Fastest film ever.

Thanks Donald! I wonder how long it will be before someone figures out how to formate dope an emulsion post production? It'd be cool to take a fine grain film and boost it to 1000 iso and shoot late in the evening handheld.

I would guess it's not possible -- at a minimum, it would require soaking the film in something, which would tend to wash out the antihalation and sensitizng dyes, as well as requiring prolonged drying in the dark prior to rerolling. Remotely possible this might be practical for sheet film (if some means is found to reimplant the proper amount/type of sensitzing and antihalation dye), but beyond consideration for roll film.

The only potential I see is if the dopant can be applied in gaseous form, like forming gas used to hyper films (98% nitrogen, 2% hydrogen), but this seems unlikely (and in any case, formic acid, which would create formates, has a pretty distinct vinegary odor and is likely to absorb into backing paper and such, causing uneven sensitization.

More likely the doping has to occur at the point when the halide crystals are being formed and/or coaxed to grow in a particular crystal habit (cubic, tabular, or epitaxial instead of the native octohedral), which would make it impossible to apply aftermarket.

Oh, on a side note -- I happened to see on the Land List while researching a recent junk-store purchase that Polaroid at one point sold a peel-apart CRT recording film rated at EI 20,000, the fastest film every sold commercially. I wonder what its shelf life was before thermal and cosmic ray fogging did it in?

Fastest Film

snaggs said:

If you've been reading the Rangefinder and Medium format forums, youll know that Im after the ultimate solution for night time candits.

So what is the fastest film? Which film can be pushed to the highest speeds with results acceptable for 8x10?

Daniel.

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In Les McLean's excellent book"Creative Black and White Photography" he has taken a photo with 35mm Ilford Delta 3200 called the "New York Kiss". Worth a look if you can get the book. This fits your night time candids exactly. It was taken at 2:00am in a subway station.The print in the book is about 5 x4ins so half your desired size but given that you have 120, I'd have thought that this shot on 120 at 8 x10 would have been very acceptable. He rated it at 25,000 ISO! Yes it's grainy but that's often what expected for night time candids.