Slide film emulsions: past and current

efix

efix

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Hello everybody.

I've been using the search, but could not find what I am looking for. I am interested in a list of past and current slide film emulsion. In essence: which slide films are now discontinued, and which are currently available?

Also, does anyone know of a resource that show sample pictures of as many different emulsions as possible?

Thanks!

EDIT: From what I can gather from online resources, currently available (if partially discontinued) emulsions are:
Agfa CT Precisa 100 (discontinued?)
Fujichrome Astia 100F (discontinued and hard to get)
Fujichrome Provia 100F
Fujichrome Provia 400X
Fujichrome Velvia 50
Fujichrome Velvia 100 (discontinued?)
Fujichrome Velvia 100F
Fujichrome Sensia 100 (discontinued!)
Kodak Ektachrome E100G
Kodak Ektachrome E100VS
Kodak Elite Chrome 100
Kodak Elite Chrome 100 Extra Colour

EDIT2: So far I have shot Provia 100, Velvia 50, Sensia 100 and Elite Chrome 100. Provia 100 is contrasty and has very vivid yet natural colours. Velvia 50 is very warm, very contrasty and very saturated, tends to be easily underexposed and should be rated @ EI 32 or 40 if processed E-6. Sensia 100 is rather warm, too warm for my taste, and has "muddy" colours, as I feel. Elite Chrome 100 has very natural colours, medium contrast and wonderfully blue blues, however greens are a bit pale.
 
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I use flickr for samples mostly... They have a lot, and samples on forums such as rff are likely to be corrected in some way, photos on flickr are more likely to be straight scans.
 
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3M... Ansco... Ferrania... Gevaert... Ilfochrome (I think)... Orwo... Polaroid... Konica... Mitsubishi (I think)... Sakura... Scotch... That's just manufacturers, not individal films, off the top of my head, though I know there's overlap (3M/Ansco/Ferrania/Scotch, Sakura/Konica)

Cheers,

R.
 
efix said:
Hello everybody.

I've been using the search, but could not find what I am looking for. I am interested in a list of past and current slide film emulsion. In essence: which slide films are now discontinued, and which are currently available?

Also, does anyone know of a resource that show sample pictures of as many different emulsions as possible?

Thanks!

EDIT: From what I can gather from online resources, currently available (if partially discontinued) emulsions are:
Agfa CT Precisa 100 (discontinued?)
Fujichrome Astia 100F (discontinued and hard to get)
Fujichrome Provia 100F
Fujichrome Provia 400X
Fujichrome Velvia 50
Fujichrome Velvia 100 (discontinued?)
Fujichrome Velvia 100F
Fujichrome Sensia 100 (discontinued!)
Kodak Ektachrome E100G
Kodak Ektachrome E100VS
Kodak Elite Chrome 100
Kodak Elite Chrome 100 Extra Colour

EDIT2: So far I have shot Provia 100, Velvia 50, Sensia 100 and Elite Chrome 100. Provia 100 is contrasty and has very vivid yet natural colours. Velvia 50 is very warm, very contrasty and very saturated, tends to be easily underexposed and should be rated @ EI 32 or 40 if processed E-6. Sensia 100 is rather warm, too warm for my taste, and has "muddy" colours, as I feel. Elite Chrome 100 has very natural colours, medium contrast and wonderfully blue blues, however greens are a bit pale.
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Hi,

AgfaPhoto Precisa 100 is not discontinued.
But it is a relabeled film. Until last year Kodak Elitechrome 100 was in the box, now it is Fuji.
Lupus Imaging, the company who has licensed the right to use the name AgfaPhoto for films, is often changing the films in their boxes.

Fuji Astia 100F is only discontinued in 35mm, not in the bigger formats. There is an official statement from Fuji Japan on their website (only in Japanese).
In Germany getting 120 Astia is no problem. Some distributors even have 35mm in stock.

Fuji Velvia 100 is not discontinued.

Then you have forgotten to mention Rollei CR 200. This film is made by Agfa-Gevaert in Belgium. It is the original Agfa RSX II 200 emulsion coated on a PET-base.
It's by far the worst slide film on the market: Extremely yellow cast, very grainy, low resolution.
If you need higher speed Fuji Provia 400X is much, much better in every respect.

Concerning your description of the films I have to disagree in some respects:
- Fuji Provia 100F ist not contrasty, it is a medium contrast film
- Sensia 100 is only a little bit warmer than Provia, and don't have "muddy" colors; Sensia 100 has very natural colors, that's the reason why this film was the most used film by European wildlife photographers
- Velvia 50 is exposed best at ISO 50/18°.

Cheers, Jan
 
Double Negative said:
and of course it goes without saying, Velvia (50)!
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Amen! 😀

I shiver every time I see Velvia slides projected. Beats watching digital megapixels on screen any day.

BTW, any opinion on the Ektachrome 100VS? I just ordered a couple of rolls to see how it compares with Velvia 50 and 100.
 
I recently bought 20 rolls of Ektachrome 100 GX because it was very cheap (I've never seen rolls of slide go for less than 90 NOK a roll, these were 60), and because developing slides at the local place is really cheap. I haven't got any rolls developed yet, though.
 
Double Negative said:
Here's a shot from E100G, 35mm:
img181.jpg
Click to expand...

cool pic. 🙂 looks like very neutral colors from the E100G. although I think you will agree that scanning slides for digital share is the worst crime committed. The chromes look so yummy by themselves, even when just held in hand up to light, especially if they are MFs.

I have been told that 100VS is Kodak's answer to Velvia's saturated colors. Will see.
 
Roger Hicks said:
3M... Ansco... Ferrania... Gevaert... Ilfochrome (I think)... Orwo... Polaroid... Konica... Mitsubishi (I think)... Sakura... Scotch... That's just manufacturers, not individal films, off the top of my head, though I know there's overlap (3M/Ansco/Ferrania/Scotch, Sakura/Konica)

Cheers,

R.
Click to expand...

That's quite an impressive list! I forgot to mention though that I'm specifically interested in 135 format films. Do these manufacturers sell 35mm slide film, and if yes, do you know where it is obtainable?
 
efix said:
That's quite an impressive list! I forgot to mention though that I'm specifically interested in 135 format films. Do these manufacturers sell 35mm slide film, and if yes, do you know where it is obtainable?
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All 35mm, all discontinued, mostly long, long discontinued. I misunderstood the original question, I fear, as historical rather than shooting.

Cheers,

R.
 
Lomography has their own 100 and 200 speed E6 films, I think they are Agfa emulsions, but I'm not sure.

I've also tried Argenti Godochrome, I've no idea what that is, if it's their own stuff, or rebranded something else. It's still being made, anyway.
 
kmallick said:
Amen! 😀

I shiver every time I see Velvia slides projected. Beats watching digital megapixels on screen any day.
Click to expand...

Every slide film on the market beats digtal megapixels in projection.
The difference is huge.

We have directly compared current slide films, projected with Leica Pradovit PC slide projector with Leica Super-Colorplan projecting lens with the 10000€ Leica Prodovit 1200 beamer.

The beamer looks like crap in comparison to the slide projection.
Two different worlds.
The Beamer is decades behind in technology.
2 Megapixels is ridicolous low for projection purposes.
But thats the maximum available.

Slide projection is the king class of color photography:
Highest contrast range, best color brillance, highest sharpness and resolution.
A league of its own.
Unsurpassed.

kmallick said:
BTW, any opinion on the Ektachrome 100VS? I just ordered a couple of rolls to see how it compares with Velvia 50 and 100.
Click to expand...

Excellent film: High saturation, but still quite natural. Very good skin tones (much better than Velvia).
More grain than all three Velvias, sharpness and resolution comparable to Velvia 50.
Velvia 100 and Velvia 100F have finer grain and higher resolution than Velvia 50 and Kodak E100VS.

Kodak Elitechrome 100 ExtraColor is the amateur version of E100VS. Available in 135 only.

Cheers, Jan
 
thegman said:
Lomography has their own 100 and 200 speed E6 films, I think they are Agfa emulsions, but I'm not sure.
Click to expand...

The ISO 200 Lomo slide film is from Agfa-Gevaert (Aviphot chrome 200 = Rollei CR200 = Agfa RSX II 200 emulsion on PET base),
that's right.
The ISO 100 Lomo slide film is Kodak Elitechrome 100.

Cheers, Jan
 
HHPhoto said:
Hi,

AgfaPhoto Precisa 100 is not discontinued.
But it is a relabeled film. Until last year Kodak Elitechrome 100 was in the box, now it is Fuji.
Lupus Imaging, the company who has licensed the right to use the name AgfaPhoto for films, is often changing the films in their boxes.

Fuji Astia 100F is only discontinued in 35mm, not in the bigger formats. There is an official statement from Fuji Japan on their website (only in Japanese).
In Germany getting 120 Astia is no problem. Some distributors even have 35mm in stock.

Fuji Velvia 100 is not discontinued.

Then you have forgotten to mention Rollei CR 200. This film is made by Agfa-Gevaert in Belgium. It is the original Agfa RSX II 200 emulsion coated on a PET-base.
It's by far the worst slide film on the market: Extremely yellow cast, very grainy, low resolution.
If you need higher speed Fuji Provia 400X is much, much better in every respect.

Concerning your description of the films I have to disagree in some respects:
- Fuji Provia 100F ist not contrasty, it is a medium contrast film
- Sensia 100 is only a little bit warmer than Provia, and don't have "muddy" colors; Sensia 100 has very natural colors, that's the reason why this film was the most used film by European wildlife photographers
- Velvia 50 is exposed best at ISO 50/18°.

Cheers, Jan
Click to expand...

Thanks for the info, Jan!
You're right, Provia 100F is not really contrasty, I think I got something mixed up there. And my problems with Sensia were do to the camera acting up, so most shots ended up with weird colours (the lens is not colour corrected) and underexposed, giving me and the scanner a hard time.
BUT I am certain that Velvia 50 *IS* to be rated at EI 32 or 40. This is an observation many photographers have made when having it processed by E-6, and I even read an official statement from Fujifilm that Velvia 50 is *ONLY* then to be rated at EI 50 when its processed by Fujifilms proprietary CR-56 process (which is only slightly different from E-6, but enough to make a difference of 1/3-2/3 stops).

EDIT: Someone really should make a slide film database!
 
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100VS is a warm and high saturation film. I wouldn't call its colors natural... It emphasizes reds at the price of also making too warm other colors that should remain cool... Of course that can be good or bad depending on the scene... It's used a lot for product photography.

Cheers,

Juan
 
HHPhoto said:
The ISO 200 Lomo slide film is from Agfa-Gevaert (Aviphot chrome 200 = Rollei CR200 = Agfa RSX II 200 emulsion on PET base),
that's right.
The ISO 100 Lomo slide film is Kodak Elitechrome 100.

Cheers, Jan
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Good to know, I bought some Elite Chrome and some Lomo Xpro 100 for a holiday, and they're the same thing! Thankfully the the Lomo stuff was not much more expensive.

Any ideas what the Godochrome is:

http://www.argenti-photo.com/es/argenti-godochrome

?
 
efix said:
.
BUT I am certain that Velvia 50 *IS* to be rated at EI 32 or 40. This is an observation many photographers have made when having it processed by E-6, and I even read an official statement from Fujifilm that Velvia 50 is *ONLY* then to be rated at EI 50 when its processed by Fujifilms proprietary CR-56 process (which is only slightly different from E-6, but enough to make a difference of 1/3-2/3 stops).
Click to expand...

That was true for the first version of Velvia 50, which was produced until 2005.
Then production stopped due to delivery problems with raw materials.
Fuji did research on new raw materials and introduced a new Velvia 50 in 2007. Almost identical in it's characteristics to the former version, but with real ISO 50/18° in both Kodak E6 and Fuji CR-56 process.

Cheers, Jan
 
HHPhoto said:
That was true for the first version of Velvia 50, which was produced until 2005.
Then production stopped due to delivery problems with raw materials.
Fuji did research on new raw materials and introduced a new Velvia 50 in 2007. Almost identical in it's characteristics to the former version, but with real ISO 50/18° in both Kodak E6 and Fuji CR-56 process.

Cheers, Jan
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Ah, thank you very much for your clarification! Then probably the online source where I found that information was actually referring to the old Velvia.

Either way it seems to be VERY sensitive to underexposure -- I've had a hard time scanning the one roll I shot.
 
efix said:
Ah, thank you very much for your clarification! Then probably the online source where I found that information was actually referring to the old Velvia.
Click to expand...

No problem, you are welcome.

efix said:
Either way it seems to be VERY sensitive to underexposure -- I've had a hard time scanning the one roll I shot.
Click to expand...

That is right. Velvia 50 is the slide film with most contrast and lowest dynamic range of all curent slide films.
All the others are much easier to handle in this respect.
The color slide films with highest dynamic range are Fuji Astia 100F and Sensia 100. Followed by Provia 100F, E100G, Elitechrome 100 and Provia 400X.
And some BW slide films are even better in this respect.

If you like color slide, I recommend trying BW slide as well.
Has it's own unique look, different from BW prints.

And in Germany getting BW slides developed is very easy and convenient.
I recommend www.photostudio13.de

Cheers, Jan
 
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