B & W Slide film?

[BWGirl]

Hi All!

I've been wondering about 35mm B&W slide film. I know that Agfa has a product...Scala 200. Has anyone here used it? If so, how did you like it?

I started going to a camera club & they all seem to shoot color slides (I'm the B&W freak of the bunch). Anyway, if I'm going to sway them to the colorblind side I'm thinking slides may be the answer...

Thanks!
Jeanette

 

[ann]

It is the only one left on the commercial market. It is pricey and there are only a few locations that process that film. So be prepared for managing the timeline. I have seen great stuff .

There are some who have tried developing other b&w films with "homebrew" , am sure there are some formula out there , i may have some in my files and will check .

 

[Shesh]

You can also use TMX rated at ISO50 and process it per the recommendations from Kodak. Check it out on their website.

 

[photomc]

Or you can check this out at Freestyle photogrpahic..PF has a kit to create slides from TMX 100 as mentioned above...

http://www.freestylephoto.biz/sc_prod.php?cat_id=&pid=574

Good Luck.

 

[titrisol]

.dr5 labs process slides from almost any BW film.
They reccomend some of the EFKE, MACO, FOMA films due to their clear base.

AGFA Scala has a formidable reputation, I didn;t like the reversal processing of TMX.
I'd rather make copies of my negatives into BW film thus a positive.

 

[juan]

A photographer at my camera club submitted some B&W slides once. The judge was perplexed. "Surely there must be some color somewhere in this photograph." After looking at the second slide, she said (and to steal a line from Dave Barry - I am not making this up) that when her club goes on a group shoot, someone always wears a red coat. Someone puts on the coat and stands somewhere in the shot to be sure there is plenty of color.

You must go into competitions with the right attitude to withstand criticism like that. Go get them. Good luck.
juan

 

[jd callow]

The Kodak chromogenic (c41) films rated at about iso 25 and developed normal in e6. The resulting slide has great tonal range and a cyan tint.

 

[Les McLean]

If you can source a lab to process Scala and are prepared to pay the asking price I'd strongly recommend it. I tested it when Agfa first introduced it and the results were stunning, the quality not necessarily the images, so much so that Agfa used the images for publicity.

I remember testing a Tetenal product that produced reversals from black and white film and had decent results from FP4 and Fuji Neopan 400.

 

[clogz]

Foma make a B&W reversal with and a kit to do your own developing. J&C may sell these.
Hans

 

[Flotsam]

Used to process B&W reversal with the Kodak kit (Where you achieved reversal by re-exposure) once in a while. The last time was a whole 3 screen 12 projector slide show. That was _lots_ of reversal hand processing!

The results are really awesome, mainly due to the extended tonal range of a projected image over a paper print. The bright highlights are actually bright light rather than merely as white as light reflecting off of a sheet of paper. Also, the huge size of the projected image adds to its grandeur. The big drawback is that you can only share them properly by projecting them.

 

[doughowk]

Problems with Agfa Scala in USA, only 3 labs to process it. I used Duggal in NY & they did excellent job. The price: $8 per roll of film + $8 for development. Like all slide films & unlike B&W negative film, you have to be right-on in your exposure. Then there is printing: you can scan but alot of scanners have problems with B&W positive, they try to interpolate in the shadows often producing scanner artifacts. For traditional prints, only means I now of is color paper for transparencies. Despite all those negatives (pun?), I'd continue using it. But as Juan mentioned the camera club judging is amazingly stupid, especially with B&W slide film.

 

[gma]

I have seen an architectural slide show with all Agfa Scala slides. I haven't seen anything that compares. It is processed at only 3 labs in the US as I understand, but it is well worth a try.

 

[Konical]

Good Evening,

Some years (make that decades!) ago, I made B & W slides simply by copying negatives onto Kodak High Contrast Copy Film. My originals were anything from 35mm to 4 x 5. If I recall correctly, I developed the positives in either D-19 or Dektol, but I don't have the details at hand. The process worked well, and I also remember using it to produce B & W slides from color negatives. High Contrast Copy is, of course, no longer available, but Technical Pan would seem to be a good alternative. A little experimentation is necessary to lock in exposure and development times, but, once that's done, future results are highly predictable. I found that the projected slides were much more effective for instructional purposes than even large-sized prints would have been.

The advantages of this method are that just about any negative film can be used in the original shooting and still be available for ordinary printing; only specific negatives can copied as positives rather than devoting a whole roll to reversal processing; no special, infrequently-used processing is needed; multiple slightly varying exposures can be made quickly; and a little cropping can be done, easily with roll film and 4 x 5 negatives, and, provided that your close-up equipment gets beyond 1:1, even with 35mm original negatives.

Konical

 

[BWGirl]

Thanks for all the input! I will do some more investigating before I buy some & try it.

Juan - that was a great bit! People are amazing in what they see & do not see! haha

I'm just thinking of doing it for the club. It's not any sort of contest, but I think it would be cool for a presentation to the club. They all kind of look at me like I'm a rare animal on loan from the zoo! Except...one of the older gents confided in me that he actually has an enlarger and is thinking about setting it up again! BWHAHAHAHA (evil laugh)!!!

Jeanette

 

[modafoto]

I've been wondering about 35mm B&W slide film. I know that Agfa has a product...Scala 200. Has anyone here used it? If so, how did you like it?

I have used it for a few shots, and here in DK we are so lucky to have a company that develops them. It costs approx. $9 per roll and I send them the films and they return it within a week. Very nice service.

 

[Annemarieke]

I have used Scala a lot recently, for details in nature. It is absolutely stunning material. The tonal range is amazing. To mee it is "fibre" quality in slide film.

In Holland it is quite convenient to have Scala developed. The only lab that develops that film is in Amsterdam. Envelopes are sold with the film that include development and postage. It only takes about 3 days. I often send my rolls straight from Scotland to Amsterdam, and find my rolls all nice and ready when I come home. OK, so it is not cheap, but it is absolutely beautiful!

There is only one downside to Scala, it is very hard to scan properly.

Good luck.
Anne Marieke

 

[titrisol]

BW girl, I may insist that it'll be easier to borrow a slide copier and copy negatives into clear base film (MACO has one) and develop to have a negative of a negative aka positive.

 

[gma]

For your first venture into B&W slides I recommend Agfa Scala if you have time to send away for the processing. The quality is excellent and you do not need to buy any new equipment or supplies. You can always try the DIY approach to B&W slides at a later time. I hope you are not so impressed with Scala that you will stop doing your own darkroom work.

 

[mobtown_4x5]

I've been thinking about using Scala for my first go at "alt" process contact prints- shoot 4x5 Scala and throw it in the enlarger to eliminate the "interpositive" step in making an enlarged neg. Any reason why this wouldn't work?

Matt

 

[photomc]

Another plus to B&W slides, is you can do Polaroid transfers with them using color Polaroid film. Would post an image here, but can't figure it out, so will post it for a few days in the Technical gallery.

 

[gma]

Matt,

I think that enlarging the slide to sheet film will work fine. I have made B&W ( pan film ) negatives from color slides using an enlarger. You can enlarge the Scala slides onto ortho film easier.

 

[Seele]

If you are comfortable with compounding your own solutions, the Dietrich formula (D&CCT March/April 1988) works very well with TMX, but less successful with TMY. A couple of years ago we had a shootout between TMX/Dietrich and Scala and found that the former actually has a slight edge, and when we compared the prices it is also only a fraction of using Scala.

 

[Les McLean]

For those interested, I've posted a Scala slide that I sorted out and mentioned in an earlier post in the Technical Gallery. It loses a little in the scan but it will give you an idea of how good it is.

 

[David A. Goldfarb]

For scans of lots of different films reversal-processed in dr5 check out this page:

http://www.dr5.com/Filmreview.html

If you live in the vicinity of the lab, you can see all of these on David Wood's lightbox, which is even better. I had the good fortune to do so, while the dr5 was located in New York.

 

[Mike Kennedy]

Evening,
I was given 3 kits by my local photo shop:there called Kodak T-Max 100 Direct Positive Film Developing Outfit.You can have one if you like.The only problem would be shipping.All sorts of warning logos on the box.In Canada you need a special licence to transfer the goods.(Probably why they were free,because my local camera shop doesn,t have a permit to ship them back to the distributer).
Anyhow,If you can figure out a way to comply with all the new international regs.get in touch.
Mike