I am done with Velvia....

[DavidClapp]

Velvia is the most frustrating film I have ever worked with. It doesn't matter whether I use a light meter or a digital camera as a light meter I throw 80% of my shots straight into the bin. It's so depressing. I had two films back this afternoon and only two shots out of twelve are worth scanning. (they are all 6x12's shot on a large format camera)

I can't work out what is going wrong, but I see little point in continuing to use this frustrating film, that essentially looks like something I can post process out of a digital camera. Can anyone give me any pointers?

Colour negative is a total joy in comparison!

 

[Old-N-Feeble]

Oh my... don't tell a certain member importing and selling it on the LFPI forum.

 

[coigach]

It's a finicky film with little latitude, I agree. Depends how you meter and what you are photographing. I wouldn't use Velvia without ND grads to even out the exposure for landscape pictures for example...

 

[Prof_Pixel]

Might your camera(s) shutter speeds be off?

 

[removed account4]

Oh my... don't tell a certain member importing and selling it on the LFPI forum.

LOL !

 

[DavidClapp]

No it doesn't matter what lenses I use or cameras for that matter - All I get is consistent underexposure. I have a lovely Chamonix LF camera that I use it with a 6x12 120mm roll film back as I can't afford 5x4... It seems like the latitude is so narrow it can't even handle anything other than subdued conditions. It's the most frustrating experience.

All my colour neg experiences have been great. It's all about Ektar and Pro400H I feel - a great look to each film... I think I have a Velvia landscape photography hangup

 

[Sceptic]

I would be happy to take it off your hands

 

[removed account4]

i have a full and a partially full box of velvia (50 ) and provia (4x5 )
i don't have anyone local to process sheets of chromes or color negative film
so i plan on exposing them and processing them in plain old b/w developer
so i don't have to deal with miniscule latitude or excessive processing fees ...

 

[MattKing]

Consistent underexposure should be a lot easier to deal with then inconsistent exposure errors.

Test exposures with a dark slide seem in order.

 

[Poisson Du Jour]

Velvia has been around for a long time now. It is very rare for people to express frustration with it. Truth be told, it's not the film, but the photographer.

80% of your shots go into the bin!? Jeez. A clue is in your film format: 6x12 in 120 format; is there any light fall-off which gives the perception of underexposure?
I wouldn't mind using RVP50 with a Chamonix LF set up; I know of a few who use various LF setups with RVP50 and its uber-saturated Disneychrome brother, RVP100.

Velvia is the best film for the landscape job (and for printing, too!), in lighting that you are able to judge and mould to the film's response. The latitude of 3 stops is fine. Trouble starts when photographers use Velvia in conditions it was not designed for; for the record, it performs best in diffuse illumination, not point (e.g. bright sunlight where there are deep shadows). This diffuse illumination design means that both highlights and shadows can be well taken care of without losing one or the other. Swing the other way to mid-summer sun and you will lose any skerrick of highlights and have nothing to speak of in shadows. People do that, of course. If that gives them kicks, well and good. But it's film wasted.

Photographers have had ample time to learn the tricks of mastering Velvia. Casualties are rare. If people move away from it, it's because of processing difficulties e.g. the distance to or absence of an E6 lab; they fall back to C41 emulsions or B&W. I have been using it since 1994 in 35mm and 120, printing to Ilfochrome Classic (which presented its own nasty problems) and latterly RA-4 hybrid. There is truth that the more experience and skill you have, the better you are able to achieve what you desire. Don't give in! True, also it's easier to get exposures correct in MF and LF, but exposures will always be a bit more challenging in 35mm because of all the contrast squezed into a frame the size of a postage stamp and that you are allowing the camera to make critical decisions when scenes are not as straightforward as they first appear (Galen Rowell wrote extensively about this many years ago), so dump 35mm. And all my 120 work is multispot metered (I bypass the TTL meter on my Pentax 67). I never use grad. filters, but almost always use a polariser for my rainforest work.

 

[Roger Cole]

It's a finicky film with little latitude, I agree. Depends how you meter and what you are photographing. I wouldn't use Velvia without ND grads to even out the exposure for landscape pictures for example...

Exactly this. I don't care for it either so I just don't use it. I know others do and that's fine. I'm glad they still make it.

I got along better with E100VS for that matter, when I wanted that look, or something much like it, but even that was finicky, just not as bad.

 

[Roger Cole]

Velvia has been around for a long time now. It is very rare for people to express frustration with it. Truth be told, it's not the film, but the photographer.

80% of your shots go into the bin!? Jeez. A clue is in your film format: 6x12 in 120 format; is there any light fall-off which gives the perception of underexposure?
I wouldn't mind using RVP50 with a Chamonix LF set up; I know of a few who use various LF setups with RVP50 and its uber-saturated Disneychrome brother, RVP100.

Velvia is the best film for the landscape job (and for printing, too!), in lighting that you are able to judge and mould to the film's response. The latitude of 3 stops is fine. Trouble starts when photographers use Velvia in conditions it was not designed for; for the record, it performs best in diffuse illumination, not point (e.g. bright sunlight where there are deep shadows). This diffuse illumination design means that both highlights and shadows can be well taken care of without losing one or the other. Swing the other way to mid-summer sun and you will lose any skerrick of highlights and have nothing to speak of in shadows. People do that, of course. If that gives them kicks, well and good. But it's film wasted.

Photographers have had ample time to learn the tricks of mastering Velvia. Casualties are rare. If people move away from it, it's because of processing difficulties e.g. the distance to or absence of an E6 lab; they fall back to C41 emulsions or B&W. I have been using it since 1994 in 35mm and 120, printing to Ilfochrome Classic (which presented its own nasty problems) and latterly RA-4 hybrid. There is truth that the more experience and skill you have, the better you are able to achieve what you desire. Don't give in! True, also it's easier to get exposures correct in MF and LF, but exposures will always be a bit more challenging in 35mm because of all the contrast squezed into a frame the size of a postage stamp and that you are allowing the camera to make critical decisions when scenes are not as straightforward as they first appear (Galen Rowell wrote extensively about this many years ago), so dump 35mm. And all my 120 work is multispot metered (I bypass the TTL meter on my Pentax 67). I never use grad. filters, but almost always use a polariser for my rainforest work.

While I'd dispute "best" (depends on whether you want the highly saturated look) this is exactly it. It's a very narrow range film. For overcast conditions, fine, it's easy enough to expose well in flat lighting and punches up the scene. But in already contrasty lighting, forget about it unless you can use fill flash or a reflector or something to even it out, or unless you are willing to get only about three stops of range and let anything above that blow out and below that go black.

 

[Trail Images]

It was only a year back I was struggling with the same thing. Since making changes with suggestions made by APUG members I've had a full year with few images going in the round file.
For years I had no issues with V-50. All my shots are in low light of sunrise & sunset. But all of a sudden I was having problems with both 120 & 4x5. After spending serious time re-verifying light meters, both spot and incident, I also got serious with using reciprocity table.
Problem solved. I was totally sloppy about reciprocity and got away with it off and on. But after wasting film I've used the table enough now I have the numbers memorized.
So, don't give up on it unless you're sure you've checked all possible issues. Good luck.

 

[Trail Images]

only about three stops of range and let anything above that blow out and below that go black.

I totally agree & this is where the balancing act is. There is a trade off one way or another, and you have to learn how to best work with & accept the shortcomings. I have a tendency to let the sky go a bit, it's much easier to deal with it then inked up shadows.....but that is me....

 

[wildbill]

Have someone who know's how to use a spot meter show you how to use it. I'd say 90% of my shots are spot on, 5% still usable, 5% complete rubbish because I made a calculation error.

 

[markbarendt]

Velvia has been around for a long time now. It is very rare for people to express frustration with it. Truth be told, it's not the film, but the photographer.

The reason I don't complain about Velvia is that I don't use it normally. It can be pretty, but it's too much work and the color palette can be a bit "cheesy".

The film simply doesn't fit my needs. There are a few of us in this camp.

 

[Poisson Du Jour]

The reason I don't complain about Velvia is that I don't use it normally. It can be pretty, but it's too much work and the color palette can be a bit "cheesy".


The film simply doesn't fit my needs. There are a few of us in this camp.

Fair enough. There are still many, many who would love to try Velvia, but they read these sort of posts and are (unfairly) discouraged and put off by it. I would encourage a 10 year old to put it in his Olympus OM10 and see what happens.

There's also Provia and its subdued palette, though it can look a bit 'cold' to some. I expose Velvia to make it look more like Reala. I do have a choice how I want the finished image to look — everybody does. A few of my rainforest shots were thought by viewers to be on Reala or a muted-palette film, but no. Other rainforest shots though sometimes can definitely move into the "Disneychrome" territory (e.g. rapidly changing light which "ups" greens excessively under polarisation). That (changing light) can be a major, frustrating problem (e.g. a place you can visit only once) that can get the heckles up.

 

[markbarendt]

I like provia's pallette a lot better. I'd still rather shoot Portra.

 

[TheFlyingCamera]

From a color palette standpoint, and from an exposure latitude standpoint, I'm an Ektar/Portra guy myself, but one of the things I've always been told about Velvia when I shot it was expose it at 40, not 50. It's not a huge change, but it will knock that saturation down just a teensy bit and open up your shadows a teensy bit, which with Velvia is a good thing.

 

[markbarendt]

From a color palette standpoint, and from an exposure latitude standpoint, I'm an Ektar/Portra guy myself, but one of the things I've always been told about Velvia when I shot it was expose it at 40, not 50. It's not a huge change, but it will knock that saturation down just a teensy bit and open up your shadows a teensy bit, which with Velvia is a good thing.

It is that type of adjustment and the regular admonition to bracket that made shooting negatives so attractive to me.

 

[Roger Cole]

First time I've ever heard Provia described as "subdued" though I suppose it is in relation to Velvia, but only in that regard. I loved Astia, then went to E100G until that too went away.

But then again I started shooting slides when E4 was the process de jour, though I never actually processed E4 - I started doing that with early E6. In those days Kodachrome was considered highly saturated. My history may have affected what I consider saturated and what I consider realistic. Vericolor III type S (VPS) was considered a very saturated print film in those days.

 

[wildbill]

I shoot 4x5 and 8x10 velvia for color work almost exclusively. I don't bracket, never have. That's what a spot meter is for.

 

[Poisson Du Jour]

Rating Velvia at a different speed can help with its troublesome 35mm format, that's well known. But it isn't universally applicable to all scenes. It's a long time since I shot RVP in 35mm, but all the exposure records I have kept reflect the arbitrary re-rating of the film to suit conditions. So EI40 when shooting 35mm, ISO50 for other formats and scrutinise the results (or bracket in situ)...but it can be anything you want to suit conditions and the expected (or known) outcome. Like pulling and pushing, rating RVP at EI40 (or EI32) predisposes the film to obvious burning of highlights. Likewise, exposing it at EI64 (in say soft morning or evening light) introduces the risk of losing detail in even light shadows. Spot metering can sort out all this of course. Of all the formats to use RVP in, large format very often shares that "wow!" factor. I'm happy sticking with MF in the medium-term.


Sent from my LG-D855 using Tapatalk

 

[Roger Cole]

Well I really only shoot E6 for projection, and lacking a MF projector at the moment that means 35mm.

If my final goal is a print, then I will shoot negative film so I, or someone, can optically print it.

 

[Poisson Du Jour]

Roger, Velvia has been used for printing (over anything available in C41) ever since it was released, particularly to the defunct Ilfochrome Classic media, and latterly the excellent Kodak and Fuji RA4 print media (either/both give a much better result to boot). Printing from Velvia is a specialised task though. There is a resurgence in the take-up of Velvia here in Australia with online dealers running out of stock a day after refreshing it! Peter Lik, Peter Dobre and Ken Duncan all used Velvia up until their migration to digital (which hasn't exactly improved any of their work, especially Duncan's zealous twiddling of HSB controls and Lik's psychedelic abstracts.). In the past month I have ordered 6 boxes to replenish my stock and see me out to February. I threw out my last two boxes of negative film but I think somewhere in the deep recess of the freezer I have two long-expired boxes of the E100VS emulsion you mentioned. I used that film once, in 2004, and never again since. It wasn't the right palette at all for my work.