120 Film Characteristics & Strengths

I've purchased a 500CM and getting back into film photography. I've purchased some Fujifilm Neopan Acros 100, Kodak T-Max 100, and Ilford HP4 Plus. As I slowly experiment with these different films, several questions come to mind. My natural tendencies is to shoot fine grain film. For a variety of reasons, I will be shooting my 500CM from a tripod and I don't anticipate the need to capture action. Therefore, longer exposures won't bother me. That being said, I have noticed that several photographers who's work I admire use Kodak Tri-X 320/400. At first I assumed they were generally shooting handheld and needed the higher ASA rating. Now, I'm starting to wonder if there is some characteristic or strength to Tri-X that is the primary reason these folks are using it - not the higher speed? Sooner rather than later I hope to reach a place where I'm prepared to purchase a large quantity of film and learn to make the best photographs possible.

Here is my basic questions:

1. What are the characteristics and strengths of the 120 b&w film generally available?
2. Does my desire to develop in Rodinal versus D76 limit my film selection?

3. When it comes to grain, is there much difference is there between Acros 100, T-Max 100, HP4 Plus and Acros 100, Tri-X, HP5 Plus?

Accordingly, I wanted to tap into the APUG collective and get some comments/suggestions.

Thanks in advance.

It's largely personal experience and learning that lets people get the results they want from a particular film, tri-x being the most popular one. You can have one film and use it handheld, on a tripod, small/medium/large cameras, etc.. Not change films according to light levels, sale of the week, etc... I choose tmax400 as it's less grainy than fp4+ but good handheld in lower light too.

2. Rodinal will increase your grain size. D76 is sort of a normal grain developer. I use pyrocat hd and it's stain reduces the prominence of grain.
3. Acros and Tmax100 will be least grain. No such thing as HP4+ perhaps you mean HP5+

It might be more precise to shoot a roll of each film that you have, on the sort of scenes which you anticipate looking at in the future, and develop them carefully to the manufacturers recommendation using D76/ID11 at 1+1 dilution. The films won't ever look much better than that and you can see which results you prefer. Other peoples descriptions are subjective and constrained by their/our individual circumstances so taking the recommendations of others as 'The Truth' will be imprecise to say the least.

Having said that, one recommendation I'd make regarding film would be to not choose Acros. It is very good looking film, and has very convenient characteristics for long exposures especially, but Fuji may be the first of the big three to leave the film business and that wouldn't be helpful for you.

Also, I think your 'HP4+' should probably be 'FP4+'

Tmax 100 and Fuji Acros both work beautifully in Rodinal, with very little grain. That said, Tmax 100 has far nicer tonality in my opinion.

FP4 looks nice in D-76, as does Tri-X. Rodinal gives a grittier look, both in grain and in slightly harsher midtone gradation, with FP4, HP5, and Tri-X.

My current favorite film/dev combo is HP5 developed in PMK. I'm shooting nearly everything in medium format, in a Mamiya 6.

To me, Tmax 100 works well in D-76, Rodinal, or PMK.

Acros is good in Rodinal or PMK. Don't like it in D-76.

FP4 looks nicest in PMK and is pretty nice in D-76 and ok in Rodinal.

I agree, sadly about Acros. It is beautiful film but i would not trust Fuji to continue it for very long. FP4 seems to have a better projection of life than Acros and its development in PMK is stunning. I suspect it is equally stunning in Pyrocat HD. Not enough can be ever said about TriX. It has a look that is difficult to describe. I develop it mainly in Diafine and am surprised by the gradation I achieve. I am moving to Pyrocat HD at the suggestion of Jim Norman, who is a superior LF photographer. So far he has been spot on in his suggestions. But TriX is, I think, the Answer to all photographic problems. Old TriX was even better than the new TriX but those good old days are way behind us now and we work with what's left. So, now I recommend it developed in PMK or Pyroccat HD, Diafine, D23, D23G, Xtol, D76 or Rodinal or what you get when you order Rodinal these days. Whatever you do, use TriX and have fun with it!
Logan

JDW22 said:

When it comes to grain, is there much difference is there between Acros 100, T-Max 100, HP4 Plus and Acros 100, Tri-X, HP5

Click to expand...

There is a huge difference in grain between tmax 100 and HP5. Developer will play a huge part of this as well. I'd recommend starting with D-76/ID-11 1:1. It doesn't get much better than this for a beginner. Also if you're looking for fine grain and film speed check out Tmax 400. My favorites are FP4, HP5, and Tri-x all developed in ID-11 at various dilutions.

Thanks all for the excellent comments and suggestions - please keep them coming.

I apologize for the miscue on using Rodinal. I had mistaken a comment from another local photographer that Rodinal was a fine grain developer. Thanks for the correction.

Again, please keep the comments coming.

Personally, I'm not a big fan of rodinal. The photos look very low contrast and very grey to me. I like more black and white photos. If you want easy one shot developer, I suggest HC110. I like it better. Xtol is good too, but more maintenance.

But it's all about the look you want to achieve.

I'm currently using Plus-X and T-Max 400 developed in replenished HC-110 dilution E.

When my Plus-X is gone (sigh) most likely I'll transition to T-Max 100 in its place. FP-4+ would be another good choice.

If I had a bit more storage room, I would be using X-Tol replenished.

Modern films are quite fine grained, especially if you shoot medium format or larger.

JDW22 said:

I've purchased a 500CM and getting back into film photography. I've purchased some Fujifilm Neopan Acros 100, Kodak T-Max 100, and Ilford HP4 Plus. As I slowly experiment with these different films, several questions come to mind. My natural tendencies is to shoot fine grain film. For a variety of reasons, I will be shooting my 500CM from a tripod and I don't anticipate the need to capture action. Therefore, longer exposures won't bother me. That being said, I have noticed that several photographers who's work I admire use Kodak Tri-X 320/400. At first I assumed they were generally shooting handheld and needed the higher ASA rating. Now, I'm starting to wonder if there is some characteristic or strength to Tri-X that is the primary reason these folks are using it - not the higher speed? Sooner rather than later I hope to reach a place where I'm prepared to purchase a large quantity of film and learn to make the best photographs possible.

Here is my basic questions:

1. What are the characteristics and strengths of the 120 b&w film generally available?
2. Does my desire to develop in Rodinal versus D76 limit my film selection?

3. When it comes to grain, is there much difference is there between Acros 100, T-Max 100, HP4 Plus and Acros 100, Tri-X, HP5 Plus?

Accordingly, I wanted to tap into the APUG collective and get some comments/suggestions.

Thanks in advance.

Click to expand...

Small difference between Acros, T-Max 100, large dfference between those and FP4+, HP5+ and Tri-X.

How does Tmax 100 developed in Xtol compare with the other developers?

Nuff said:

Personally, I'm not a big fan of rodinal. The photos look very low contrast and very grey to me. I like more black and white photos. If you want easy one shot developer, I suggest HC110. I like it better. Xtol is good too, but more maintenance.

But it's all about the look you want to achieve.

Click to expand...

Rodinal does not give low contrast images. If you're getting them, you are not developing long enough.

chriscrawfordphoto said:

Rodinal does not give low contrast images. If you're getting them, you are not developing long enough.

Click to expand...

I have phrased it badly. There's a lot of greys, some people call it great tonality etc, but for me it looks like great mass of greys. I have seen some great looking photos developed in Rodinal, but I like more contrast. HC110 curve works for me, the shadows are darker and might have less detail, the highlights might be blown etc... but I like that look. Just something to consider.

JDW22 said:

I've purchased a 500CM and getting back into film photography. I've purchased some Fujifilm Neopan Acros 100, Kodak T-Max 100, and Ilford HP4 Plus. As I slowly experiment with these different films, several questions come to mind. My natural tendencies is to shoot fine grain film. For a variety of reasons, I will be shooting my 500CM from a tripod and I don't anticipate the need to capture action. Therefore, longer exposures won't bother me. That being said, I have noticed that several photographers who's work I admire use Kodak Tri-X 320/400. At first I assumed they were generally shooting handheld and needed the higher ASA rating. Now, I'm starting to wonder if there is some characteristic or strength to Tri-X that is the primary reason these folks are using it - not the higher speed? Sooner rather than later I hope to reach a place where I'm prepared to purchase a large quantity of film and learn to make the best photographs possible.

Here is my basic questions:

1. What are the characteristics and strengths of the 120 b&w film generally available?
2. Does my desire to develop in Rodinal versus D76 limit my film selection?

3. When it comes to grain, is there much difference is there between Acros 100, T-Max 100, HP4 Plus and Acros 100, Tri-X, HP5 Plus?

Accordingly, I wanted to tap into the APUG collective and get some comments/suggestions.

Thanks in advance.

Click to expand...

For HP4 Plus let's assume you mean FP4 Plus.

OK the question is simply "What do you want?"

You prefer to work with the camera on a tripod, so that opens up your choices greatly if you seek fine grain, not least by adding: ILFORD Pan F Plus, ROLLEI RPX 25 (a lovely film that lies as flat as sheet film in the negative carrier) and ADOX CMS 20 to the list of current films you could choose from.

Why do you lean towards Rodinal as a preferred choice of developer? Why is the other developer under consideration D76?

There are newer and better developers, especially for roll films, where exposures for each frame could be all different and so, in a perfect world (such as Large Format using individual sheets) have different conventional development requirements. These developers are compensating and so make it easier to get every negative on a roll in a reasonably printable condition.

You could consider Caffenol, DiXactol, 510-PYRO or OBSIDIAN AQUA to preserve your fine grain and yet still achieve sharpness.

It all depends on your answer to the question above: "What do you want?"

RR

MartinP said:

It might be more precise to shoot a roll of each film that you have, on the sort of scenes which you anticipate looking at in the future, and develop them carefully to the manufacturers recommendation using D76/ID11 at 1+1 dilution. The films won't ever look much better than that and you can see which results you prefer. Other peoples descriptions are subjective and constrained by their/our individual circumstances so taking the recommendations of others as 'The Truth' will be imprecise to say the least.

Click to expand...

This strikes me as excellent advice for someone new, or newly-returning to, film and who wants to know "which is the best film".

Bombarding people with options for using all sorts of home-brewed developers and obscure document-type films can be very confusing and unhelpful for those not of an "experimental" turn of mind; we only need make film photography as complicated as we want to or need to.

JDW22 said:

Here is my basic questions:

1. What are the characteristics and strengths of the 120 b&w film generally available?
2. Does my desire to develop in Rodinal versus D76 limit my film selection?

3. When it comes to grain, is there much difference is there between Acros 100, T-Max 100, HP4 Plus and Acros 100, Tri-X, HP5 Plus?

Accordingly, I wanted to tap into the APUG collective and get some comments/suggestions.

Thanks in advance.

Click to expand...

1 subjective cept for dynamic range
2 no
3 yes lots but unless you are cropping to16x20 or larger grain is not biggest problem

There are three types of film

conventional crystal
Tabular crystal
dye

conventional are more grainy than tabular for same ISO
and dye image have a different grain signature

conventional panf, fp4, hp5
tabular delta100, delta400, delta 3200
dye, xp2

all Ilford, Kodak only do some equivalents

if the shop has only one film I buy it if it has two I buy the cheaper, normally Forma

if you dev for the manufacturers data sheet time and temperature you should be ok the ISO is some times iffy

formapan 100 @ 125
formapan 400 @ 250

ignore box this is what the datasheet says

XP2 needs the colour negative c41 process if you have a local lab that will do 120 and not damage film it is ok otherwise different chemicals needed at home, but it is wide range and grainless at 100ISO.

I use Rodinal when Im lazy or weigh out raw chemicals when motivated.

Fuji are getting out of film Id try them for nostalgia and Kodak have been in 'eleven'... and may not last either.

There is a China company so the betting is on China, forma or Ilford being last man, Ilford have the largest selection currently.

PanF is very high contrast and on sunny day will burn highlights, Id use a soft developer if I had shot on sunny day or HP5 if I had spare back. But in subdued light Panf is grainless & easy to print.

Grain is not a problem film dynamic range is Trix and HP5 have a wide range for contrasty light - pros know this.

FP4 is slower but still has resonable wide range.

Delta400 has similar grain to FP4 but maybe more dynamic range.

Lastly the blad will crease film left in camera such that the second frame in a days sequence won't necessarily be flat I shoot a blank 2nd frame when using a larger aperture than f/8... and at home only load film in back to stop markers or use the Mamiya c330 which has straight film run.

Rely on meto forecasts, if you like PanF or use Delta100

They used to do 220, long gone.

Thanks. I'm getting my Tmax 100 processed in a lab and they use Xtol, that's why I was asking. They will use other developers but there's a $50 surcharge for setup.


This might not be the forum for it, but I scan the negatives and notice that the Epson V600 scanner only produces about 0-60% of the 0-255 histogram. I suppose that's the limit of the scanner because the contact print I got from the lab looks normal. I'm able to PS it and process the lighting to expand the range to 0-255 as per the attached. But does this look like Tmax 100 should I print it chemically? Of course, with PS you can add contrast and black and white with the slider so there's no way for me to know what would be "normal" results had I printed it chemically. On the other hand, I'm thinking, does it really matter? If the final result is something I like, especially the tones and contrast, what difference is there?

In any case, here's the original scan.

http://imgcdn.geocaching.com/cache/06a70948-932f-4076-a5cd-5bed1e54e9a5.jpg?rnd=0.6511149


Here's the PS results.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/alanklein2000/13219393413/

Does the second look like Tmax 100?

I think you've picked three good films to start with. They are sufficiently different to give you an idea as to which tonal renditions you prefer. I might add Tri-X 400 since it is such a classic film. I agree with the advice that you ought to start with a "mainstream" developer, e.g. D76, XTOL, ID-11 to start with, rather than something esoteric, such as pyro. Get the basics down first.

If you plan to print, I would also start that process as soon as possible. Most negatives will look good on a light table but may be too over or under developed to get your tones on paper.

Alan Klein said:

Thanks. I'm getting my Tmax 100 processed in a lab and they use Xtol, that's why I was asking. They will use other developers but there's a $50 surcharge for setup.


This might not be the forum for it, but I scan the negatives and notice that the Epson V600 scanner only produces about 0-60% of the 0-255 histogram. I suppose that's the limit of the scanner because the contact print I got from the lab looks normal. I'm able to PS it and process the lighting to expand the range to 0-255 as per the attached. But does this look like Tmax 100 should I print it chemically? Of course, with PS you can add contrast and black and white with the slider so there's no way for me to know what would be "normal" results had I printed it chemically. On the other hand, I'm thinking, does it really matter? If the final result is something I like, especially the tones and contrast, what difference is there?

In any case, here's the original scan.

http://imgcdn.geocaching.com/cache/06a70948-932f-4076-a5cd-5bed1e54e9a5.jpg?rnd=0.6511149


Here's the PS results.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/alanklein2000/13219393413/

Does the second look like Tmax 100?

Click to expand...

it is desirable that it will print easily on grade 2 if you ever want to wet print, but the density range on the negative depends on the lighting.