HP5, reportage style, what developer?

This is my first post, and I have to admit I am neither an internet expert nor a film developing genius. I saw some prints of a press photographer, and I really liked what I saw, purchased a Canon A1 and started analog photography with some cheap color negative films. That old photographer said he used HP5 at 400 ISO and sometimes higher. Is it right that this film is somehow similar to Tri-X? The good thing is that HP5 is available here, and as the number of shops for cameras and material in this place is very, very limited I will use that film.

The reason why I ask: in a week I will fly to Latvia and visit some friends for two weeks, and I want to photograph how they live and what that country is alike. I have a Canon A1 with a 28, 50 and 135 lens and will take a huge amount film with me, maybe 10 films. I do not have a flashlight, and I don't want to buy one, so, perhaps, it might be necessary to push the film up to 1600 ASA maybe for some rolls... well, we are all students, and we love the night, if you know what I mean [] So, we could spend the evening (that means until 6 am) in a pub or other places with dim light and lots of contrast sometimes.

I saw that Ilford says Microphen for pushing, but I read the results can be very rough. I would very much like to use just one developer and one film.

What kind of developer do you recommend for the best results?

Your 50mm lens probably opens up to f1.8. Practice shooting wide open; selective, critical focusing is what matters. Practice shooting at lower shutter speeds: 1/15th of a second brings in a lot of light. I've used a small beanbag in places like pubs quite effectively - especially with a wider lens, like your 28mm. Just rest it on the edge of the table, and compose freely. I normally use cameras with waist level finders, making this easier, but you'll find something that you're comfortable with.

Worry about pushing the film after that. HP5 or TRI-X can be happily pushed to 800 in something like DDX or Microphen, and still get results that print. But after a while, you're sacrificing too much shadow detail, and any subtlety that goes with it.

You can pick up a cheap hot shoe mount flash at charity stores for nothing. I saw one in a Salvation Army yesterday for 2$ that would serve you just fine. Figure out how much light it kicks out, set your aperture correctly, and shoot away. You can always hold it off camera if you want to avoid the "deer in the headlights" look.

I'm a real proponent of shooting with naturally occurring light, but only if it exists in usable levels. If it doesn't - i.e.: in the back corner of a dimly lit pub - you won't gain anything by simply cranking up your ISO to 3200. If there's no light, there's no light. That's sometimes a hard fact to swallow

Shoot a few rolls of 24 before you go; if only to see what using f1.8 can do for you. See what sort of depth of field you're dealing with, and the look it creates. If you do opt for a flash, burn a roll on that, just to make sure everything is syncing fine, and that you're exposures are correct.

Good luck on your trip!

Alex, welcome to APUG.

HP5+ is like Tri-X in many ways, both are excellent films. Both can be pushed at least 2 stops with excellent results.

When you push a film there is always a compromise, lack of some shadow detail and lack of some highlights will be lost, this loss is quite livable though. In fact often looks alright.

Your lens range is a good one, close in fact to what I myself usually carry these days. Normal exposure in a fluorescent lit room with HP5+ film at 400 ASA is 1/30 at f2.8 roughly, this would be good for the 28mm lens.

Therefore if you push the film to 800 or 1 stop, you can shoot at 1/60 f2/8 and use the 50mm. If you wish to push two stops then 1/125 f/2.8 with the 135mm could be thought as a possibility.

This setting I have speculated for you is with a normal room lighting situation and normal or average subjects, as I would, and do, shoot.

You do not mention your printing experience, but if you know and/or have printed very high contrast negatives, then expect to have the shadows go quite dark, the highlights go very white and an increase in apparent grain. These are the kinds of lighting you may experience.

These are the trade offs, that go with pushing any film.

Microphen is a great push developer, and I would agree that if you can get this developer, use Ilford HP5+ film then you should be able to get usable negatives for most situations.

Microphen is also a reasonable developer for normal speed in say daylight, of HP5+, so you have the situation where you can use the one developer and one film for quite differing lighting situations.

My personal experience with HP5+ is that it pushes well to two stops, pushing three stops is getting nearer the limits of the film and you may in future think of a faster film.

However for a one film, one developer all situation holiday, you have something which will be workable and also is available, go for it.

Mick.

it is indeed parallel to tri-x, even better than tri-x. probably, the best high speed b/w film in my taste.. only that recently i started to love the new tmy-2 (new version of kodak tmax 400)...
800asa is very eassy with this film, 1600 is well doable, but u will indeed have more contrast, so make sure to make fast dicisions as to what is the important part of your pic while u mettering the exposure .... for very contrasty situations i would say neopan1600 (even at 3200) has a little advantage in dealing with extremes of the light and shadow compared to pushed hp5.
developer - id-11 is the best in my experience... great look to the film and very good flexibility. delute 1+1 as single use solution. this will also give u advantage of finer grain, sharper look, and the deluted developer extends the developing time which u can use for contrast reduction. in short, since u seem to be new to film developing ... there will be plenty of time to develop lower tones (blacks and dark greys) and since the developer is getting weaker, it will have less power to over-intensify the high-tones (the whites and the light grey tones). a gentel agitation will help as well... when pushed to 1600 in contrasty conditions measure for avarage of the lighting scene (unless there is some other conidiration in the scene) and then develop the ilfords given time with only 2 inversions per minute instead of ilfords suggested 4. further, i can skip the inversion procedure from time to time on the second half of developing procedure and instead, add a couple more minutes to the recomended/normal development. experiment a couple of times before u do any significant stuff ...

alexs said:

I saw that Ilford says Microphen for pushing, but I read the results can be very rough. I would very much like to use just one developer and one film.

What kind of developer do you recommend for the best results?

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Note with regard to Microphen that this behaves like a completely normal developer, what is special about it is that includes two developing agents called Phenidone and hydroquinone, whereas standard developers like D76/ID11 have metol and hydroquinone. The presence of Phenidone instead of metol means that the developer gives about 1/2 to 2/3 of a stop more film speed without any more grain or contrast. It certainly does not give results which are any rougher than with any other developer.

If I were you. and were using Microphen, I would shoot at a film speed of 500 as a standard and develop for a time half-way between the Ilford recommendations for 400 and 800. This will give negatives of normal contrast. In dull weather or at night, there is no reason why you should not use a higher film speed setting with some rolls of film and push-process this, as long as you understand that this pushes up the contrast, too, and will make pictures of high-contrast subjects difficult to print. If you are photographing your friends in a bar, you could well use lower shutter speeds - sitting at a table with your elbows on it, you have a good chance of getting reasonably sharp pictures at 1/8 or even 1/4 second, particularly if you use the technique of "Breathe in, breathe out, hold breath, take picture" within the space of approx. 1 second.

Personally my favourite is Delta 400 pushed to 1600 in DDx, but it all has to do with your own taste. I tried HP5 at 1000 in DDX recently, and I liked it, but more acutance than I expected. You can see the image here for an idea (there was a url link here which no longer exists) Rgds, Kal

"will take a huge amount film with me, maybe 10 films."

That is *far* from a "huge amount". It will probably just warm you up.

If I needed just one b/w film (for some reason) to cover most "reportage" scenarios, it would be HP5, with Delta 3200 as my second choice. But, you don't need only one, so why not bring both, and some FP4 while you are at it?

If you really will be shooting largely in low-to-no-light, I would opt for Delta 3200 instead, for the extra stop or so. In my testing and experience, it can make it to EI 8000 (three stops underexposed) without much difficulty getting fairly normal-looking results, assuming of course, you can print. 16,000 (4 stops underexposed) with tweaking, such as selenium toning and/or other forms of intensification followed by good printing. You can also expose it at EI 32,000 (5 stops underexposed) if you know what and what not to shoot at that EI (I'm talking about having an eye for contrast at the scene), and you are an outstanding printer who can manipulate and print a totally jacked up underexposed flat neg (and you don't like midtones and don't mind crazy grain).

Most of the time, I shoot it from EI 4000 to 8000 (depending on what shutter speeds I want to be using), and use reduced-agitation development.

Remember that it is an ISO 1000 film to start, so pushing it once, rate at 2000. Pushing twice, rate at 4000, etc.

That old photographer said he used HP5 at 400 ISO and sometimes higher.
In the old days (1960 and 70s) most JP used TriX or HP5 rated at 400 (with my equipment 400 is a 1/2 push as I rate TriX or FormaPan 400 at 320), for low light we rated TriX or HP5 400 at 800 to 1600 and pushed in D76, ID11, there were just too many developer to name them all. I use to push TriX to 1600 and devlop in Dianfine, but UPI developed in D76. I use Forma Pan 400 in 35mm as my standard film, with Delta or Tmax3200 rated at 1600 and develop in DDX low level lighting, I have used Tmax 3200 at 3200 and even 6400, but those are really a push and can be look really raw.

Is it right that this film is somehow similar to Tri-X? The good thing is that HP5 is available here, and as the number of shops for cameras and material in this place is very, very limited I will use that film.

HP5 is very close to TriX, but I think the film that most closly matches TriX of the 70 and 60s is Formapan 400. I would also take a few rolls of a 3200 speed film, as well as PF4 or Plus X for informal porturates.

I have a Canon A1 with a 28, 50 and 135 lens and will take a huge amount film with me, maybe 10 films.

It is a good basic set, if you have the money think about a 105 or mid rage zoon such as a 70 to 105. A 105 was the classic JP lens in the day, another alternative is a 85mm. I shoot 10 rolls a day. Take as much as you can afford. And make sure to do several trail runs before you leave, know what to expect.

I do not have a flashlight, and I don't want to buy one, so, perhaps, it might be necessary to push the film up to 1600 ASA maybe for some rolls... well, we are all students, and we love the night, if you know what I mean [] So, we could spend the evening (that means until 6 am) in a pub or other places with dim light and lots of contrast sometimes.

Get a few rolls of Delta or Tmax, push to 3200.

I saw that Ilford says Microphen for pushing, but I read the results can be very rough. I would very much like to use just one developer and one film.

What kind of developer do you recommend for the best results?

I have pushed with just about every developer I can think of, Microphen is good, as is DDX, Edwal FG7, D 76, Microdal X, Acufine, and Dinafine. I could have just one developer I would use Edwal FG7, but if you have access to Ilford products, DDX or ID11 are good choices.

I'd take tri-x instead and develop in diafine. EI1250 is possible with this combo.

I have pushed hp5 to 1600 in ddx and got excellent results. It should be pushed to 800 with d76 stock without any problem either.

I shoot dance and theater, and for many years I have used HP5+ at 1600, processed in Ilfotec HC, 1:31. An equivalent Kodak developer is HC-110. I have gone as far as 3200 in a pinch, but it gets very contrasty (Delta 3200 is a better choice for that speed). For daylight work I shoot HP5+ at 400, and process in the same developer. So for your "one film, one developer" request, I can gladly recommend HP5+ and Ilfotec HC.
I have also used Microfen, but prefer the Ilfotec.

Microphen is in fact a bit "rough", but it gives a very classic look to the images, I used it many years ago.

If you think beyond these 10 films consider Kodak XTol, it's only available in 5 liter packages, that's for about 50 films and lasts 6 months. It's cheap, just in case you don't process 50 films in 6 months and need to discard 3 liters...

As far as I know, there is no Ilford equivalent for this universal developer. It's excellent for pushing especially when diluted. I processed a few HP5 in Xtol 1:1, and the results were very good.

If you think beyond these 10 films consider Kodak XTol, it's only available in 5 liter packages

Foma makes a Xtol type developer, Fomadon Excel, avialble in 1 liter, I just ordered a packet a couple of days ago, I stopped using Xtol when Kodak stopped making the 1 quart size.

That's true, and it is not expensive, too. But when I compared prices I found out that 2 liters of Excel cost the same as 5 liters Xtol. Yes, I am a scrooge...

I started out my career as a newspaper photographer shooting HP5, souping it myself and printing it.

I found it pushed to 1600 very easily (providing, of course, you develop it accordingly). EI800 is very easy if you need only one stop extra.

The grain was always very attractive in that film, in a classic B&W photography kind of way -- of course, that's subjective but I find the T-grain films have a look that's quite different, and you did say you wanted that classic look.

As always, the advice here is sound and I'd heed what they all say about the developers. Good choices, all.

The only thing I can add is that a lot of the time when I shot that film on the job, I shot wide open. Get used to that! Mostly...just go with what you feel and don't think about it beforehand. Better to shoot and not use it than not shoot and regret it forever!

(P.S. - always pack WAY more film than you think you'd use. Voice of experience talkin', there)

It is difficult to know these days what is meant by pushing. My best results have come when I decided what would be the deepest shadow in which I wanted some shadow, set the meter to read 4 times the film speed and took a reading in that area. It usually turned out that if I could see well enough to read a menu or the label on a bottle of beer, 1/60 at 2.8 would do the job with a little extra development to improve contrast. I would hardly call that pushing. One could use the same rule in photographing low contrast scenery. Now, when I read Kodak's J-109 exposure tables, I see the effective film speed of HP5+ being up to 3200 in full strength XTOL when a contrast index of 0.85 is obtained. That takes 15 minutes at 70 F or 21 C with agitation. This is because the current ISO rules specify film speed at a certain level above base + fog, and that level occurs at lower exposure levels as contrast increases. The T-MAX films have extremely high maximum contrast, so T-MAX 400 can go as high as 25000 according to the usually very conservative Kodak lab. I have not personally tested that.

I should mention that in my youth I had very steady hands. At the age of 13, I tied for second place in the Hearst Trophy rifle match in St. Louis MO. I made expert on the Garrand M1 in the Army. The principles are the same when "firing" a camera: squeeze, don't jerk or jab. An old practice stunt was to balance a coin on the end of the rifle barrel and see if you could dry fire the rifle without knocking the coin off. Try it with a coin on the lens barrel. (You could win a contest with an uninitiated opponent by placing the coin in contact with the front sight ring of the rifle. The jar of the hammer striking would send the coin off the front of the barrel)

HP-5+ is more or less similar to Tri-X, but it has quite a different look, a somewhat smoother characteristic curve, and maybe a bit more latitude. It is a very good film for your kind of work. D-76 (ID-11) is a good developer for it, especially in 35mm. HC-110 may, however, give you a bit more of the classic photojournalistic look.

vic vic said:

it is indeed parallel to tri-x, even better than tri-x.

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Heresy!!

HP5 Plus is a great film. I tried Tri-X a few years ago, couldn't see what the fuss was about and HP5 is the standard film in my go-everywhere camera, the mju-II. 10 rolls isn't a lot if you're in a new place and feeling trigger-happy.

Microphen is a push-processing benchmark, and hard to beat. Its liquid twin DD-X would be the ideal stuff for this IMO - less hassle to make up, great results. Don't be afraid of giving it a little extra development over the recommended times, grainy negs are better than underexposed ones. If you're going to take a lot of indoor photos why not go for Delta 3200? Expose at EI 1600 and dev in DD-X for the EI 3200 time.

In the pub the 28mm will probably prove the most useful, lens will be wide open and accurate focussing tricky - especially after a few pints of the local brew. A flash might provide some variety (or certainty). A bounce unit off the ceiling might be complicating things but you'll get more natural-looking illumination that way.

If you are thinking of doing any outdoor photos take your sunglasses and paracetamol for the hangover Oh, and an orange filter to darken blue skies somewhat.

alexs said:

in a week I will fly to Latvia and visit some friends for two weeks, and I want to photograph how they live and what that country is alike. I have a Canon A1 with a 28, 50 and 135 lens and will take a huge amount film with me, maybe 10 films. I do not have a flashlight, and I don't want to buy one ... So, we could spend the evening (that means until 6 am) in a pub or other places with dim light and lots of contrast sometimes.

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With that, I would recommend you take a small tripod with you. Something you can put on the pub table and fire with a cable release. This will let you take good pictures at 1/4 second - assuming the subject is motionless or cooperative or almost comatose. Even with moving subjects the best shots are often at the 'peak of the action' where the subject stays still - in a pub it would be the moment when the subject holds an expression. Flash in a pub setting looks, and is, unnatural - and it annoys the other people in the pub.

Contrast in a pub is high to begin with and pushing makes it worse. I get the best shots when I lower the contrast by pulling the film: rating it 1 to 2 stops slower and developing for 25 - 40% less time. Because of this, the tripod becomes a necessity.