Color: Slide film or negative film?

[Nick R.]

I never had a problem with slide film in my Hexar Silver. Even the automatic exposure system did a great job.

BTW, did these cameras have leaf shutters and could the inaccuracy of the shutter speed compensate for the shutter inefficency? Just a thought.

You're right! I should have said "except my Hexar Silver" which takes beautiful slides.

They were all leaf shutter cameras. Canon, Konica, Yashica (only at top speed).

 

[dmr]

DMR, when I measured the shutter speeds of all the fixed-lens RF's I could get my hands on, none of them measured up to the stated values, esp. on the high end.

Nick, not to hijack this thread, but what did you use to check the shutter speed?

I've given both of my RFs the sanity check with a TV screen, and they seem to be more or less accurate, but I know this test is not the best and I'm trying to think of something simple that will be more accurate. About the only thought I can come up with is to shoot some exposures of something that rotates at a known accurate speed and measure some angles.

 

[Nick R.]

I used a laser and a large area photodiode. I opened the back of the camera and place the diode at the film plane. I read the output of the diode on a Lecroy digital scope. I used a low-enough impedance to negate the capacitance of the diode.

One test that you can do for a shutter-priority camera like the Canonet (and I didn't think this up but read it here: http://www.photo.net/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg?msg_id=00HTZp&tag=) is to shoot the exact same scene on B&W film at different speeds in succession, i.e., 500, 250, 125, etc. Every negative should look identical. I suspect that they will get denser as you get to the faster shutter speeds.

 

[Ronald M]

Negs scan just fine on my Minolta 5500 and 4x5 color neg on my Epson 4870. They do not have off colors or any other probelems and both machines scanned them fine right out of the box.

Profiles can be set and saved up in both machines if you want to adjust color or contrast or you can import the files to photoshop to do anything creative you wish to do like increasing color saturation.

Now you can send the files to be printed or saved to be projected with a digital projector.

If you only want to project, slides are the way to start.

Color neg is cheaper to process, more places do it, and the film is more readily available. On top of all this , you can adjust the exposure post development, something that is much more difficult with slides even with duplicating films.

Do not consider making slides from negs. The process is a royal pain and the slides are not sharp when you are all done. Stay away from this at all costs. It is worse than duplicating slides.

Further I don`t know if Vericolor print film or slide dup films are still made.

 

[dmr]

I used a laser and a large area photodiode. I opened the back of the camera and place the diode at the film plane. I read the output of the diode on a Lecroy digital scope.

Thanks. I was curious on how you did it.

There are a couple pages on the web that kind of use a similar technique, using a PC sound card as a makeshift oscilloscope. I don't think I want to get that complicated.

One test that you can do for a shutter-priority camera like the Canonet ... is to shoot the exact same scene on B&W film at different speeds in succession, i.e., 500, 250, 125, etc. Every negative should look identical. I suspect that they will get denser as you get to the faster shutter speeds.

Hmmmm ... that sounds like it might be a good sanity check.

Any particular reason why you need B&W film? I would think that you would want something more like a color slide film so that errors or differences in exposure would show up more obviously.

Speaking of which (to steer this thread back on topic) I don't remember where this discussion happened (Usenet?) but a while back somebody remarked that it's really the reversal processing (and not the film itself) that's responsible for the way that slide films have less latitude and tolerance. He (I think it was a he, anyway) said that when he cross-processed Ektachrome as color negative film, he got an exposure latitude similar to regular color negative film.

 

[Nick R.]

. . .
Any particular reason why you need B&W film? I would think that you would want something more like a color slide film so that errors or differences in exposure would show up more obviously.
. ..

You want to eliminate the printing process as a source of error. You will be examining the bare negatives for any changes in density. Maybe a color negative would also work, but I can never look at a C-41 color neg and make any sense of it.

 

[Finder]

The nature of the slide means that certain "tricks" used by those who design films cannot be used - the orange contrast reducing mask so familiar from colour neg being one.

The orange intragal mask has nothing to do with contrast. It simply stops blue light from reaching the magenta (green) and cyan (red) layers (it is hard to make an emulsion that is not blue sensitive). Slide film has the same thing, but it is removed during processing for obvious reasons.

 

[Flyfisher Tom]

Thorsten,

Difficult question, there are a lot of people who prefer color negatives because it is more forgiving, cheaper, and easier to process.

I switched to slides years ago. I was on a trip and in an absolutely gorgeous place in Montana, on the Gallatin river. The colors in the sky, in the grass, on the water were just amazing. Took photos with the color negative film. Came home and if reflected NONE of the color fidelity I remembered with my eyes that day. Moreover, it looked totally flat, no dimensionality at all.

After that trip, I switched to Velvia and Provia slide film. I view slides on a lighttable. And here are slide film's strengths:

1) superior color fidelity - the transparency effect of viewing slides on a lighttable reflects the truest color fidelity in my experience

2) dimensionality - with slide film, you see a 3-D dimensionality to your photos, makes you feel you were right there again

Weaknesses:

1) 5 stops total exposure range ... so you have to meter accurately. But that isn't really a weakness since with proper care and practice, metering accurately is not really difficult

2) more expensive and scarcer to buy

3) more expensive and scarcer to process

In the end, I use slide film, and continue to use slide film, because the strengths of slide film (how the film renders what my memory of that moment) is more important to me than the downsides.

If you have a long trip, simply prepare with enough film, and wait till you are home to process.

As for the metering/forgiving argument, one should meter properly with either slide or negative film. So I don't really view it as a valid argument in the first place.

Try one roll of slide film versus one roll of color negative on the same subject, you will be blown away by the differences.

good luck

 

[GeneW]

Good thread -- I'm enjoying all the insights. I think slides are very compelling for nature shooting, but less so for street shooting where the longer exposure range is preferable and a bit of grittiness adds to the ambience. I do like the Fuji 400 and 800 C-41 films for general city shooting, but would not like them for a trip to the Alps.

Gene

 

[Ted Witcher]

Not to hijack, but here's a quick question: my Velvia shots tend to go blue outdoors. This is a daylight-balanced film, of course, so can someone explain something about color temperature to me that I'm missing? What are your tricks for avoiding this blue cast? Thanks.

 

[dmr]

Any particular reason why you need B&W film?

Maybe a color negative would also work, but I can never look at a C-41 color neg and make any sense of it.

I admit that when I did the recent sanity checks, I had trouble telling a one stop difference in many of the color negatives.

However, when I put them in the scanner and did a prescan without auto exposure, the difference was very obvious. This one here is not the best example, but it's one I can get to right now.

These are screen captures of scanning 2 negatives exposed one stop different, same scene, both on the underexposure side.

When I look at the negatives, if I didn't remember which one I shot first, I would not be able to tell which was which. When they are (pre)scanned, they show what appears to be just a bit more than one stop difference between them. The example below is a screen shot of two of the five.

 

[Nick R.]

Good choice, DMR. A scanner is a good tool for comparing exposures and would work well for color.

Slides should cost less to process than prints. I pay half the price to process slides as prints in the NYC area.

 

[Flyfisher Tom]

Slides should cost less to process than prints. I pay half the price to process slides as prints in the NYC area.

Nick, I'm paying $8 per roll of slide processing. Do you have a better price? If so, could you recommend your processor? thanks

 

[butch]

Don't mean to butt in but I'm sending my Velvia to Fuji via Wal-Mart. 36 exposure roll costs around $5.00. Takes about a week. Am very pleased with results. Funny, but Fuji won't put them on CD.

 

[timbedsted1234]

I became a slide film devotee because of its ease to store. Later I learned that at times slides are preferable to print film because the process previous to printing may change the colors of the scene just because (as it may occur with the nice pink tones from a sunset, which may be altered in print film).

BTW, print film is very forgiving, but slide film has some tolerance. It's less than the C-41 stuff, but it's there (like half-stop either way). You should use it, Thorsten... because, in Europe, you may not be able to shoot Kodachrome: it's not easy to find and only developed in Switzerland. Try using Kodak and Fuji films, though... and, given your preferences, I know you'll pick Ektachromes.

You can get Kodachrome from http://discountfilmsdirect.co.uk/shop/acatalog/Colour_Silde_film_Process_Paid.html

It is no more of a hassle to develop than developing ordinary slide film, and it has that special tone and contrast

Cheers,
Tim

 

[Flyfisher Tom]

Thanks Robert ... I'll look into Walmart and see what my local turn around time is.

 

[sf]

I expose slides very carefully - especially Velvia 50. My general method is to slightly overexpose Velvia 50. Very slightly. VERY VERY slightly. I aim to meter about 5% higher than I would with a C41 film.

With the other slides films, I've always just aimed where to meter best and fired the shutter. Never had a single blooper fromt the RF645. Had a number of bad ones from the Mamiya 645E.

 

[thorsten]

I am surprised by these huge amount of answers (and opinions ). Thanks a lot for this interesting thread; I'll definitely give slide film a try, perhaps I'll just test myself through the different options.

 

[keithwms]

Slide film can do wonders for slightly flat lighting; e.g. ona recent trip to Arizona I was faced with abnormally un-contrasty lighting and found that velvia 100 really saved the day.

But for more contrasty light, I reach for fuji pro s almost every time. Rate it at 125 if you want more slide-like saturation.

Ted what's going blue on your slide film, the shadows? Remember that the colour temp can be quite different in the shadows and, yes, slide film really sees that. I get good results with velvia 100 though. But I do recall seeing bluish shadows from velvia 50.

 

[mackigator]

I like the workflow of slides when going digital - look at them on a lightbox, grade them, scan the best, toss the worst. With negatives I have to preview everything on the scanner just to find the good ones - more time.