CatLABS X FILM 320 (35mm) and 80 (120)

Since Panatomic X is discontinued, finding a suitable substitute is reasonable.

I have ordered both - Shanghai GP3 film from China and CatLABS X 80 . It will interesting to compare them

Mikhailc said:

I have ordered both - Shanghai GP3 film from China and CatLABS X 80 . It will interesting to compare them

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I look forward to hearing of your experiences and comparisons to both.

I have just run a roll of the 120 film through my camera this weekend and I noticed the white frame numbers on the backing paper much more vivid than the last time I used Shanghai GP3. I also noted that the film sub-straight is thicker. But for me is the fact there is much less curl than I am used to. I was very happy with the results I got developing in my home brew Parodinal.

Oxleyroad said:

I look forward to hearing of your experiences and comparisons to both.

I have just run a roll of the 120 film through my camera this weekend and I noticed the white frame numbers on the backing paper much more vivid than the last time I used Shanghai GP3. I also noted that the film sub-straight is thicker. But for me is the fact there is much less curl than I am used to. I was very happy with the results I got developing in my home brew Parodinal.

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I was impressed with the lack of curl also

Mikhailc said:

I have ordered both - Shanghai GP3 film from China and CatLABS X 80 . It will interesting to compare them

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Looking forward to the results . . . hurry! LOL

John Galt said:

Looking forward to the results . . . hurry! LOL

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Delivery to Ukraine and customs clearance here takes some time – please be patient!

BAC1967 said:

This was a long exposure, I was just guessing on the time. It would be nice to know the reciprocity, some of my other long exposure shots were quite underexposed from what I was expecting. This was developed in beer so that seems to work good. I need to mess around with it some more before I decide how much I Really like it.

Nizo Heliomatic Trifo by Bryan Chernick, on Flickr

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That's a very good result. What kind of beer?

lpt10 said:

That's a very good result. What kind of beer?

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I used Rainier Beer for that one, it's a local cheap lager in the Pacific Northwest.

EdSawyer said:

Too much hype, not enough info. How about for for starters: who's coating it, base type, emulsion formula (t-grain?) details, etc.

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That is indeed a good question!
If I would bring out a new film I would state the following for introduction :
We proudly presents.......XYZ
We earnned much more than the expected 500.000,- from our crowndfounding campaign!
We spent full 18month to design film parameters with several tests in cooperation with Ilford!
The film is produced there!
We have several further formats on scedule !

with regards

PS : If a manufacturer can't tell us I also begin to ASK :Why??

CatLABS said:

We have just launched our new line of films.
No doubt some will ask "what rebranding shenanigans are going on here?" and rightly so, as so many "new" films are just different packaging of more of the same or old stocks of film pulled out of deep storage.

We are happy to say that CatLABS X FILM 80 (at the moment only available in 120 roll film, but sheet film is in the cards for the near future), is a fresh, new emulsion not currently available in another packing form. With that said - it is clearly finished by one of the existing facilities of film manufacturing, that cannot be avoided, as there are so few of those and there are none such independent facilities not making film for the general public.
In a nutshell, this is a traditional emulsion, following in the footsteps of Panatomic X, with a very fine grain and deep tonal range.

This film is now in stock and is making its way to retailers around the world (and the US of course).
This film is currently with a number of Beta testers, and we will be posting samples soon.

As for CatLABS X FILM 320 - we are almost sold out of the initial very small scale test production run - we will soon have news about this as we ramp up to a large scale production, with a different, and all new emulsion (not available anywhere else). Stay tuned for news on this. We will be updating ASAP when this is ready.

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No worries CatLABS - BECAUSE :

Also bad publicity is publicity....

with regards

Richard Man said:

Maybe go through the Massive Dev Chart and do a match based on dev times for different developers ;-) My bet is Shanghai GP 100

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Richard - Sean from Photrio has not allowed to lift that curtain such early!
But OK so if you've done it - lets talk about :
Could you imagine a film at ISO 100 can be produced from simplest modification at ISO 80
version? And how much would it higher its positive characteristics?
Much more like you shot em with E.I. ISO 80 ? Have you tried Shanghai at E.I. ISO 800 ?

with regards

MattKing said:

There are coating facilities out there.
There are finishing facilities out there.
Films coated by one entity aren't necessarily finished by the same facility.
Just think what fun we would be having if the Shanghai finishing facility had a bunch of old Kodachrome sealing tapes on hand.

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OK more of that Matt - are there plans in China to revive Kodachrome!!!!!!!!!

Come on Matt tell us the true!

with regards!

PS : PE hasn't answered!

PPS : Seriously I had the need of 3 min. to come to conclusion on GP3 - missed this Photrio thread
in total! But after reading most posts here I will change my mint in concerning of
Catlab !

No need to blame this manufacturer folks!

Because cats will love Chinese food :




Because : CatLAB smack the cat!




!

Who cares who makes it. It's a film offering from a full range dealer of analog photography products. Seems reasonable in price. I have a freezer full of Acros and TMY2 in 120, so I'm not in the market right now. If I was buying something else from Catlabs I would give it a try. Results indicate it's a nice film.

I understand what they’re doing, because I’ve poked around figuring out the best way to get my dry plate emulsion coated onto film or paper.

With *small* coating lines costing half a million bucks easy to set up from scratch ( I shit you not), the logical choice for me is to reach out to a company that provides “web” (i.e. film) coating services. So if I were to do that, it would be *my* emulsion or emulsion formula, tailored to coat film instead of glass (plasticizers, different surfactant, etc), and coated by the service provider to my requirements.

That’s pretty much what CatLabs is saying they did, though I’m not sure if they designed the emulsion themselves and then the coater followed a recipe to make the emulsion on-site, or rather CatLabs generated a set of requirements for the coater’s emulsion maker to meet.

For those of you familiar with how businesses interact with each other, likely CatLabs and the coater signed an NDA (Non Disclosure Agreement) which would prevent sharing of trade secrets including who they are working with unless by mutual consent.

Those are my thoughts, for what it’s worth. It makes perfect sense to me what they described without the conspiracy theories. I ordered a couple boxes to check out (if/when I can find time to shoot some actual film instead of plates) and support another photographic small business.

Cheers,
Jason

There is an interesting review here of Shaghai GP3 for comparison here;

https://www.davidjtoman.com/blog/2018/5/gp3

In particular he describes it as;
'I have found it to have smooth tonality and medium to strong contrast, with very fine grain when rated at the box speed of 100 ISO. Many photographers compare it to the beloved (now also discontinued) Kodak Plus-X, a native 125 ISO panchromatic film with fine grain and medium contrast. That said, I have pushed it two to three stops many times, and love the resulting rich shadows and strong contrast. When pushed up to 800, the grain remains silky smooth and does not become chunky or brittle, and contrast increases as can be expected'. (nb. Catlabs compare it to Panatomic X rather than Plus X).

Shanghai (Shanggong Shanghai Photosensitive material factory) has being producing film since 1958. They ceased production in 2015/6, restarting in 2016/7 (depends on source) according to article now using imported acetate base material. Shanghai GP3 is sold in roll and 4x5 and 8x10 sheet film only.

Catlabs states the X film 80 has an E.I of 80 (expose at 80 or 100 for similar results), which suggests its really a 100 ISO film. They also state is can be pushed to an EI of 800. The initial order size is quoted as 10k rolls which isn't a lot in coating terms, about 530m of typical 1m wide coating. They are also offering it in 4x5 and 8x10 sheet film.

Even if it is repackaged GP3, and thats a long standing approach with film given very high costs to produce a new emulsion, with the relative scarcity of this outside China, its a useful addition to the market place, although into a fairly crowded market sector.

Available in 4x5 and 8x10 now. I was told that Beau Photo in Vancouver will carry it.

I'm pleasantly surprised by the CatLabs 80. I've had a 120 roll of it sitting around for months, and have always assumed I'd hate it, so I didn't expose it - till yesterday. I shot one roll at 50ASA, using my Minolta Autocord and processed it in Xtol 1:1. Here's a sample.