Adorama Paper

ronlamarsh · Aug 28, 2012

Anybody know who manufactures paper for Adorama?

Just did some spec checking between freestyle and adorama and the listed specs for the adorama product matches the freeestyle kentmere specs exactly

Thomas Bertilsson · Aug 28, 2012

I don't know much about this paper, but I hear from others that the matte paper behaves differently from the glossy, and Kentmere does not make matte paper emulsions, so it's possible that glossy is Kentmere, but the matte has to be something else.

With only a few factories left making paper; Ilford, Foma, Slavich, ADOX, Fuji, and I'm sure I'm missing one or two - as far as I know only Ilford and Foma make a matte paper, and Fotokemika Varycon (which has been discontinued) has a semimatte surface, not flat matte like Foma or Ilford... . Ilford does not sell their own Ilford branded product as OEM product to others, so it basically leaves out everybody but Foma. I say the matte paper has to be Foma Fomabrom Variant 112, leaving the glossy more difficult to figure out.

ronlamarsh · Aug 28, 2012

could be so

Just read some more descriptions on the adorama site it would appear from their specifications that the Glossy RC product is Kentmere compare the 2 statements below:
Adorama VGRC is a high speed, variable contrast, black and white enlarging paper with a medium weight, polyethylene coated base. The paper base is 190 g/m2 coated on both sides with 40 g/m2 of polyethylene giving a base weight of approximately 270 g/m2 and a thickness of approximately 245 microns. The silver halide emulsion has a silver content of approximately 1.5 g/m2.

From the freeswtyle Kentmere specs:The paper is 190 g/m² coated on both sides with 40 g/m² of polyethylene giving a base weight of approximately 270 g/m² and a thickness of approximately 245 μm.
Coated emulsion layer
The light-sensitive silver halide emulsion layer has a silver content of approximately 1.5 g/m². This is covered with a gelatine supercoat which protects the emulsion from stress fogging and physical damage and also contains a developing agent.

I also checked out the adorama FB VC product and its description matches the edu ultra/foma paper i.e. they are the only paper descriptions I have ever seen calling themselves ISO 9001 certified the rest of the descriptions pretty well track also.

So this seems to be the reason that folks on other threads notice speed differences between different adorama papers i.e. FB and RC

tkamiya · Aug 28, 2012

We KNOW it's not Ilford.

If you wait long enough, one of the Adorama rep, Helen will show up and will tell you, because of confidentiality agreement with the manufacturer, she won't be able to say who made the paper. Simon Galley (of Ilford) has said Ilford does not make any paper for house brand, so we know it's not Ilford.

The box says it's made in EU country.

I tried RC Pearl, FB matte and FB glossy. It's entirely possible FB Matte is made by someone else. It behaves very differently from the rest.

MattKing · Aug 28, 2012

tkamiya said:
We KNOW it's not Ilford.

If you wait long enough, one of the Adorama rep, Helen will show up and will tell you, because of confidentiality agreement with the manufacturer, she won't be able to say who made the paper. Simon Galley (of Ilford) has said Ilford does not make any paper for house brand, so we know it's not Ilford.

The box says it's made in EU country.

I tried RC Pearl, FB matte and FB glossy. It's entirely possible FB Matte is made by someone else. It behaves very differently from the rest.

I'm not sure that you can definitively say it is not being manufactured by Ilford.

I think that Simon has said that they will not supply their own Ilford product to be labelled as someone else's house brand. I do believe, however, that Ilford do manufacture other products to the specifications of other parties.

As I understand it, Ilford's facilities and people are available for hire.

And they are in the EU.

HelenOster · Aug 28, 2012

tkamiya said:
We KNOW it's not Ilford.

If you wait long enough, one of the Adorama rep, Helen will show up and will tell you, because of confidentiality agreement with the manufacturer, she won't be able to say who made the paper.

Thomas Bertilsson · Aug 28, 2012

HelenOster said:

A-ha. Now we know EXACTLY who made it...

tkamiya · Aug 28, 2012

I wouldn't know if Ilford makes a third party product and sell them under completely different brand names. I do recall Simon saying this isn't the case. I really doubt it is worth anyone's trouble to make a special blend just so they can produce third party papers.

Adorama paper looks and behaves so differently from any of commonly available Ilford papers. I just use them because I like how it looks and behaves. (and it's inexpensive) In particular, FB Matte is great. Tones well and the surface is more like semi-matte than matte. I'm curious who makes it but I don't think anyone who really know will be talking....

ParkerSmithPhoto · Aug 28, 2012

Love the fiber matte paper. TK (there was a url link here which no longer exists) that has a lot of great information about Adorama papers.

My work was just accepted into the Atlanta Celebrates Photography portfolio review (only 50 photographers total from across the country, back pat) and I'm going to (re)print much of it on the Adorama fiber matte. Did I mention how much I like this paper?

ronlamarsh · Aug 28, 2012

ParkerSmithPhoto said:
Love the fiber matte paper. TK (there was a url link here which no longer exists) that has a lot of great information about Adorama papers.

My work was just accepted into the Atlanta Celebrates Photography portfolio review (only 50 photographers total from across the country, back pat) and I'm going to (re)print much of it on the Adorama fiber matte. Did I mention how much I like this paper?

In as much as the adorama FB paper seems to be FOMA(based on technical descriptions i.e. FOMA, freestyle edu ultra, and adorama all use the almost exact same technical description for their papers) I am not surprised as I normaly use FOMA/Arista EDu Ultra for all my printing the tonal scale is supberb and it tones well.

Dennis S · Aug 28, 2012

I have been debating recently whether to try this paper but with all the good things I have heard or read today it seems to be that I will order some tomorrow. I am almost out of Foretzo paper that I acquired a large quantity of and this is in my price range and have had good luck with Adorama shipping lenses etc. It is great to read about people that actually use this product and not just the opinion of the sales person. I had my order made out with Glossy paper but I see now that I should order the matte finish. Thanks again APUG.

tkamiya · Aug 28, 2012

You should get BOTH. They are completely different in characteristics.

They do have a sample pack that has 5 of each (I think) if you just want to just try it out.
Just remember, glossy is about 2 stops faster than matte. Former does not tone well but the latter does.

Dennis S · Aug 28, 2012

The toning is the reason why I discarded the glossy selection. Now I only print 11x14 so my paper selection is limited by my budget.

tkamiya · Aug 28, 2012

Ah, I see. You'll love the matte paper then. It tones beautifully in brown and selenium. The paper base is rather whitish but emulsion is quite tonable. It has a slight green cast so you might want to lightly selenium tone it if neutral black is desired. Brown tone is just beautiful.

Here's my best result out of this paper.
(there was a url link here which no longer exists)

Dennis S · Aug 28, 2012

Nice browns. I do a lot of landscape so the toning will work well for me. I also added a small order (10) of the glossy just to see.

bvy · Aug 29, 2012

Off topic for this subforum, but I'm also curious about their color paper products...

ath · Aug 29, 2012

MattKing said:
I'm not sure that you can definitively say it is not being manufactured by Ilford.

I think that Simon has said that they will not supply their own Ilford product to be labelled as someone else's house brand. I do believe, however, that Ilford do manufacture other products to the specifications of other parties.

As I understand it, Ilford's facilities and people are available for hire.

And they are in the EU.

One has to distinguish betwenn Ilford (brand) and Harman (company).
I understand that Harman told us you will not find a film / paper sold under the Ilford brand and another one. The Kentmere label is another story...

Adorama Paper

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