Slide/Transparency Film -Do you use it?

dave lackey

dave lackey

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Spring is here! Well, for some of us...🙂

For some unexplained reason, I want to shoot a lot of slide film! I have missed the gorgeous images for a long time.

Do you shoot slide film these days?

If so, what is your end use? In the past, slides were much fun. I still want to shoot some 120 slides this year, badly. But what do you guys do with your beautiful images?
 
All get scanned.
35mm ones get loaded into a tray and projected. Though to be honest it's been a while since I hauled out the projector.

I need to remember to shoot duplicates - one for scanning, one for projection.
 
I print them and sell them. Love the colours. I shoot C-41 more just because it is a lot cheaper. A lot cheaper...

This is either Provia or Astia. I need to check my notes.

 
Scanned. I still have same projector from times I was using nothing but slides. I remember how it was melting emulsion on these slides as well.
And just like back then, I put slide film in the camera and it lasts forever.
 
In the film days of my career about 65% of my work was transparencies from 35mm to 11x14. I shot many thousands of sheets and rolls. I've got to say I really miss shooting transparencies. Large transparencies, especially 8x10 and 11x14, will knock you out they're so beautiful. If I could I'd go back to film entirely right now.

The problems with film in the commercial world are, if you handed a roll or sheet of 8x10 transparency film to an art director today he or she wouldn't know what to do with it. If prrchance the AD know what it was there are very few prepress houses that could do drum scans.

I don't shoot as much as I'd like to personally but when I do I scan them and digitally print them.
 
Huss said:
I print them and sell them. Love the colours. I shoot C-41 more just because it is a lot cheaper. A lot cheaper...

This is either Provia or Astia. I need to check my notes.

Click to expand...

Nice image, Huss...🙂

Is that a 35mm stitched image?

I am trying to figure a novel way to use slides. One of the cool things I have seen is inserting slides into the decorative openings in vintage movie film reels and mounting the reel with some backlit frame. Still not sure how that was done.

I think I would like to shoot duplicates and crank up my projector, maybe even go out on the patio to view the slides on a sheet or something across the backyard! Cookout and fire pit, drinks, etc.🙂
 
Although I've shot Velvia I never understood the big attraction. It's saturated but it's very contrasty. First of all your tonal range is very limited compared to Provia or Ektachrome 100VS for example. For scanning if you're working with a contrashy film you can't really reduce contrast and you can't extract information in the films highlights and shadows that doesn't exist. Lower contrast films like Provia and Ektachrome VS are much easier to expose and scan. Actually Fuji made a film specifically for scanning. Astia was low in contrast with moderate color saturation. It wasn't snappy like Provia but it scanned perfectly. When you scan you can easily add contrast and saturation but it's hard or impossible to reduce contrast.
 
I stopped shooting slide film and went 100% digital for my color work in 2011. That summer, my son and I went on a road trip to New Mexico and spent a couple weeks out there. I shot 40 rolls of 120 transparency film in a hasselblad.

By then, all E-6 labs in Indiana had closed down. I had to send them to chicago, and it cost me over $400, and many of the rolls came back with scratches on them. That was the last straw for me. I liked shooting slide film, but digital is giving me better quality, cheaper, with no hassles.
 
I was given about a dozen rolls (mixed, mostly Velvia 50/100 and Ektachrome 100) a year or so ago, so I've shot a few. It's fun, and I had them mounted in case I ever want to project them, but they've been scanned and used that way primarily. For me it's really just an experiment, and in that it's been successful in that I got some images I like while working within the limitations of the film. I shoot so little color generally that it's not a huge expense whether it's C-41 or E-6.
 
I shoot colour slide film as much as I can (afford that is), usually Velvia 50 and 100, but also Agfa CT Precisa (Provia offcuts, I understand) and I recently bought some Provia 100F to try.
I'm so parsimonious with it though that, like KoFe, a roll stays in my camera for a long time. The stock in my fridge is already mostly expired.
Kodachrome, of everyone's blessed memory, is what I miss. Kodak's impending revival of Ektachrome is good news as far as choice goes, but I never liked it much when it was around first time. My Ektachrome slides from the late 70s are all faded/gone funny while my Kodachrome slides have held up much better.
I mostly have my film scanned now, but I have a collection of slide projectors and boxes of slide mounts ready for when I pull my finger out. A projected slide is a thing of beauty and a slide show is like going to the cinema (assuming you don't fall asleep during the boring bits).
 
pyeh said:
I shoot colour slide film as much as I can (afford that is), usually Velvia 50 and 100, but also Agfa CT Precisa (Provia offcuts, I understand) and I recently bought some Provia 100F to try.
I'm so parsimonious with it though that, like KoFe, a roll stays in my camera for a long time. The stock in my fridge is already mostly expired.
Kodachrome, of everyone's blessed memory, is what I miss. Kodak's impending revival of Ektachrome is good news as far as choice goes, but I never liked it much when it was around first time. My Ektachrome slides from the late 70s are all faded/gone funny while my Kodachrome slides have held up much better.
I mostly have my film scanned now, but I have a collection of slide projectors and boxes of slide mounts ready for when I pull my finger out. A projected slide is a thing of beauty and a slide show is like going to the cinema (assuming you don't fall asleep during the boring bits).
Click to expand...

Peter,

Love it! I just finished pulling my own projector out and doing a little slide show in the living room with 10 year old slides of our grandchildren... I had forgotten about those and we thoroughly enjoyed seeing them again. Our prints languish in the archive boxes... our digital images languish in our now dead computer and backup drives. But, the slides were in action tonight and I must say the retro fun was amazing!!!

SLIDES PUT THE FUN BACK INTO PHOTOGRAPHY!🙂

I think I can afford about 10 rolls this year... to start with... can't wait to dig out all the really old slides!!!
 
Slide film is great. There's nothing like seeing a transparency in your hand. The bigger the better. As far as printing goes, right now I can't print in my darkroom so any color has to be sent out from scans, so it doesn't really matter to me. Slides of course are a bit harder to control, in terms of contrast, but easier to scan. Color neg is great too, and I shoot that as well, depending on the situation.

Once I find a decent color head for my Beseler 45MX, I'll have to shoot primarily color neg if I am going to print myself. But I will still shoot positives because they are a lot of fun.
 
I used to shoot little else but 35mm slide film,mainly Ektachrome and Velvia. I'm not taking too many slides in 35mm now, but I do a lot with 120 Velvia in the Hasselblad for projection. 35mm slides have mostly given way to digital, which I view on the iMac. But give me time, and I'll shoot more 35mm Velvia one of these days.

I did a slide show years ago on Missouri's rivers and springs. I compared Kodachrome, Fujichrome, and Ektachrome. The film that gave the truest colors (for those subjects) was Ektachrome EPP-100. It showed the deep blue of the springs and the green vegetation growing in the springs and rivers with the truest colors.
 
When I look at images like these (below) shot on Kodachrome I can see why people like slide film (some slide film). Too bad Kodachrome is now gone though I understand Ektachrome is back.

http://reelfoto.blogspot.com.au/2012/06/glory-that-was-kodachrome-old-color.html
shorpy-archive-4x5-kodachrome-andreas-feininger-columbia-steel-worker-geneva-utah-1942.jpg
 
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