Grainy photo's? HELP

[jesse7392]

Hi All, I'm having alot of trouble with high grain photo's and I have no idea whats causing it. (I'm very new to film photography) I've attached a sample, both shots taken within a couple of minutes of each other on a pub crawl through Sydney's The Rocks. It doesnt matter the lighting conditions, shutter speed, film brand/type/asa etc. I've tried a few different film types, Fuji Colour, TMax, Delta 400 and all of them sometimes give this effect whether I've pushed the film or not. I simply dont know whats causing this... Its VERY dissapoining when I put 10 rolls in for scanning and 90% of the shots come back with unacceptable grain...

 

[koraks]

I've attached a sample

It hasn't made it into your post, yet.

a pub crawl

pushed the film

I'm going to hazard a guess and suspect that you may have underexposed.
Keep in mind that there's no magic trick that will increase film speed. Pushing film means underexposing at the loss of shadow detail, and then giving more development to end up with comparable overall contrast in the negative. This does not, however, compensate for the underexposure.

 

[xkaes]

Welcome to the FORUM.

Lots of FORUM members are in search of ways to increase the grain in their photos. We hope that you can give us more information about your processing methods to help out these fellow shutterbugs.

 

[Dustin McAmera]

Welcome!

You say you 'put the film in for scanning'; I suppose the same people did the developing too? If you're getting consistently disappointing results from one lab, you might just try another one (I suppose it's also possible they can develop film well, but their scanning is no good; if its bad scanning, you might still be able to get better scans of your negatives).

We will need to see an example or two (more, preferably) to comment. Details of your camera would be helpful too.
Before seeing those though, I see you're in London, and your photos were in Sydney. Did you get the films developed in Sydney, or transport them back undeveloped? Airport security x-ray can be bad for film, though the effect (at least the effects I've had) isn't to increase the grain.

Saying you pushed film is a red flag to some people here, but I have always done it, to keep shooting as the light fades, or on cloudy days in winter. You need to be reasonable; some film pushes well and some doesn't. Even with film that the maker's say pushes well, you shouldn't expect to go more than a couple of stops, and you will be able to see it was done. And of course, you need to tell the lab you pushed, and what speed you used, so they can adjust the developing.

Are the photos from the first half of the pub crawl any better than the second half? Working on a backup theory here...

 

[Bazamat]

When you are able to upload the samples scans here, I would suggest also attaching a photo of your negatives to examine if you haven't done so already. If for example your negs are too dense or too thin, scanners can't get much infomation out and can result in grainy scans.

 

[snusmumriken]

IMHO, over-development is the major cause of obtrusive grain. In the days when every pharmacy could get your films developed, many labs tended to err on the side of overdevelopment. Seems the philosophy was to make sure there was something to print. So if you are using a commercial lab, consider switching as @Dustin McAmera suggested; if not, you know what to do.

Be aware, though, that negative scanning can (often does) exaggerate apparent graininess. It’s simply an optical effect that’s hard, or perhaps impossible, to escape. Inappropriate sharpening and/or contrast settings can then make this absolutely horrible.

 

[abruzzi]

without pictures this is all just talk, but it seems possible that underexposure is the issue. A lot of people new to film jump headfirst into underexposure and push processing--probably beause they were used to digital CMOS scanners that can capture at suprisingly high ISO and still create a clean image. Underexposure and push processing can give good results for a few stops, but my reccomendation is before jumping to that, shoot a roll at box speed properly metered. Do it on a sunny day so you can confirm that your camera's meter is picking reasonable aperture and/or shutter speeds, and have it normally developed. This should help determine that the camera works properly.

Then you can go back to underexposure and pushing, but it may be worth taking a step by step approach, and only underexpose by one stop for the next roll or two. And continue from there.

The only time I underexpose is when I'm shooting the fastest film I can get (B&W: Delta 3200, Color: Portra 800) and its still not fast enough to handhold. In both those cases I have gotten amazing negatives out of the process but I was (sort of) within two stops. (sort of, because I believe some of my delta shots would have been at around 12,800, which is two stops up from 3200, but delta 3200 isn't really 3200, so its closer to 3.4-4 stops .)