Ilford SFX 200 vs. Rollei Infrared

I'm interested in playing with infrared film with my Bronica ETRSi and was wondering about these two remaining options. Rollei is the true infrared and requires only a red filter that I already have and Ilford is not a true infrared film and requires a $74 Hoya R72 filter to achieve the infrared effect. I'm leaning toward the Ilford because it can be handled like ordinary black and white film and can be shot and processed as such and then switched to infrared by attaching the filter. But, Rollei doesn't require a new expensive filter.

Anyone familiar with both of these options and have an opinion?

The Rollei has a little more sensitivity into the near infrared, but only a little. If you look at the spectral sensitivity charts for the two films, you will see that they are more similar than different.

You really won't see much of the Wood effect with either film unless you use an R72 or similar filter.

I've had good results with a less expensive R72 (generic eBay) filter.

brianentz said:

I'm leaning toward the Ilford because it can be handled like ordinary black and white film and can be shot and processed as such and then switched to infrared by attaching the filter.

Click to expand...

The Rollei film is on a polyester film base which can cause light piping, so the film should be loaded into the camera in subdued light. Once it's in the camera you can switch between IR and regular BW by mounting or removing the IR filter just as with SFX. It's processed in regular BW process.

The polyester base is also a bit more tricky to cut with scissors.

As far as I know, the currently available films for IR are not 2 but 5.
There are 4 Rollei films with extended sensitivity: Retro 80S, Superpan 200, Infrared 400S and ATP.
Imho, Superpan 200 and Retro 80S are the most universal but Retro 80S got finer grain and higher resolution.
Rollei IR and Ilford SFX200 are kinda similar but the first one is with finer grain and goes a bit beyond 750nm.

This thread ((there was a url link here which no longer exists)) will give you some idea of what the Rollei IR400s is capable of. I use a cheap Chinese IR720 filter for it when shooting Infrared, but was surprised at how much lighter leaves looked with a red #25, and the real surprise was how much lighter the foliage looked with a red #25 + blue 80A.