Fomapan 400 anti-halation (lack thereof)?

FotoD said:

Or maybe your camera has a very reflective backing plate.

Click to expand...

That's a very interesting hypothesis. I never paid attention to the backing plates in my cameras - they all seem to be some sort of metal + semi-matte black coating.

Are there many cameras out there with different backing plate designs?

So, how to tell if a film suffers from halation? It's quite easy - just look at the edges of the film frame. Here's a few examples from random rolls of F400; literally the first two rolls I came across going through an old folder.


Note the blooming around the frame edges. Lens used was a fairly modern Canon EF lens, not particularly prone to blooming or haze, and more importantly, the fact that it crosses the frame borders rules out the lens as the culprit. Of course, halation does not only occur at the edges of the frame - it's just easily visible there.


Another one. Overcast day. Note the blooming in the center.


One more. Note how the windows basically 'extend' behind the camera's film gate. The same is visible in the frames between the windows, which suffer degraded contrast as a result

FotoD said:

Or maybe your camera has a very reflective backing plate.

Click to expand...

Shoot Foma 400 side by side in the same camera with something like HP5+ and note the difference.

Mind you, ALL films will suffer from halation to some extent, but Foma 400 is relatively prone to it - in fact, of the regular B&W still films I've used, it halates the most strongly. The only 35mm film I ever shot that does it more strongly is the obscure 'Polypan F' stuff that was allegedly an oddball cine duplicating film.

The severity of the effect furthermore depends strongly on shooting conditions. This explains to a large extent why some may never run into the issue, while others find it objectionable.

Thanks enormously to everyone (especially Pioneer, for recreating the experiment), and apologies for going off the grid!

I went back to look again at the 28mm Chinon, and realised that it was the 35mm Chinon that has haze (I suspect it may be balsam separation), whereas the 28mm is reasonably clear (apart from the usual dust). So I don't think severe halation in my original photos can have much to do with faulty optics (though of course the lens itself may be prone to flare), it must be mainly down to the contrasty composition.

albireo said:

Can you take a picture of your lens against a strong point light source? Do you see fingerprints, dust, fungus?

Click to expand...

As it turns out, I blamed the wrong lens!

albireo said:

Also, could you show the negatives of your first set of shots. I think halation with Foma 400 might be exacerbated by over-exposure.

Click to expand...

Will try.

koraks said:

Btw, I just dug up some Foma 400 scans lingering around on a network share.

View attachment 349275
Note halos again around highlights; the neon sign top left, the specular highlights in the foliage of the tree.

Click to expand...

Yes, this one does look rather like my photo with foliage.

koraks said:

Note the blooming around the frame edges.
View attachment 349413
One more. Note how the windows basically 'extend' behind the camera's film gate. The same is visible in the frames between the windows, which suffer degraded contrast as a result.

Click to expand...

That's a clever trick! I dug out my negatives, and it's indeed quite striking how halation leaks out outside the frame - never noticed it before...

albireo said:

Also, could you show the negatives of your first set of shots. I think halation with Foma 400 might be exacerbated by over-exposure.

Click to expand...

Here's the alley shot. Can you tell from it if it's over-exposed?

Quite noticeable how halation bleeds into the borders. Even a hazy lens couldn't have produced that?

Thank you koraks, this is good information.

And thank you Lucius for showing that negative. The print was pretty conclusive but this negative eliminates any doubt in my mind. I think that is a classic example of halation.

I have another roll hanging to dry that was exposed using an uncoated lens. I am personally interested in seeing how much effect this has on the film when used to shoot against very bright light sources.

While shooting this roll I was reminded of a possible reason why I rarely seem to encounter serious halation in my own shooting. The uncoated lens I used for this roll was a Leitz Elmar 50/3.5 rangefinder lens built in 1933. It was on my Leica III rangefinder that was built around the same time. As I was lifting the camera to shoot towards the sun with this camera I was instantly reminded exactly why I rarely shoot into the sun.

Anyone who has burned holes in their rangefinder shutter curtains will immediately understand. I know that SLR cameras are not subject to this type of damage but old rangefinders certainly are and you learn very quickly to use a lens cap and not to point your camera at the sun, especially if you are using wide open apertures.

FotoD said:

@Lucius try a modern multicoated lens and the halation will be quite managable. And avoid extreme overexposure.

I think you will find that the Chinon is the culprit here. Or maybe your camera has a very reflective backing plate.

Click to expand...

I only have m42 lenses, so nothing more modern than SMC and EBC, but will try those.

I shot the Foma 400 with an old Chinon SX -- it's back plate does seem a tad more glossy than on some of my other cameras. Can this really be an issue?

Lucius said:

Even a hazy lens couldn't have produced that?

Click to expand...

No, that's really the film. It's a severe/extreme case, for sure.

Lucius said:

it's back plate does seem a tad more glossy than on some of my other cameras. Can this really be an issue?

Click to expand...

I'd recommend trying a roll of HP5+ or so in similar conditions and then see what you get. But no, I don't see how a backplate would cause this. The light needs to bounce around in a transparent medium for halation to occur. For this reason, a glossy backplate along won't cause halation. It needs the film to 'cooperate' with it, at least, and that means the film must be prone to halation. Mind you, the interaction may explain why the problem is fairly extreme in your case, but light scattering through the film base itself is still a necessary condition for this effect to occur.

koraks said:

I'd recommend trying a roll of HP5+ or so in similar conditions and then see what you get. But no, I don't see how a backplate would cause this. The light needs to bounce around in a transparent medium for halation to occur. For this reason, a glossy backplate along won't cause halation. It needs the film to 'cooperate' with it, at least, and that means the film must be prone to halation. Mind you, the interaction may explain why the problem is fairly extreme in your case, but light scattering through the film base itself is still a necessary condition for this effect to occur.

Click to expand...

I didn't mean if a glossy backplate could cause halation by itself, but whether it could make things worse if the film already was halation-prone. Ah well, one would have to experiment, though I guess it would be difficult to create conditions controlled narrowly enough to compare backplates in different cameras... Trying out HP5+ sounds more feasible.

Yikes! I was just about to try Foma 400 but now I'm discouraged.

albireo said:

Are there many cameras out there with different backing plate designs?

Click to expand...

Yes.

Arthurwg said:

Yikes! I was just about to try Foma 400 but now I'm discouraged.

Click to expand...

Shouldn't be. Everyone works differently. If you shoot into the sun all the time you may not like it.

I just ordered another bulk roll of 100 feet yesterday. Obviously I like it.

Try a roll or two and shoot the way you normally do. See how it works for you.

Fomapan 400 won't always work for me. I was not impressed with my first couple of rolls but these were shot with quite a soft lens on 35mm in mixed conditions. When I came to make darkroom prints (as opposed to scans) I really noticed that the shots I'd taken inside museums and in overcast conditions were a lot better than the ones in bright sunshine.

Then I tried it in 120 with a 1930s Zeiss-Ikon folding camera and began to like it. I was being a bit more careful with lighting and the lens was less soft. I've since been trying it in 35mm again and recognise that grain isn't the big problem I first thought it was. But it is prone to halation, which can be an issue in outdoor shots into the sun. It's not quite what I need for gig photography but it's not known for being a film one pushes to 1600 and beyond. It actually does better than I expected. But I do think that if your photography isn't generally into the sun, it's a decent film.

Pioneer said:

Shouldn't be. Everyone works differently. If you shoot into the sun all the time you may not like it.

I just ordered another bulk roll of 100 feet yesterday. Obviously I like it.

Try a roll or two and shoot the way you normally do. See how it works for you.

Click to expand...

Foma is great, but I've found you need to stick to the workflow that works for it.

I've not seen serious halation issues so far.

In 120 is it lovely - but also has a serious green halation coating I have to rinse out for a minute before the developer.

I've also found some fixers so weird things to foma400; odd spotting etc. TF-4 works very well.