Expierence with film

[Youngun]

I just bought a fill SLR and have been overwhelmed with the varieties of film out there. I'm sure a lot of film choice is preference and/or experience, however are there any films or brands to stay away from? or that are very nice? What's your take?

 

[voodoocat]

My personal favorites....

Velvia for landscapes
Provia for macro and still lifes
Portra VC for portraits

 

[voodoocat]

Oh, and for black and white.

General use I bring out the Ilford HP5 and for fine grained, high contrast I use PANF.

 

[Bosscat]

I have found and alot of others would agree that Fuji seems to lead the pack these days......and is the film of my choice

 

[Sash[DSL]]

What about non-professional film? Which one will give a decent quality except fuji superia...

 

[Karalee]

I have found and alot of others would agree that Fuji seems to lead the pack these days......and is the film of my choice

Ditto. Buy it at walmart and you save money when you buy the packs

 

[Bosscat]

Only problem with Wal-Mart it seems is that all you can get is Superia in packs.......and usually ISO 200,400 and 800

I prefer to shoot ISO 100 or less.......is the reason I buy fast glass.

 

[BernieSC]

When I am shooting people and even landscapes I try to use fuji Reala because it has low contrast and low color saturation. Most of the consumer film promotes bright colors well they produce the film with a high contrast to accieve that which I do not like high contrast in photos it makes skin tones too red or too high color saturation and it washes out certain areas when the light is uneven mainly on outdoor shots.

Reala and the "portrait" films are usually what i like the best I think low contrast is better.

 

[terri33 4]

I love Fuji slide films, and also Kodak Ektachrome (E100 VS) - all wonderful color slide films.

For B&W, I like Ilford FP4 and TMax 100, and have had great results with Ilford HP5 and Tri-X 320.

And I shoot Kodak HIE pretty exclusively for infrared.

 

[Dana13]

]What about non-professional film? Which one will give a decent quality except fuji superia...

I often use Kodak Elitechrome (especially in 100 ASA), and I am always satisfied...
There also exist "Extra Color" Elitechrome films that give more saturated colors.

 

[fadingaway1986]

Possibly a little off topic - but a cheaper-branded supermarket has opened in australia called 'aldi' and we got lost the other day when trying to drive home and went past one - so we went and looked in it...

On the way out - I found kodacolor film...

(The info is in german... hehehe)

anyway - i like fuji...

 

[Artemis]

I always use Kodak and nothing but...is that a good idea?

 

[sput]

for b&w, i use kodak a lot, mostly tri-x for street photography (i'm very partial to the grain of this one), and tmz 3200 since i do tons of concert photography. i push a lot, in spite of using mostly a 2.8 135mm lens.

i sometimes use fuji neopan 1600 when the lighting allows it, in order to get slightly finer grain, and reduce the contrast, which is always a pain when you shoot shows and do your prints yourself.


then for colour, i use provia 400 quite often, NPZ 800 as well, when i can get my hands on some, that is. i don't really care that much, since i don't really like not developing my film myself in the first place.

 

[ksmattfish]

i sometimes use fuji neopan 1600 when the lighting allows it, in order to get slightly finer grain, and reduce the contrast, which is always a pain when you shoot shows and do your prints yourself.

Have you tried Tri-X developed in Diafine 2 bath developer? It knocks the film speed of Tri-X up to 1000 to 1600 (depending on the format), grainwise looks almost like Tri-X shot at 400 (and developed with a regular 1 bath developer), and tends to be very low contrast. I've found it to be great for shooting shows.

 

[Walt]

For color I prefer Agfa, I'm still playing around with B&W so I don't have a preference.