Neopan 400 or HP5

[Mablo]

Neopan 400 in 120 is gone forever, right?

That's correct. I assume Neopan 400 in 135 will not live much longer either. Anyway, the current exchange rate of Yen makes it more costly than the premium material Kodak makes so I don't really see the point of buying it at the moment.

 

[wotalegend]

That's correct. I assume Neopan 400 in 135 will not live much longer either. Anyway, the current exchange rate of Yen makes it more costly than the premium material Kodak makes so I don't really see the point of buying it at the moment.

Neopan 400 is gone in 120 only, and it is not for any reason to do with the film itself (the reason given was an environmentally unfriendly component in the backing paper), so there is no reason to believe that its demise will lead to 35mm going also, provided Fuji deems that there is still a market for it. And I would not say "forever" either - remember the Velvia 50 story.

With regard to price, it depends where in the world you are, and when you buy it. I buy mine from the US, the home of Kodak, but where Neopan was cheaper than Kodak until quite recently, and Legacy Pro (re-badged Neopan) was even cheaper. Having said that, I see that Neopan is slightly dearer than Tri-X at Freestyle right now, no doubt due to the weakening USD. But the real bargain seems to be Arista Premium (re-badged Tri-X).

 

[Tim Gray]

Depending on what your expectations really are, I'd say you are dreaming in getting something like Acros out of a 400 speed film. However, from what I've seen, the closest you'll get is probably T-Max 400. Don't believe the hype; it's a great film.

 

[andredossantos]

Acros is a monosize cubic grain emulsion with incorporated development accelerants. It is not a flat-grain / t-grain type film.

Marty, thanks for correcting me. I always assumed it was T-grain since it looks more similar to Tmax and Delta than other films like FP4+, etc.