Aristacolor Print Film from Freestyle

[Ektagraphic]

Hello- Has anyone ever worked with the Aristicolor Print 100 film from Freestyle? I need some 12 exposure rolls for my photo club and they seem to be the only option. Does anyone know what brand of film this actually is? Thanks
Patrick

 

[mts]

No results yet, but I bought a 100' roll that I will be using in the next few weeks and I will let you know how it compares to my preferred film Portra 160NC. The latter is getting difficult to find in long rolls that I prefer. Long rolls let me fill cassettes with the length I need for the occasion.

 

[Ektagraphic]

Somewhere in my travels, I believe that I read that is is Solaris print film made by Ferrania. I should seriously consider a bulk loader.

 

[nickrapak]

Hello- Has anyone ever worked with the Aristicolor Print 100 film from Freestyle? I need some 12 exposure rolls for my photo club and they seem to be the only option. Does anyone know what brand of film this actually is? Thanks
Patrick

If you are interested, ultrafine online has several brands and speeds of 12 exposure rolls, ranging from 79 cents per roll for their own brand 200, to $1.29 for Fuji 200.

 

[bob100684]

Somewhere in my travels, I believe that I read that is is Solaris print film made by Ferrania. I should seriously consider a bulk loader.

which I would never bother putting through my camera. I HATE that stuff so bad.

 

[WGibsonPhotography]

which I would never bother putting through my camera. I HATE that stuff so bad.

What's so bad about it? I've never used it. I'm just curious

 

[Photo Engineer]

Check grain, color fidelity, sharpness and dye stability. For the latter you will need about 20 years for it to be valid, but by then, who cares. You saved some $$$.

I remind you that Kodak and Fuji have the cutting edge dye stability technology. All dyes fade, but theirs fade more slowly than anyone else's dyes. Ilfochrome is a print material and another case entirely.

So, go ahead. Save $$$ on pictures taken with an expensive camera. With other color films, they may not last. IDK.

PE

 

[WGibsonPhotography]

Check grain, color fidelity, sharpness and dye stability. For the latter you will need about 20 years for it to be valid, but by then, who cares. You saved some $$$.

PE

dye stability is the least of my worries. I scan my color negs and process them in a manner in which I must not speak. Fine grain and sharpness is another matter, though. I like my color prints, darkroom or printed with dark side technology, to be sharp, detailed, and fine-grained. Ironically, I like the grainy (but still sharp) look of HP5+ in rodinal for my B&W stuff

 

[Photo Engineer]

Well, check out the magnetic stability of your media then. And good luck.

If you print them, the dyes may have a problem too. Image spread will give you blurry images in about 10 + years or so.

again.

PE

 

[WGibsonPhotography]

Well, check out the magnetic stability of your media then. And good luck.

again.

PE

Yeah, I've considered, that, and I think I have enough backups to prevent permanent loss of any files on the computer (hard drive, external hard drive, and DVD). Hopefully I wont lose all three at once. I do keep the negatives in glassine sleeves from Freestyle, so I could always scan them again if I need to. Luckily for me, I shoot Kodak almost exclusively for color, so I think I have the dye stability thing taken care of. (I usually shoot Ultramax, but would like to shoot more Ektachrome)

 

[Ektagraphic]

Well I am only going to use these for quick work and will probably throw away the negs after anyway. I do always use Kodak.

 

[WGibsonPhotography]

Well I am only going to use these for quick work and will probably throw away the negs after anyway. I do always use Kodak.

good luck, and I hope it's not crappy film

 

[AgX]

Check grain, color fidelity, sharpness and dye stability. For the latter you will need about 20 years for it to be valid, but by then, who cares. You saved some $$$.

I remind you that Kodak and Fuji have the cutting edge dye stability technology. All dyes fade, but theirs fade more slowly than anyone else's dyes. Ilfochrome is a print material and another case entirely.

So, go ahead. Save $$$ on pictures taken with an expensive camera. With other color films, they may not last. IDK.

PE

You can rely on internal tests of Kodak's own and their competitors' films.
But where are public figures of independant tests of recent(!) films to be found? I have not come across such.

 

[Photo Engineer]

AFAIK, there are no reliable independant tests.

Since this is not a Kodak film, I have no idea what it may be like. I had good results with a late run of Agfa color, but some earlier films did not keep well pre-exposure.

PE

 

[bob100684]

if you want to see what the stuff is like before committing $30 to it......you can usually Solaris film loaded in $1 store disposable cameras. Obviously image quality dependent on the lens won't be up to your normal standards, but you'll get to see the huge grain and horrible colors.

 

[mts]

OK, I recently tried some of this film that I have noticed for several years in the FreeStyle product lists. My result applies only to my own scratch-mix C41 clone chemistry, with the caveat that the chemistry works beautifully on Kodak and Fuji C41 films. I tried to get a usable negative by extending development time to 6 minutes for images exposed at ASA 100, but to no avail. To get decent images I had to expose at ASA 50 and extend the developer time to 4 minutes. Images exposed at ASA 100 simply don't reach threshold at the toe of the curves. The shadows are empty.

Arista is not going to be my choice for CN film, ever. In my opinion, FreeStyle isn't doing anybody a service by selling this film. Years ago I used 3M film and some other cheap C41 store brands and got acceptable results from all of them. Arista 100 images exposed at ASA 50 are somewhat better and development time can be reduced to perhaps 4 minutes to get a usable negative, but the film does not appear to have large dynamic range.

On the plus side, the film is easy to bleach and fix. Arista negatives begin to clear when the fixer bottle is brought near the tank. I suspect the reason being that Arista 100 contains minimum silver halide in its emulsion (read cheap for that). Of course with little silver halide it is difficult to produce decent dye concentrations leading to empty shadows.

With so much really good film available I have no idea why anyone would try to economize with Arista film. Kodak Gold 200 is cheap also and is far better for the average user. Perhaps the Arista result might be different with official C41 processing, but I doubt that the results are going to be acceptable for anyone who is the least bit discriminating.

Certainly for someone starting out in color work I cannot recommend this Arista 100 film. Buy Kodak Gold and learn with a product that is proven. If I can get some decent images from Arista I will post a negative scan or two.

 

[jd callow]

wow this sounds interesting is it made in 120?

 

[Ektagraphic]

Nope. Only 35mm.

 

[cmacd123]

Hello- Has anyone ever worked with the Aristicolor Print 100 film from Freestyle? I need some 12 exposure rolls for my photo club and they seem to be the only option. Does anyone know what brand of film this actually is? Thanks
Patrick

I have used the 400 from time to time. The film is (was) Ferrania formerly known as Imation formerly known as 3M formerly known as Ferrania.

I understand that ferrania has closed their film production as of the end of 2008. Freestyle only shows broken lines of the Arista now, they used to have 12, 24 and 36 exposures of 100, 200, and 400 ASA as well as 100Ft bulk rolls.

 

[mts]

Here are two samples of negative scans from Arista 100 that was exposed at ASA 50 and processed 3.5 min in my scratch-mix C41. Processing time in the developer was 3.5 min at pH 10.2. The negative Dmax is a little light and the saturation is low. Both exposures were made with Minolta 7000 auto settings using a Minolta 28 mm lens. The MacBeth chart picture is about 1/3 of the entire negative, and the St. Michael Mtns. picture is a full frame scan. Both images are flat sunlight illumination.

The negative scans were made using Nikon 9000 ED auto settings. The scan brightness was adjusted down about 10% with PS to yield these images. Arista film might be acceptable to some who plan only to scan, but certainly it's not likely to be acceptable for printing. With such low saturation it will be very difficult to make acceptable prints, in my opinion. On the other hand, because the film is advertised as inexpensive for students, it might be just the thing to use for learning. If you are able to make good prints from these negatives then you probably have pretty much mastered color printing.

Saturation might be improved somewhat by rating the film at ASA 25 and reducing development time to say 3 minutes, but the contrast isn't very good as it is at ASA 50, and will suffer further by shortening development time or increasing the developer pH. I am just guessing when I conclude the film simply doesn't have enough silver content to yield good color saturation. The color balance doesn't appear too bad, but one cannot really compare with the really excellent films that are in today's market.

 

[mts]

Arista 100 film isn't the best for resolution either. Dye clusters are somewhat large and diffuse. Here is a full-frame 35 mm picture (a runoff into Water Canyon) and a detail section I scanned at 4000 dpi.

I should also mention that the Arista film base is somewhat thinner than either Kodak or Fuji products. The thinner base makes it more difficult to achieve the slight curl that is necessary to load Nikkor reels, but other than that problem, it doesn't seem to matter.

 

[2F/2F]

It doesn't look as bad as all that, and the price is right. It looks overexposed and scanned to me. I might just have to try me some.

 

[popeetheus]

Looks like an interesting film. Those scans look fine to me, especially if you are going for that effect. I'd like to find a film that would be close to the old 5035 Kodacolor II for those times when I don't want such a modern look.

 

[kodachrome64]

If you want cheap, go with some Fuji Superia. Or even Ektar 100 for that matter is quite a bit cheaper than Portra. Of course it depends on what you are shooting but I am with PE on the dye stability issue...and I wouldn't be very quick to say that doesn't matter because I have a hybrid workflow....

There are plenty of digit@l equivalent "dye stability" issues that photogs are dealing with now, except they are trying to figure out how to keep their files on magnetic media and wondering if they'll be able to open them in 20 years. To me, buying the brand-name film (if at all possible) is worth the assurance of knowing you have the best chance at having an image several decades from now.

 

[Ektagraphic]

It's not that I want to go cheap,(I don't like cheap films at all) it is just that I need 12 exposure rolls.