Ektar 100 vs Portra 160 - what's the exact difference?

Kino said:

Just personally, I find Ektar much more "primary" and Portra more "pastel".

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thats a great description. they are both greeat films. I feel portra is more versatile. assuming you are scanning, in post you can make portra look like ektar much easier than you can try to make ektar look like portra.

BrianShaw said:

As always... these are great comparisons that show the difference. This one, however, always leaves me scratching my head.

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I was surprised too at first, but in thinking about it, I think it very clearly shows how Ektar is slightly less saturated in the green layer.

BrianShaw said:

As always... these are great comparisons that show the difference. This one, however, always leaves me scratching my head.

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With that particular comparison, I think it is important to look at other parts of the image, rather than the cars. I'd suggest the pavement.
I think there is an important difference in some of the variables, other than the film. It may be the light, and it may be the post processing.

Both are amazing film.

MattKing said:

With that particular comparison, I think it is important to look at other parts of the image, rather than the cars. I'd suggest the pavement.
I think there is an important difference in some of the variables, other than the film. It may be the light, and it may be the post processing.

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I was honing in (or was I homing in?) on differences in the reflections on the chrome bumper. If shown those two without labels I’d guess the complete opposite. And I would appear to be completely incorrect! All of the others clearly align with my experience.

Alan Edward Klein said:

Macfred Those appear to be accurate comparisons. One comment about the first with the old boats. There also seems to be more contrast in the Ektar. With the more saturated colors, higher contrast makes it "pop" even more. I don;t know if the higher contrast is from the film or how you post processed it.

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Those are C-41 lab developments - scanning was with EPSON V600; 3200dpi to tif (I set the input midpoint to 1.0, set the input blackpoint with the eyedropper to the darkest point of the frame and set the input whitepoint to 255.
Then I adjust the levels of the Red, Green and Blue channel) and sometimes I have to change the input midpoint (if my result looks to dark). Raw converter is RAWKER (an old German freeware prog);
editing software is Ribbet (for stuff like straightening, cropping, framing, down-sizing, adding contrast and at last for sharpening). If one has a well exposed negative it's done in less than 10 minutes.
And yes, Ektar looks far more contrasty than Portra (without digital ''tweaking'').

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I know we are in 100% analog here - if anybody feels annoyed please report the post.

TL;DR: The Portra looks better and more versatile overall, while the Ektar may be better for landscapes due to the better greens and reds but I like the overall color balance of Portra for a more retro look. Any opponents to this stance?

I have a very simple reason for wanting to use the Ektar - I just ordered a 5 pack which is in the mail because Ektar seemed more "popular" in responses I got and seems to be more "popular" at that speed. However if I were to choose one film over another using just the pictures above, I would overwhelmingly now choose the Portra 160 because in 2/3 photos it beats the ektar in my eyes, and I'm now wanting to return the ektar for the portra, even though it seems silly to return film. 120 film from B&H can only be bought on 5 packs.

It completely blows away the Ektar in the portrait, where it almost makes the girl look like she's from the 1940's or something with the color balance and what she's wearing which is probably brand new, and the boat looks way too dark in the ektar photo, with the wood looking terrible. In the car photo, I like the Ektar better but I think this has more to do with lighting and framing, since the lighting and overall exposure look better in the Ektar photo but otherwise they look almost the same. The portra has a more retro look, while the ektar almost looks like a digital camera (I can actually see the finer grain almost pixel fine on the Ektar, and the ektar has almost "olympus" like popping colors, but doesn't the defeat the purpose of using film, to make it look analog?)

But I have a few caveats here:

First, What do other people think about the picture of the boat? Personally I think the one with portra looks much better, I just like the overall color balance a little bit.. Plus, the wood on the boat (the main subject) looks terrible on Ektar. HOWEVER t almost looks like the pictures were taken with a different exposure, and could be the difference. The ektar picture looks much darker, including the sky which looks much much darker, the wood looks way darker, and the shadows look more "populated" on the boat. Is this a quality of the film or is there a different exposure going on here which could be a factor?

Secondly, I like the green on the boat photo more. It seems deeper and more detailed than the portra and seems like green would show up better on it. There is a lot of green in Hawaii rainforests and in Thailand, and I'm worried about losing the depth of that (I do a lot of picture taking whilst hiking). I always mention my setting, because it's different than most people. For instance, it means for me the use of slower film speed (Gold 200 via experimentation vs Ultramax) because the midday light is so high, it can require 8000 shutter speed wide open on my DSLR and sometimes wants to even go higher. For instance for me, the scenes you posted would would not occur, except for maybe the portrait, but even then the person would probably be wearing different clothing.

Thirdly, I also compared photos in choosing the Ektar (in a very subjective way) because I thought the images had finer grain, and more pleasing greens and red/brown tones in dirt and rock. I really liked those landscapes taken with the Ektar. However in the pictures you took, I don't like this look because it makes the photo look too "digital" - looking at the pictures side to side really helps. But they're not landscapes.

Taken overall, it does seem like the portra 160 is the more versatile film, with a little better sensitivity, better for portraits, still usable for landscapes, and an overall color balance which gives it a "look" that is retro and seems to have a little more distinctive character to me, but maybe I'm predisposed because I've used Portra but never used Ektar.

So I'm going to return the Ektar unless anyone has more to add to what I just said

macfred said:

Portra 160 vs. Ektar :
/QUOTE]

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At this rate, I'm guessing that you may never shoot a roll of film. This isn't open heart surgery! Shoot the Ektar 100 and enjoy it. Next time shoot Portra 160 and enjoy it. Next time shoot ... and enjoy it.

Whatever you choose - just go and enjoy the photos you get. All of these films are first rate, albeit with differences. You won't know what you like best until YOU get out there and shoot some film.

https://www.photrio.com/forum/threa...400h-for-my-lubitel-166b.170259/#post-2215492



But listen to wyo... don’t get too wrapped up in”analysis paralysis “.

YOU NEED BOTH...

wyofilm said:

At this rate, I'm guessing that you may never shoot a roll of film. This isn't open heart surgery! Shoot the Ektar 100 and enjoy it. Next time shoot Portra 160 and enjoy it. Next time shoot ... and enjoy it.

Whatever you choose - just go and enjoy the photos you get ...

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That! I couldn't agree more - that's exactly what I did for the last years.
I like Portra, Ektar, Pro 400H, Pro 160NS and sometimes I don't like any color film and I prefer shooting in b/w ...

Can I ask, brainmonster, how do you decide to buy a new car. When you do, I'll bet the showroom salesman really earns his money that day

pentaxuser

BrianShaw said:

... YOU NEED BOTH ...

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... and get it while you can ...

I love Photrio - reckless, ruthless, wild, but great entertainment guaranteed.

pentaxuser said:

Can I ask, brainmonster, how do you decide to buy a new car. When you do, I'll bet the showroom salesman really earns his money that day

pentaxuser

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I've never bought a new car, won't be able to afford one at this rate in order to feed my film habit ;p

brainmonster said:

TL;DR: The Portra looks better and more versatile overall, while the Ektar may be better for landscapes due to the better greens and reds but I like the overall color balance of Portra for a more retro look. Any opponents to this stance

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I'll bite
"Better" is subjective. It depends what your after. I've seen amazing landscape shots on Portra. I've seen "retro" shots on Ektar. They're different tools, and everyone can use them differently.

It's quite easy to get a "retro look" with either a car or film if you don't know how to drive either. Dents, dings, rust, flat tires.

It is pretty simple: Portra is Kodak's professional film aimed at taking portraits, hence the best skin tones, while Ektar is a film with slightly enhanced color saturation. If one wants more color saturation track down and buy some rolls of VividColor and UltraColor film.

Ektar seems better balanced overall than Vivid or Ultra. It's not just about getting certain hues saturated, but about overall color balance too, something which takes a bit of practice with Ektar to get right, but the potential is certainly there in a manner not possible with any other color neg film I've encountered. The difference between Portra 160 and Ektar involves more than just saturation; and it's every bit as much a professional film as Portra, otherwise it wouldn't be available in large format sheets as well as roll version. But my first pick for portraiture would be one of the Portras, depending, either 160 or 400.

Most retailers won't accept returns of film.
Use the Ektar you have purchased. It is a wonderful film. Take care with the scans - if you don't like the results you are getting, communicate your concerns/preferences to your lab.
If you try some Portra 160, the differences will be differences of taste and they will be subtle. You are more likely to see differences arising from scanning inconsistency than from differences in the films.

Sirius Glass said:

It is pretty simple: Portra is Kodak's professional film aimed at taking portraits, hence the best skin tones, while Ektar is a film with slightly enhanced color saturation. If one wants more color saturation track down and buy some rolls of VividColor and UltraColor film.

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DREW WILEY said:

Ektar seems better balanced overall than Vivid or Ultra. It's not just about getting certain hues saturated, but about overall color balance too, something which takes a bit of practice with Ektar to get right, but the potential is certainly there in a manner not possible with any other color neg film I've encountered. The difference between Portra 160 and Ektar involves more than just saturation; and it's every bit as much a professional film as Portra, otherwise it wouldn't be available in large format sheets as well as roll version. But my first pick for portraiture would be one of the Portras, depending, either 160 or 400.

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Fo decades Pofessional meant for portraits and very consistent for portrait professionals. EKTAR is no less professional in the sense that both Portra and Ektar are very consistent.

Kino said:

Just personally, I find Ektar much more "primary" and Portra more "pastel".

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+1!

For decades Professional also meant chrome films used 4x5 for stock photography like landscapes, as well as for commercial studio applications. What Kodak meant by Professional on the label was film that had been batch tested and kept refrigerated until distribution, and then was intended to still be refrigerated at the dealer level in order o keep the color balance within tight specifications. Minor correction factors were printed on boxes from each respective batch with recommended cc filtration until tighter quality control finally made that unnecessary. Amateurs films were expected to age a certain amount before use, and the balance was hoped to be within a reasonable range, but not precise by any means.

The thing I have always liked about Kodak's Professional Negative films is they are so easy to print. Very consistent. Modern paper is amazing as well. To be fair I've never fooled around much with Fuji Pro negative films.

Sirius Glass said:

It is pretty simple: Portra is Kodak's professional film aimed at taking portraits, hence the best skin tones, while Ektar is a film with slightly enhanced color saturation. If one wants more color saturation track down and buy some rolls of VividColor and UltraColor film.

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Indeed! Portra 160 makes for more pleasing skin tones for portraiture.
If you want color saturation, that is great for purposes OTHER THAN PORTRAITURE. Too much color makes for more noticable skin imperfections (blotchy skin, pimples, etc.)

Back when I still shot weddings with 120 medium format, I had film magazines loaded with Fujicolor 160 (NPS) when shooting portraits with lighting setups, as I liked the nicer skin tones; then I had more magazines loaded with Fujicolor Pro 400 (NPH) for general wedding/reception coverage.

I tried Ektar but had trouble with the scanning. Plus you never know what you got with negative color film until you scan and adjust it. So I mainly shoot slide film - Velvia 50. Now that's the film you want if you want colors that "pop".

Scan and adjust? That tells you what your program is capable of doing, and not necessarily what the native properties of the film itself are. Whenever I am experimenting with a color film new to me, I shoot it in 120 for sake of economy; but 120 also delivers a more accurate mid-quality scan than 35mm. There is a local lab that does the C-41 in house, and can provide a basic viewing disc with the scans PLUS a contact sheet on RA4 paper at a reasonable price. This is just a starting point. To truly understand the film, I make my own RA4 prints in the darkroom, beginning with as precise as possible a reproduction of my master neg on that particular film, of a MacBeth Color Checker chart. By now, Portra and Ektar are old hat to me in multiple formats, so I know what to expect. I don't print digital, so there's no need to belabor that kind of wild goose chase; there are appropriate threads for that in a different section of the forum. But what I am emphasizing is that one should strive to understand the film itself before trying to PS correct it for "problems" that might really lie with the shooter himself, and which are often far more easily handled at the time of the shot itself than afterwards. Correct color-balancing of Ektar using appropriate filters is something which come to mind. It's not artificially warmed like Portra and other portrait films.