinity lock.
Performance wise, it lacks wide open compared to the rest here being slightly soft and lower in contrast, but has a couple of advantages over the others.
Price! It is the cheapest lens of the bunch, the price I paid was less than the Skopar. It also seems to be less prone to flare, possibly due to the front element being recessed, acting as a sunshade.

(please excuse image quality)
My opinion of the Canon 35mm F1.8 is that it's a very good lens, cheap, of very good optical performance when stopped down a couple of stops, softish wide open (which can be good for 'retro look' shots).
So far I've found it's the lens that I keep on the camera most of the time and the extra speed over my standard Elmar means I use it for most low light work also.
Below is an example of its wide open performance, using Kodachrome 200 which is often very high in contrast is slightly softened.

1/15 sec at F1.8 Kodachrome 200

All in all a respectable performer especially when you take the cost in consideration, which for me is was less than half of the cost of a secondhand Summicron 35mmF2 of a similar vintage.

All Images and text © Mark Antony Smith

2007-06-04T19:45:00.003Z

Fomapan 200 'Creative'

This film, acording to Foma is an advanced negative film using 'T' grain technology similar to that of Kodak T-Max and Ilford Delta emulsions. It is a full stop faster than the 'Classic' Fomapan tested here

The above image was taken in very bright sunlight at around mid-day metering for the shadow area and closing down 2 stops. The negative shows good shadow detail and highlight separation with fractionally more contrast than the Fomapan 100 Classic when processed at the recomended times. I think this film would be excellent in winter or in dull flat light. I found that Foma 200 was pretty much 'box speed' at the first testing, although recently I have been downrating it to EI 160 which in my seems to give slightly better images. I processed the film in Agfa Rodinal at 1:50 for 8 mins with 2 inversions per min.

And the 100% crop

Looking at the crops I would say that the grain of this film is very fine certainly similar to FP4 which is around a stop slower, accutance is also pretty good if this is a T grain type film

The light and shade in the following shot show how well the film handles a scene with wide range, there is detail present in both the shadow and highlight on the print

The following shot of a door was taken in shadow, and on my monitor looks to have a lovely rich tone

I like the 'Creative 200' its a full stop faster than the Fomapan Classic and is a higher contrast emulsion with similar grain, possibly slightly more compressed tonanally than the Classic.

One thing I'd like to add, I'm not sure about the manufacterers claims that this is a T grain film, it behaves more like conventional emulsions (which is good) but doesn't quite have the smooth fine grain structure of say T-Max 100.

Makes me wonder is this film a T emulsion mixed with cubic grains? or is the grain less tabular than the Kodak?

I'll try to find out...

2007-06-01T12:10:00.000Z

Ebay acquisition

A rainy cold day, not much to do except look into a few forums, and check out if any interesting finds are listed on Ebay.
Whilst searching for Agfa film I came across the above item for $4.99, and thought 'why not' and was the highest bidder (well the only bidder).
My buy is an Ansco/Agfa Ultra-speed film from 1941.
I'll be interested to see what condition the film is in, I'll bet it is not going to be usable as it went out of date 66 years ago and probably has the 'vinegar syndrome' that afflicts so many films of its age.
If there is any result I'll be sure to post here, if not I'll have a nice tin to keep odds and ends in.

©Mark Antony Smith 2007

2007-05-30T09:02:00.001Z

Mr Lincoln Has Retired

This typed notice has been on the door of a closed chemists shop in my city for over ten years. The shop is kept in good repair, and has recently been repainted– but remains empty.

All Images and text ©Mark Antony Smith 2007

2007-05-23T20:26:00.000Z

Agfapan 400

Another film from the now defunct Agfa. The Agfapan range of films were hugely underated in my opinion, and APX400 probably suffered in that respect more than the rest of the range, living in the shadow of both Tri-X and HP5.

'Wensum Emporium' APX 400 at 1:50 18 mins in Rodinal (Duotone Record Rapid effect)
Personally I feel that's a shame, as it has the wonderful tonal range of the rest of the Agfapan films, with a lovely grain structure and accutance which compares favourably with Tri-x, and to me is preferable to HP5.

Below is a 100% crop of to show the grain pattern:

After Processing the film has a grey base colour, this is normal not due to base fog or poorly stored film, and although it prints/scans well, it may look strange if your normal film is something like Neopan.

It really is a shame about the demise of Agfa. I nearly didn't bother testing their films, but they are just SO good! If I hadn't given them at least a mention it would have been unfair as they are still available though many retailers.
When the current batch are gone one of the truly great photographic emulsions will be history.
So one to try out of curiosity but not a long term prospect.

All images and text © Mark Smith 2007

2007-05-22T15:17:00.001Z

Warmtone

This photo is a picture of Thrigby Church taken from a high walkway (in a Tiger pen) I liked the cross in the wall, and I've aslso tried to mimic Agfa Record Rapid Paper (monitor willing).
To achieve the effect I made my own record rapid Duotone in Photoshop.

All Images and text ©Mark Antony Smith 2007

2007-05-20T00:17:00.000Z

Fuji Provia 400X

I first tried a 400 ASA slide film from Fuji about 17 years ago, in those days you were grateful of the speed and accepted the grain which was quite a bit 'grittier' than their 100ASA offering RDP but still good for a 400.
Recently Fuji released Provia 400X which is claimed to be the finest grained slide-film in its class with grain similar to that of emulsions a stop or more slower.
Here is the Advertising blurb:
"Fujichrome Provia 400X features Epitaxial Sigma Crystal Technology for ultra-fine grain along with new generation couplers and new colour correction technology for excellent performance and image stability".

Well I'm not sure what "Epitaxial Sigma Crystal Technology" is, but ultra fine grain in a 400ISO and I'm all ears (and eyes)
So now some images.
Below is a shot taken in bright outdoor light:

As you can see contrast is good, colours are clean and well saturated. On close inspection grain seems to be very fine indeed much as promised.

Looking at the 100% crop I was surprised how good this film actually is, very sharp and fine grained certainly as good as some slower slide films.
It impresses me that a major company like Fuji is committed enough to put out a film like this, especially as they produce digital cameras and sensors. I can't help wondering if we will see many more improvements to film technology as sales slow because of the continuing shift to digital, hopefully we'll see one or two more improvements in what must be films twilight years.

2007-05-17T20:50:00.000Z

X Process (or X-Pro)
Cross Processing is when you put a film though a chemistry that it was not designed for i.e E-6 reversal film though a C-41 Negative developer.

It is a very easy way to get "wacky" colours and extreme contrast and suits a wide range of subjects.

I have found that the best way to do this is to buy cheap out of date slide film, as colour fidelity isn't an issue here and then find a willing minilab for process only.

Be sure to inform the Lab that you want it to go though the wrong process as a helpful lab assistant may just send it off for E-6 process!

When you get your negatives back they will look like this:

Little or no shadow detail and a purple/blue colour with clear rebates.

After printing or scanning the positive image will probably look very strange, high contrast and normally quite yellow or green (the unpredictability is part of the fun):

Depending on your subject you might like to leave it just like that, but in the above picture I felt that green skin tone was not that flattering.

So for the final rendition after scanning I sent the image to Photoshop to 'tweak' it in curves in order to give slightly better skin tones and increase the contrast. There is really no correct rendition of a cross processed image, but that's one of the things that makes it fun, you could even do a series all with different hue adjustments.

Experiment!

2007-05-17T09:03:00.000Z

Milky Way

'Milky Way' Leica M4-P 1sec at F2 on Tri-x, light from passing cars

I feel there has been quite a lot of technical type entries of late, so for a change here's a shot taken in low light.

2007-05-08T12:26:00.000Z

Agfapan 100

Athough Agfafilm are no longer trading (Chemical and minilab are) there is still a fair few rolls of this and their other films still available.
The batch I have is dated use by 2011 and is probably the last batch made before the Leverkusen factory shut down.
Agfa APX is a 'conventional' grain structure film with a very long tonal range and fine grain and is I believe one of the best (if you can find it) for portraits or any long tonal range subject.

Unfortuanately this film is becoming harder to find especially in 120, so if you want to try it now is probably your last chance.
It has been one of my standard films for many years and once it has gone it will be sadly missed.
The best thing about this film is its ablity to hold on to highlights and the same time retain good shadow detail, combined with Rodinal at higher dilutions it gives tonal values that are beautiful.

I love this film for its ability to keep shadows and highlights and maintain what seems to be a huge range of tones inbetween.
This helps to give an illusion of an almost three dimensional image, and in my opinion APX is one of the most 'underrated' emulsions of all time.

All images and text ©Mark Antony Smith 2007

2007-04-27T00:17:00.000Z

Adox CHS 100 ART

The Adox brand has had a very complex history. Originally a German company formed in 1860 by Dr Carl Schleussner to manufacter photographic plates both for cameras and X-Ray (Dr Schleussener was a pioneer in X-Ray photography).
Fast forward to 1952, when they introduced a range of 35mm films, renound for their thin emulsion and outstanding sharpness, which became very popular with photographers.

Ten years later Adox became the property of American company DuPont, who then licenced the film technology to Yugoslavian company Fotokemika, who kept on poducing the original emulsions under a new name EFKE.

Now into this century, and the films are still produced in Zagreb (Croatia) to the original 1952 specs, but the film has now returned back to the Adox branding- confused?
Well don't be! Adox 100 and EFKE KB21 are basically the same emulsion, not only that they haven't essentially changed since the 1950's
Here is a shot I took on EFKE KB21 (100) in 1991:

So how does the 2007 EFKE/Adox rate?
Firstly the film is packaged quite well, 120 rolls come in a neat container, 35mm come in the type of cassette that can be reused should you 'roll your own' and looks to be the same type as Ilford and Agfa used in the 1970s.
The films feel thin when you load them into the camera (and later in the film spiral for processing).

I set the ISO on my spot-meter to 100 as in my experience these are 'fussy' films that need good exposure and development to give best results. But when you get accustomed to their idiosyncrasies they can be more than rewarding, with smooth tonal range and very good sharpness.
Below is a shot of a local church taken on a rather dull afternoon.

and the 100% crop

If you look at the lower centre right area you'll notice the time on the City Hall clock 3:47, the sharpness is pretty good for a cubic crystal (as opposed to T-Grain) film although in duller conditions I may in future rate this film at 80ISO or process it at 1:50 as the grain is quite visible in the sky area.

This film is one I would use if I wanted high sharpness, but needed long tones with just a little grain.

All Images and text ©Mark Antony Smith 2007

2007-04-23T20:23:00.000Z

Ilford FP4 Plus

This film was the first B&W film I ever used, although now called FP4 'plus' it has very similar characteristics to the original.
One thing that has changed is the packaging which is a white box rather than the old black, something that has made me confuse it with Ilfords other 100ISO film Delta 100.
FP4 is a 'medium' speed (125ISO) film with quite fine grain and good tonal range. I feel (as do some other photographers I know) that it is best when slightly down rated to 80-100ISO and this is how I have used it for many years, as it gives better shadow detail.

Whenever I come back to FP4 using it feels like I'm with an old friend; I know its basic character so well. It does most things very well which makes it a good all round film but personally I feel it can lack depth in certain situations, but most of the time it suits the job very well.
Grain and sharpness I rate as good, in fact if you look below I was surprised how good the 100% crop looks.

Below is the 100% crop.

The Black bag has gold writing on it, and this can clearly be seen, definition is a little low but this could be the 1950's lens. Tonality is very good as this image was taken in bright sunlight, although I'm sure Rodinal helped preserve the scale.
FP4+ is a very capable film, and one that most photographers could use with confidence if they need a medium speed film.

All Images and text ©Mark Antony Smith 2007

2007-04-13T18:18:00.001Z

Fuji Neopan Acros

This film despite having the word 'new' all over its packaging has been around since 2002, I suppose compared to others in these tests that is fairly new!

This film has one of the finer grain structures of 100 speed films, depending on which developer you opt for will give grain similar or better than T-Max 100 (TMX), and is an excellent choice when accutance and fine grain are called for.

Some feel that the film is a little contrasty and can look 'clinical' or 'metallic' and dare I say digital feel. While it may be true that there are films with a nicer tonal range this can be helped by developer choice.

Above is one of my first attempts with the film and is processed in Paterson FX39 and clearly shows the films overall contrast whilst still holding the highlights although I feel the shadows are a little blocked

Below is the result you get from a Diluted Rodinal (1:100 at 18 mins)

Notice how the highlights (especially the sky) have been held yet so has the detail in the shadows this is one of the reasons I rate Rodinal so highly, for its ability to work well with variable dilution's.

Grain is very fine in fact probably the finest 100 speed available although it is very close to T-Max 100 I prefer Acros for the way it both scans and prints.
Acros is my film of choice for 120, I feel it gives both the acutance and tonal range, although for 35mm I prefer 'conventional' films for some subjects such as portraits and subjects that require a softer approach.
But if you mainly shoot Landscapes or detailed subjects Acros is the way to go.

All Images and text ©Mark Antony Smith 2007

2007-04-07T12:21:00.000Z

Adox CHS 25 ART

This film has been around since the 1950's and is the same as the EFKE emulsion that was called KB14.
I had used the KB14 version of this film in the 1980's and found it to be a little contrasty for my taste (which was Agfa AP25) and as most of my shooting at the time was done on 400 speed films, I didn't really persevere in finding a good exposure/development time combination.

Now in the 21st century I find myself trying the film again, this time armed with 3 rolls and some time to 'nail' a setting.
The film is pretty much as I remembered it, contrasty, slow and pretty fine grained, I eventually settled on a development time of 18mins in Rodinal at 1:100 which gives the long range of tones I like for scanning.

Also it must be noted that this is a thin emulsion that needs to be handled carefully, especially in 120 size. With a one min pre-soak (which will look blue when tipped out).

Adox CHS 25 at 18min in Rodinal 1:100, Leica M4-P. Canon 35mm 1.8'S'

The image above was taken early in the day in quite bright sunlight and clearly shows how well this film can handle contrast if processed carefully using a lower contrast developer or higher dilution.

Adox CHS 25 at 8min in Rodinal 1:50, Leica M4-P. Canon 35mm 1.8'S'

below is a 100% crop of the door in the above image which was taken in very bright conditions at mid-day.

As you can see, the detail is good and the grain is fine especially for an 'old tech' type film and certainly OK up to 12x18 (A3+) most of the grain/noise is probably introduced during scanning.

So overall i like this film, with the exception of the excessive contrast caveat which can clearly be seen in the two images posted (the second image was processed 1:50 at recommended times and is higher in contrast).
Who'd have thought the old film was so good, whether films like Acros or T-Max 100 give similar results at higher speeds is debatable but if you like the old tech films and the way they handle this film is worth a try.
All Images and text ©Mark Antony Smith 2007

2007-03-30T13:24:00.000Z

Fomapan 100 Classic

Foma is a Czech firm that have been making film since the 1920's Foma (link) based in Bohemia make a range of films and papers, the films are the Classic 100, Creative 200, Action 400 and a Reversal film R100 for mono slides or cine photography. The company also make a reasonably wide range of formats including sheet sizes up to 18x24cm.

Fomapan, Leica M4-P. Canon 35mm 1.8'S'

Foma 100 Classic has a long tonal range, not unlike Agfa APX 100 but with a slightly more modern look, for me it has elements of both a classic (tonal range and grain structure) and modern (accutance) emulsion. Kind of like a Marriage between Agfa APX and Fuji Across.

The test image above was taken in very contrasty lighting the spot meter readings were 1/250 at F16 on the area near the VW roundall (which is off white) right down to the interior of the dealership which was 1/125 at F2 the exposure selected was 1/250 at 5.6 in order to preserve the textured white around the badge.

Above is an 100% enlargement of the area to the side shows the grain characteristics of the film, which although shows more grain than say T-Max 100 or Fuji Acros is still quite pleasent to the eye.

In my opinion Fomapan 100 is a very good film, will probably be my replacement for the defunct Agfapan when stock dwindles. Probably not the best choice for landscape work where its grain structure might be a little obtrusive (in 35mm form) but certainly very good for street and people photography.

Most of all I like Fomapan Classic for its lovely tonal range:

Fomapan, Leica M4-P. Canon 35mm 1.8'S'

In fact this film was the only film in the 'test' that I'd not previously used, and after about a week or so of evalutaion of the negatives I'm placing an order for 20 more rolls!

Next Adox CHS 25 'ART'