What's a soft, low contrast 35mm 400iso black and white film?

Andrea Taurisano said:
Plain and simple Fomapan 100 and 400 gives rather flat (in my definition "dull") contrast, which probably can be a good starting point for you. Worth trying, especially since it's the cheapest film available..
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What are you developing them in? I used to shoot Foma 400 a lot and in LC29 it had some pretty strong contrast. It seems a bit more balanced in ID-11, but far from flat:


Bleeding Light by Tony Gale, on Flickr

And in Rodinal it's predictably grainy, but again, I wouldn't say it was "flat". This was wide-open with a Canon 35/1.8 in LTM in the lowest of low light - I want to say the exposure was either 1/30 or 1/20, for reference.


Robyn in the Hoop by Tony Gale, on Flickr

The one thing I will say that Fomapan 400 has going for it as far as an "old school" aesthetic goes is that I don't think it's anti-halation layer is quite as good as HP5+ and Tri-X; I've noticed a fair bit of glow/glare on Foma 400 shots with lenses that don't normally have that sort of look (see the forest photo above, which was taken with the V1 15mm Voigtlander Super Wide Heliar, for instance).
 
Here are some tests I did with one camera, one lens, two developers (100 & 200 Rodinal, 400 HC110) and three Fomas (100, 200, 400). I developed all at box speed, but metered the 400 @ 320: https://www.flickr.com/photos/markjw...57720031247932

All three films all have some elements of vintage look to them. Maybe 200 has the most; though it is the most advanced of the three (from what I gather). Maybe it was formulated to look vintage?
 
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