my film always fails

[den9]

i will try that black out white film out, maybe it will be better for star trails.

im pretty dissapointed to hear veliva 50 is bad with reciprocity failure, i shoot night scenes 80 percent of the time. they also use a noritsu scanner where i send my film.

would taking multiple short exposures prevent failure? also any recommendations on filters? i heard 81A is a good filter? any examples or comments on that?


edit



Fuji Velvia 50
Up to 1 second - No exposure compensation required
From 4 seconds - +1/3 and 5M colour compensation filter
From 8 seconds - +1/2 and 7.5M colour compensation filter
From 16 seconds - +2/3 and 10M colour compensation filter
From 32 seconds - +1 and 12.5M colour compensation filter
Above 64 seconds - not recommended


what exactly are these filter numbers, i tried searching with no luck

 

[Paul Ron]

i will try that black out white film out, maybe it will be better for star trails.

im pretty dissapointed to hear veliva 50 is bad with reciprocity failure, i shoot night scenes 80 percent of the time. they also use a noritsu scanner where i send my film.

would taking multiple short exposures prevent failure? also any recommendations on filters? i heard 81A is a good filter? any examples or comments on that?


edit



Fuji Velvia 50
Up to 1 second - No exposure compensation required
From 4 seconds - +1/3 and 5M colour compensation filter
From 8 seconds - +1/2 and 7.5M colour compensation filter
From 16 seconds - +2/3 and 10M colour compensation filter
From 32 seconds - +1 and 12.5M colour compensation filter
Above 64 seconds - not recommended


what exactly are these filter numbers, i tried searching with no luck

That filter is a tungsten to daylight color balance filter.... it cools, not warms the image. It will make the lights in the house whiter.

 

[den9]

i cant seem to find these filters, are there other names for them besides 5m, 7.5m etc

i think im going to try some acros 100

 

[Pgeobc]

It has been a long time since I got into color correction and I try mostly to avoid it. The filters recommended will be CC or color compensating filters and come in y=yellow, m=magenta, and c=cyan, IIRC. The value, or strength, is given by the number and the numbers are additive. The code for these things will look something like "CC5M" and means Color Compensating, decamired value of 5, and Magenta in color. You will need to go to a pro outfit like Calumet or The Filter Connection and have them special order what you want. Better you should use B&W film.

 

[Sw1tchFX]

12 magenta is alot. Try color negative film, slide films have never been good for night time exposures. Buy a roll of Portra 400, rate it at 200, and expose for longer than usual and you should get better results. Not to mention, color negative is cheaper than slide, or B&W to process.

 

[Paul Ron]

Just look up WRATTAN FILTERS and you'll get this chart explaining em......

Wratten number - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Correction... it is a warming filter. I once used it to shoot tungstin lights to make em look cooler on daylight film. Still stumped on th e warming thing.

 

[Josh66]

Not to mention, color negative is cheaper than slide, or B&W to process.

Not true if you do it yourself - which you should be doing if you shoot a lot of film. It's really very easy...

Color (C-41 or E-6) isn't even that hard. A little more expensive than B&W (the chems cost more), but still much cheaper than sending it out. PM me if you want more information on that...

The ONLY "hard" part about color is temperature control, and that isn't really that hard if you have a water heater (I'm talking about the big one that heats your tap water - not some special thing just for film).


The most 'high tech' thing you need to develop color film is a thermometer.


I will admit it - developing color film sounded scary before I did it... Now that I've done it, it's so easy that I don't even know what I was worried about.

The hardest part is waiting for the chemicals to get to the right temperature...


BTW - if you shoot B&W, you really should be doing it yourself... There are so many different film/developer combinations that DO affect the end result... Why leave that up to a lab that likely processes everything in D-76 (because it is like a general purpose developer that will generally give OK results for any film)?

 

[den9]

when you develop black and white film i understand a typical scanner doesnt give the same results as printing the pictures. do you usually print all 36 to see which ones you want to keep? it seems like a lengthy and expensive process.

i reallllly want to learn how to develop and print, i hope to take a class at a community college

 

[Josh66]

You'll want a film scanner. Not the same as printing, but comparable to displaying digital photos on the computer. (By scanning, you're basically converting it to digital)

I only scan the 'keepers'. Figure anywhere from $150 to $1000 for a film scanner - depending on which model you get.


Developing is easy, and you don't even need a darkroom. All of the steps that must be done in the dark can be done in a changing bag. Printing - yeah, you need a darkroom for that. (Or a bathroom that you can make light-tight.) The initial investment (tank, reels, bottles, etc) will maybe be around $150 or less. The first batch of chems will be about $40. That will be good for a hundred or so rolls (B&W)...

For $200, you can have everything you need (other than a scanner) - chemicals included. Less if you are a frugal shopper...

 

[den9]

isnt the whole point of black and white film to print it on special paper? doesnt bw film not scan well?

sorry for all the questions i just did any of this stuff. i did watch videos and understand the developing part.

 

[Helen B]

would taking multiple short exposures prevent failure? also any recommendations on filters? i heard 81A is a good filter? any examples or comments on that?


edit



Fuji Velvia 50
Up to 1 second - No exposure compensation required
From 4 seconds - +1/3 and 5M colour compensation filter
From 8 seconds - +1/2 and 7.5M colour compensation filter
From 16 seconds - +2/3 and 10M colour compensation filter
From 32 seconds - +1 and 12.5M colour compensation filter
Above 64 seconds - not recommended


what exactly are these filter numbers, i tried searching with no luck

I'll try to answer some unanswered questions.

I find that it is better to think about reciprocity failure as being more a light intensity issue rather than an exposure time issue. Star trails are a good example - the exposure time does not have much effect on the brightness of an individual trail, it only affects the length of the trail.

When film is exposed the energy in the light (in the photons) temporarily creates unstable single atoms of silver. Those single atoms can either join up with other single atoms and become stable latent image centres, or they can turn back into silver ions. (This is all very simplified) At low light levels (low light intensity at the film plane) this means that the chance of a stable latent image being formed decreases. Therefore that game of chance has to played for longer than a simple reciprocity calculation would suggest. Thinking of it this way suggests that a series of short exposures is no better than one long exposure, which is usually borne out in practice.

CC filters are available in the six primaries - the three additive primaries (red, green and blue) and the three subtractive primaries (cyan, magenta and yellow). The number represents the optical density of the filter in that particular colour. The optical density is measured in log units, so they can be added (ie a CC025M plus a CC10M makes a CC12.5M (The usual designations don't have decimal points in them, for example an 025 can be read as a 2.5). These numbers have nothing to do with decamireds, which are used for colour temperatures and colour temperature differences.

The easiest and cheapest way to experiment with them is to buy the flexible polyester (often incorrectly called 'gelatin') filters made by Lee and others. (There are real gelatin filters, which are very high quality and very expensive) If you are shooting negative film. or reversal (slide) film for scanning but not projection, you may not need the CC filters - just correct in printing or scanning.

When shooting reversal film for documentary/journalism purposes I used to carry CC10M, CC20M and CC30M filters, but that was mainly for shooting under fluorescent light. A CC10M filter is fairly pale, by the way, and of marginal benefit. I arrived at these filters by testing with polyester filters, then bought B+W screw-in filters in the strengths that seemed worthwhile. I'm afraid that neither I nor my clients were fans of Velvia, so I have no experience with it for long exposures.

B&W film can scan very well - usually the higher the scanning resolution, the better the more the scan looks like the film.

An 81A was/is very common with daylight reversal film, used in daylight or flash. It warms the image slightly, which is felt to be preferable to the technically correct colour rendition. A colleague of mine always uses an 81A fixed behind his lens when using reversal film, even though it is always scanned before use.

Best,
Helen

 

[den9]

thanks for the answers, do you have an answer for the film printing question, as in do you print all of them or would scanning then printing the ones you want be the way to go?

 

[Helen B]

I look at the negs with a loupe, then decide which ones to scan or print. If you are just learning to 'read' negs, the scan them all at low resolution or do a contact print if you have a darkroom. (This answer refers to B&W neg film processed at home)

Best,
Helen