Hello APUG from FILM Ferrania (PART 2)

[Nzoomed]

I think this P30 Alpha film has been a real good idea, its been a good way to put the coater through its paces and iron out any problems like the scratches mentioned here etc, and in addition its also putting good use the emulsions that otherwise would have simply just been thrown away.

 

[kb3lms]

In fact, we plan to make P30 indefinitely and, eventually, in all formats. ALPHA is the only thing that is limited and we're ... Progress!!

Dave, Great Update! Keep going.

 

[Brady Eklund]

I just shot a roll of Ilford Delta 3200 tonight and it got me wondering; what was the highest speed emulsion Ferrania ever produced? There'd be a lot of space at the fast end of the market for some competition, especially fast color negative or slide film. I just don't know whether they'd have the capability to produce anything faster than 800 or so.

 

[Berri]

I'd be seriously impressed if 6 or 7 APUG members could do what the guys at Ferrania have

It is not necessarily our place to actually produce film, yet people can have an opinion on many topics, even if they don't directly do it. Negativity, hate and things like that I don't see. Being critical about something is valid as it is being blindly positive. I may be skeptic about something they say and this doesn't make me a backbiter or less hopeful they will eventually produce some colour reversal film. I wish Ferrania the best of the luck, and I mean it.
A detailed explanetion for what's happening is mandatory for a crowd funded project, but if you refer to the fact that things didn't go as expected I say they should have took that in account, insted they promise things that couldn't possibly keep. Now don't start talking about the "window" they had and they missed and so on, we all know it. The point is: making film (colour reversal in particular) is a very complicated task and it is harder if you want to produce it in a half abandoned and ruined building, it takes time and ther was (is) no need to keep saying colour reversal film will happen in little time. Look at kodak, they took a whole year to reintroduce their ektachrome and they are not starting from scratch

 

[Berri]

, but I don't think Ferrania could be able to make a product as good in overall image quality (particularly grain fineness) as Provia 100,

perhaps they won't make a film as good as provia, but I'm sure some old fashioned reversal film would be quite a good achivement and could be very interesting for applications where fine grain in not the only thing you want. I think in particular at portraiture photography. For example I don't mind the grain in Rollei CR200 which is nice i portrait, but the colours are way off and made that film unusable for me. If they could make something like that but with natural colours, I would be happy!

 

[afriman]

It is not necessarily our place to actually produce film, yet people can have an opinion on many topics, even if they don't directly do it. Negativity, hate and things like that I don't see. Being critical about something is valid as it is being blindly positive. I may be skeptic about something they say and this doesn't make me a backbiter or less hopeful they will eventually produce some colour reversal film. I wish Ferrania the best of the luck, and I mean it.
A detailed explanetion for what's happening is mandatory for a crowd funded project, but if you refer to the fact that things didn't go as expected I say they should have took that in account, insted they promise things that couldn't possibly keep. Now don't start talking about the "window" they had and they missed and so on, we all know it. The point is: making film (colour reversal in particular) is a very complicated task and it is harder if you want to produce it in a half abandoned and ruined building, it takes time and ther was (is) no need to keep saying colour reversal film will happen in little time. Look at kodak, they took a whole year to reintroduce their ektachrome and they are not starting from scratch

+1
Well said. Being critical in a constructive way, expressing skepticism about goals and promises that are clearly unrealistic, and offering advice or suggestions do not amount to negativity. Quite the opposite. Saying it spreads "fear" and "doubt" is simply ludicrous. This isn't some religious cult that demands blind faith. The guys at Film Ferrania don't represent a Supreme Authority that we never dare question. We can admire their knowledge and skill, but that doesn't mean we have to possess the same knowledge and skill in order to question or criticize. We're all on the same side, we all wish Film Ferrania success, and we give expression to our constructive engagement in various ways. The last thing we need is bad-mouthing and name-calling each other.

 

[afriman]

I just shot a roll of Ilford Delta 3200 tonight and it got me wondering; what was the highest speed emulsion Ferrania ever produced? There'd be a lot of space at the fast end of the market for some competition, especially fast color negative or slide film. I just don't know whether they'd have the capability to produce anything faster than 800 or so.

I've been thinking along the same lines. There is already an adequate choice of medium-speed colour film, and with Ektachrome being re-introduced, competition will be very strong in a rather small market. Perhaps offering something that supplements the existing choices, like an 800 or 1600 ISO colour (C41 and/or E6) film is an option worth looking into?

 

[Truzi]

I've a question for Ferrania that deviates from the latest posts.

Since P30 is a cine-film and not meant for our usual developers, they said they will publish suggestions on how to use our more typical developers.

My question is, will you also provide suggestions/formulae for those of us who can mix the "correct" developer from scratch (or people like me who can't, but might try anyway )?

As far as the Kickstarter rewards is concerned, yes, I'm anxious to get my slide film, but I would rather they work out the bugs first - so I've no problem waiting.
There will be problems when production is started, as Ferrania notes on the recent run of P30. I may be wrong, but I imagine these problems are more expensive with a color film. I'm sure there will be problems unique to color, but at least the P30 will let them shake-out the common issues at a lower expense - and give us something to play with as a result.

 

[railwayman3]

I've been thinking along the same lines. There is already an adequate choice of medium-speed colour film, and with Ektachrome being re-introduced, competition will be very strong in a rather small market. Perhaps offering something that supplements the existing choices, like an 800 or 1600 ISO colour (C41 and/or E6) film is an option worth looking into?

Good suggestion....I remember using the Konica C41 films in the 1600ISO and 3200ISO versions, both were exceptional films for their specific purposes. Konica also made a (real) infra-red film. There's no real competition now for these and other specialist films ?

 

[fdonadio]

Antani, legendary Ferrania Photo engineer, inventor of the 'supercazzola' silver sensitization method for core-shell emulsion

Supercazzola prematuratta con scapellamento alla destra o alla sinistra, eh?

 

[flavio81]

Supercazzola prematuratta con scapellamento alla destra o alla sinistra, eh?

destra of course

 

[fdonadio]

destra of course

I am trying to help myself from laughing out loud. My wife's already asleep!

"Destra, of course" made my day!

 

[Berri]

Tarapìa tapiòco? Prematurata la supercazzola, o scherziamo?

 

[Nzoomed]

perhaps they won't make a film as good as provia, but I'm sure some old fashioned reversal film would be quite a good achivement and could be very interesting for applications where fine grain in not the only thing you want. I think in particular at portraiture photography. For example I don't mind the grain in Rollei CR200 which is nice i portrait, but the colours are way off and made that film unusable for me. If they could make something like that but with natural colours, I would be happy!

You must be shooting a bad batch of the stuff.
Here are my results from CR200

 

[Diapositivo]

One must never go to Germany...



(waiting for Ferrania news, nothing wrong in looking over some movie classics...)

 

[ericdan]

You must be shooting a bad batch of the stuff.
Here are my results from CR200

The fact that there are "bad batches" is exactly why it's unusable.

 

[Berri]

The fact that there are "bad batches" is exactly why it's unusable.

exactly.

 

[mudfly9]

Apologies if this has already been addressed somewhere but is it known what kind of grain the new Ferrania chrome will have, cubic or t-grain?

The reason I ask is that one of the things that puts me off using the current crop of Fuji slide films is that the grain is so smooth it's almost invisible. I realise that this is an utterly subjective point and is simply my personal preference, but I much prefer using films that have what I consider to be nice looking grain, which is why 90% of all my photos are on HP5+. One of the many reasons I like shooting film is because of the grain, and it would seem that other people like that too given the amount of grain simulation software out there, so I'm really hoping for a slide film with good looking grain. I absolutely loved CR200 in its various iterations for this very reason.

 

[Prest_400]

Apologies if this has already been addressed somewhere but is it known what kind of grain the new Ferrania chrome will have, cubic or t-grain?

The reason I ask is that one of the things that puts me off using the current crop of Fuji slide films is that the grain is so smooth it's almost invisible. I realise that this is an utterly subjective point and is simply my personal preference, but I much prefer using films that have what I consider to be nice looking grain, which is why 90% of all my photos are on HP5+. One of the many reasons I like shooting film is because of the grain, and it would seem that other people like that too given the amount of grain simulation software out there, so I'm really hoping for a slide film with good looking grain. I absolutely loved CR200 in its various iterations for this very reason.

Not quite sure, I think it may have been discussed quite a bit ago. If you dig around, you will find the datasheet for the Imation Chrome which is the predecessor. RMS13 in granularity. That graininess may or may not be reduced with the R&D in the new production.
I don't know when exactly T-grain made an appearance throughout color film. PE worked on Gold 400, first gen with T-grain, but I don't know which exact year they introduced it. The question is when overall migration towards T-grain was made.
It may be reasonable to think that by 2000 most colour films were tabular grained. EPP, which was made until 2009 (and I don't remember exactly) may have been cubic grain (or the first T-grain film).

However, tabular grain doesn't automatically imply low grain. I'd expect a film exhibiting a more classic character.

 

[flavio81]

I don't know when exactly T-grain made an appearance throughout color film. PE worked on Gold 400, first gen with T-grain, but I don't know which exact year they introduced it. The question is when overall migration towards T-grain was made.

Kodak's first DISC film (1982) was the first T-grain film. Then they incorporated the t-grain technology on the Kodak VR color negative films.

I would safely assume that, by now, all manufacturers know how to create "large aspect ratio" grains.

 

[flavio81]

One must never go to Germany...

LOL, fortunately i could understand most of it!!

One must never go to germany, even worse if you were studying electronics in Germany.

 

[railwayman3]

Kodak's first DISC film (1982) was the first T-grain film. Then they incorporated the t-grain technology on the Kodak VR color negative films.

I remember the Disc cameras, and not in a good way ! Back in the 1980's I advised an old friend to get one, she wanted a camera which was simple to use. The results were terrible, grain like lumps of coal and washy colours. I actually felt so bad that I bought her a simple point-and-shoot to replace it, and the results from 35mm VR film were several magnitudes better !
I remember also being surprised by how bad the VR Disc results were, even compared with the tiny negs from the sub-min Minox which I had at that time.

 

[Brady Eklund]

I remember the Disc cameras, and not in a good way ! Back in the 1980's I advised an old friend to get one, she wanted a camera which was simple to use. The results were terrible, grain like lumps of coal and washy colours. I actually felt so bad that I bought her a simple point-and-shoot to replace it, and the results from 35mm VR film were several magnitudes better !
I remember also being surprised by how bad the VR Disc results were, even compared with the tiny negs from the sub-min Minox which I had at that time.

Hmm... Has anyone in this thread suggested Ferrania should make disc film yet?

 

[railwayman3]

Hmm... Has anyone in this thread suggested Ferrania should make disc film yet?

Did they ever make disc film ? I don't remember seeing any under the Ferrania name, though, IIRC, there may have been films under own-brand names ?

 

[Sal Santamaura]

I remember the Disc cameras...The results were terrible, grain like lumps of coal and washy colours...

Bad results from an 8x10 negative? I'm shocked, I say, shocked! Oh yeah, they were 8x10mm, not inches.