I developed my first roll of this yesterday. I shot it at EI 200 and developed it in D76 1:1 for 10 minutes. The negatives are quite dense, although the indoor shots look slightly better than the outdoor shots. They are both scannable and printable, but it took some work in PS to bring them back from the stratosphere. Also, as a result, they are a bit grainier than I had anticipated, although not outrageously so, roughly on par with Tri-X at 400.
Still, I like the look very much. Neither the highlights nor the shadows are blocked up, which is remarkable considering how dense the negs are. Any recommendations from the experts here about whether I should a) shorten my dev time, b) expose them at a higher EI of c) both? I only have one roll left, and while I think I will be buying a 400' roll when I've run through the remainder of the black and white film in my fridge, I'd like to get a better handle on this film before then.
I will post images tonight when I'm home.
Alright, here are my first batch of photos. As you can see, even at web resolution, they are a bit grainier than I would have expected.
In addition to serving as a test for my first roll of Double-X, it allowed me to test a couple of lenses I haven't shot with that much: my "Sweeney'd" 1957 ZOMZ Jupiter-3 and my uncoated nickel Leitz 50mm Elmar f/3.5 with the 11 o' clock infinity lock (what a mouthful). The camera for all shots was a Leica M6.
The Mecca of awful beer, the Anheuser-Busch brewery in Newark, NJ. Taken with the 50mm Zeiss Planar ZM.
This woman runs the sandwich/burrito place in the office park I work in, and her cheerfulness can really break up a dull day. Taken with the Jupiter-3. I think I missed the focus a little on the first shot, as I didn't change the aperture between the first and second shots, and the second one is much sharper.
My coworker Jason, who just purchased a Nikon F100, his first film camera. We were taking a short walk talking about film and how to use his camera. Taken with the uncoated 50mm Elmar (which I must say is VERY sharp for a 70+ year old lens).
The view from my seat on a flight from Newark back to Seattle somewhere over rural New York state. Taken with the Nikkor 35mm f/2.5.
I figured I should do some classic Brian Sweeney-style shots with the Jupiter-3. The streaks are rain, not defects or scratches in the film. The first shot is "close up and wide open," which is what Brian optimized it for, and the second one is stopped down to somewhere around f/8-11. The beauty of the stopless aperture of the Jupiter-3 on the M6 is that you can make sure the meter LEDs center perfectly in between proper stops if necessary.
