Provia 400 @ 3200

[egpj]

Th recent thread about pushing Neopan reminded about long ago asking about pushing Provia 400 to 3200 or 4800. Well in answer to the question I posted I have received the results of my own work. In the interest of showing the results in the most unbiased way I have not done any adjustment besides resizing and saving to jpg (as if that wasn't enough). These shots were exposed and processed for 3200.

 

[CosmicCharlie]

Looks really good, reminds me of the old 3200 agfa slide film
thanks for posting those

 

[dmr]

Did you process these yourself or have a lab do it?

 

[Flyfisher Tom]

Glenn,

I love these 'extreme-push' experiments

They have a very interesting look about them.

The grain seems to have been remarkably well-preserved. Hard to tell on a jpg, but what did you think of the color fidelity from viewing the slides on a light table?

I'm curious as well, did you process these yourself?

 

[egpj]

No I had them processed at a lab in Gainesville. The lab can only push up to 3 stops from what the guy told me. I bet that they can go another stop though. The slides look just beautiful. When I scan, I do it at 16 bit per channel so the final image is frigging huge (like 140 megs) so when you scale down and save out as jpg you are not losing anything but color fidelity. That's what I see when I save out to jpg anyway. Colors not being as vibrant. The box on Provia 400 says you can push up to 4800 with acceptable results. After looking at these I believe it! When I get back to the house I will scan some more and post them but the whole roll looks like this. I used a Nocti wide open for most of the shots so I really was dealing in some low light.

I have heard that shooting slide has a similar dynamic range as shooting digital. So far I like the results I have gotten out of this stuff.

 

[jwcat]

Glenn, I live in Ocala, would you list the name of the lab please?

Thanks...John

 

[plexi]

Wow, looks good. And it will be really interesting to see how the new Provia 400X will hold up, as it is a lot less grainier than the current 400 accoding to Fujifilm.

 

[egpj]

The Harmon Flair Lab located at

4111 SW 35th. Terrace
Gainesville, FL 32608

It is sort of hidden away in a small office/industrial type area. Here is the webpage as well.

http://www.showprints.com/contact.php?store=flair

They do a good job. I have probably put 6 rolls of E-6 through them and every one has been spot on so far. I would consider their job very professional.

 

[egpj]

Here are some more off that roll.

 

[rogue_designer]

great results! Much better than I was getting pushing UC400 neg film.

Thanks for sharing this kind of experiment!

 

[Fedzilla_Bob]

I enjoy digital and color, but I haven't felt satisfied with available/low light results. These shots are very nice and they have me rethinking chromes and camera choices.

I especially like the color and light on the organ with hymnals.

 

[BJ Bignell]

I'm very impressed. Now that I know it can be done, I'm sure I'll find a way to make myself dangerous... The photo with the turntable is wonderful; it has a mysterious, almost sensual feeling to it.

All of these pictures show excellent colour balance, regardless of light source. It makes me want to ask: Are you sure you or your scanner didn't introduce any colour balancing?

 

[egpj]

I enjoy digital and color, but I haven't felt satisfied with available/low light results. These shots are very nice and they have me rethinking chromes and camera choices.

I especially like the color and light on the organ with hymnals.

That was one reason why I shot so much Black and White film. The pretty poor low light characteristics and the high grain with some of the films I tried (fuji 1600 print film to name one). But you can see in these examples that the colors really pop even after converting to jpeg. I will have to find a lab that can push Provia 400 to 4800 and try a roll like that. I have to add that it was not cheap to get this roll developed. The lab charged an extra 2 dollars for every stop they pushed the film. I think the total was around 12 dollars when I got out of there.

I used my handheld meter (a good meter is a big help) for all shots and they came out just like you see here. I couldn't believe the colors did not need any correction as well. All I can say is that I must have gotten lucky in that respect. All the print films I ever used needed color correction including some of the Kodak 800 that I had used in the past. No, no color correction from the scanner software. I purposely do not use color correction from the scanner software and if I ever need to do anything like that I use Photoshop CS.

The organ image was taken in Lakeland Florida. There is a college there and most of the building were designed by Frank Loyd Wright. I took that picture inside the chapel at the college.

cheers

 

[egpj]

I'm very impressed. Now that I know it can be done, I'm sure I'll find a way to make myself dangerous... The photo with the turntable is wonderful; it has a mysterious, almost sensual feeling to it.

All of these pictures show excellent colour balance, regardless of light source. It makes me want to ask: Are you sure you or your scanner didn't introduce any colour balancing?

If you look above the turntable you'll see that the light is very neutral white light. That helped allot. Here is another from outside the club. Very red, ehhh.

 

[BJ Bignell]

Well, I'm very impressed. I guess using a good incident meter would make a huge difference, as in-camera metering gets pretty shaky at ISO3200, not to mention difficult when you're shooting in such dark conditions. Like I said before, this is something that I will definitely be trying.

Not entirely related to this subject, but I've always been impressed with Provia films in general. Provia 100F has always been good to me, and doesn't require any exposure adjustment for long exposures up to 30s (which is very helpful for interior/architecture shots). I've seen some of my Provia 400F shots, but not in detail yet, and they look good, too.

Cheers,
BJ

 

[kully]

Bloody hell, that's amazing. Would it be possible to link to a full-sized image of one of these? I don't mind hosting if that is a problem.

I took rolls of Provia 400F with me on holiday but only pushed to 800 after getting discouraging advice on pushing any further... You've completely changed my mind and I've just ordered six rolls of this stuff, one for experimentation and the rest for a holiday/wedding in August.

I'm going to shoot a roll at 4800 too, the results should be up in three weeks or so...

 

[ajuk]

Bloody hell, that's amazing. Would it be possible to link to a full-sized image of one of these? I don't mind hosting if that is a problem.

I took rolls of Provia 400F with me on holiday but only pushed to 800 after getting discouraging advice on pushing any further... You've completely changed my mind and I've just ordered six rolls of this stuff, one for experimentation and the rest for a holiday/wedding in August.

I'm going to shoot a roll at 4800 too, the results should be up in three weeks or so...

And this is the old Provia 400f not the new Provia 400X.