Peter Klein wrote:
>> Thanks to everyone who contributed to the "Colour Films" thread. Very
>> informative. How about a similar thread on black and white films?
>>
>> I *love* good B&W pictures, having grown up on books about the golden age
>> of photojournalism. I used to do all my own darkroom work, but gave it
up
>> in the 80's for lack of time. Since then it's been mostly Kodachrome 64.
>> Or lately, (shudder) color print film to please my wife, who doesn't like
>> having to wait for a slide show to see all the pictures.
>>
>> Lately I've been toying with the idea of shooting B&W again, especially
>> after seeing some of the beautiful B&W shots by list members. I've
>> noticed that B&W pictures often look better on a computer screen than
>> color pictures (perhaps because the bandwidth used by color information
>> can be used for better resolution and brightness gradation?).
>>
>> Anyway, my feel for B&W film is based on using 1970s Tri-X and Plus-X,
and
>> occasionaly Panatomic-X. What are the current films like in comparison?
>> How do the current true B&W films compare to color-chemistry based film?
>>
>> What's a good film for long tonal range, luminosity, texture and that "I
>> can't believe you didn't shoot that with a larger format" feeling? And
>> what's good for the existing-light slice-of-life pictures?
>>
>> Opinions wanted.
Hi Peter,
apart from Ken Norton's excellent posting, there doesn't
seem to have been much response to your query (it mustn't
be as contentious an issue as slide films :-) so I'll
weigh in with my experiences even though they aren't
based on very much.
I used a lot of Ilford B&W film when I was a student
(bulk-loaded to keep the cost down) mostly FP4, but also
HP5 and some Pan-F (this was before the Deltas appeared).
Developer was usually ID11 (D76) at 1:1 and I was generaly
quite happy with the results.
When TMAX 100 and 400 came out I switched to those, lured
by the promise of finer grain, but I wasn't able to consistently
get either the granularity or the tonal quality that these
films are supposed to be capable of. Developer was TMAX at
first (expensive!) and HC110 later.
During my brief post-graduation stint as a stage photographer
I continued using TMAX 400 (and P3200) but when - towards the
end - I switched to Tri-X, I liked the results better.
(I have seen other people's comments to the effect that the TMAX
films require very precise development if they are to give their
best. The "traditional" films (Pan-F, FP4, HP5, Tri-X, etc) are
reckoned to be more forgiving of imperfect technique, with the
Deltas falling somewhere in between.)
Taking up photography again in the past year, I have returned
to Pan-F and HP5, developed in Xtol. I'm scanning at the moment,
rather than enlarging, but the results are quite good and the
negatives themselves look wonderful (not the case with every
developer).
I have also tried Delta 3200 (finer grain than TMAX P3200) and
I will probably try the Delta 100 and 400 at some point but for
now I'm sticking with what I know.
For me, Xtol is the Big News in black-and-white at the moment.
It seems to offer a near-perfect blend of characteristics and
both old- and new-technology films do well in it.
I haven't tried the chromogenic films (XP2, TC400N) but I suspect
that being dye-based they might scan better than silver negatives.
My benchmark for "I can't believe you didn't shoot that with a
larger format" is still Technical Pan. That said, I'm actually
*using* Pan-F, because it's faster, cheaper and easier to process,
even if it doesn't have quite the same sharpness and fineness of
grain as TP.
Hope this helps,
-Brian
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