>Subject: [OM] Black & White films
>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?
Oh, this is real easy too. Kodak T400CN. Grainless, huge exposure range,
and develops in C-41. I absolutely love this film as it can be shot at ISO
400 and it gives you as finely detailed and grainless image as say Ilford
Pan-F at ISO 50. When blowing this up to a 11x14 you would swear that it
was from medium format. Lens image falls apart before the grain structure.
This film can be shot two stops over or two stops under and still gives you
more exposure range than most real B&W films shot at their prime ISO
setting. The only problem with this film is that you can't seem to find
Zone 0 or 10 with it--shadow and highlight detail hold forever. You print
this film slightly differently than with normal film as you end up trying
to crunch the range a big. Some people claim that the shots are a bit
muddy in the middle tones. I haven't seen that, but just possibly TMAX 100
might be just a hair better in the middle tones--though not enough for me
to worry about.
I've completely changed over to T400CN for all of my B&W work now as I am
not really a "grain man" and this film truely does mimick the next size up
in negative format.
Just as an example of the sharpness and exposure range of this film, I did
a test strip print of a portrait blown up to around 20x24. I printed the
eye area and the eyelashes held detail and you could not only make out the
shape of the umbrella flash in the eye but also the spars in the umbrella.
(of course this is a testiment to our fine Zuikos too)
Because of the layered dye emulsion the film is sharper when overexposed.
Therefore your highlights are a bit sharper than shadow detail too. I
generally have been shooting this film around ISO 200 because of the
sharpness issue, but unless you are examining a 11x14 print with your loupe
you will not see the difference.
Other films worth noting: Tri-X is still around, but thinner emulsioned
than in days past. TMAX still blocks up on the highlights but has
fantastic tone. Ilford Pan-F is really really sharp and has beautiful
tonal range.
Ken Norton
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