Image quality of Fujifilm Instax Wide .

neilt3 · Sep 3, 2020

Lomography have announced a new back for 5x4 cameras that uses Fujifilm Instax Wide , and it's got my attention .
See here ; https://shop.lomography.com/en/lomo-graflok-instant-back?country=gb

Now I'm aware that the film is quite a bit smaller than 5x4 , but what I'm interested in is what the image quality , resolution wise of Instax Wide film actually is .
With a normal instant cameras the deciding factor is the lens , good or bad .
Not knowing what cameras use this , it doesn't tell me what the IQ of the film is and how it stands for enlarging ( obviously a hybrid method ) .

As this is a Graflok back the lenses that will be used are the same as I use on 5x4 film , so quality isn't an issue .

What catches my eye with this is partly the fact it's an instant back , and partly cost of colour film is quite expensive .
This item could be just what I'm after .
But as the images captured are to be enlarged , say about 10x8 inch minimum , how good is the film , and would it stand it ?
Or is instant film only any good for postcard sized prints .

Thanks .

Daire Quinlan · Sep 3, 2020

tons of examples extant of people who've loaded instax into other cameras with a bewildering array of lenses. Here's one I took in a mamiya press.

Correspondence

I'd say it's sufficient for what it's designed for, to be viewed as an image as it is. Low resolution aside, there's also the problem that it's not completely flat so it's difficult to get a solid FP. All that said, that back is pretty interesting. Instax does have an amazing look to it, and their B&W is lovely.

AgX · Sep 3, 2020

neilt3 said:
With a normal instant cameras the deciding factor is the lens , good or bad .

In contrast to classic analog photography
-) the image is not be enlarged in a further step
-) the resolution of diffusion materials is one magnitute off that of classic film

Oren Grad · Sep 3, 2020

Fuji specifies the resolution of the Instax prints as "10 lines/mm" - presumably they mean 10 lp/mm.

Regardless, I've shot a fair amount of Instax, including with a 100mm Sironar-N on a modified Wide 300 camera. It's finicky stuff, very contrasty with correspondingly narrow exposure latitude, and the color Instax is very sensitive to white balance. When everything is just right, the prints are exquisite. But it's a medium for creating little jewels, not a useful intermediate for making crisp enlargements.

neilt3 · Sep 3, 2020

Thanks for the replys .
I think I'll probably get one , just wanting to know what results to expect .
My expectations from instant film is relatively low , but at this price , knowing that the film packs are liable to be available reasonably long term , I think it might be worth my while getting one .

The only instant camera I have is a Minolta one that uses Polaroid Spectra film packs , which have now been dropped .
I'm on my last pack now , then it'll be sat on a shelf .
I was happy with image quality for what is was , I've never scanned them for enlarging though , so was curious about this one .

Thanks again .

ic-racer · Sep 3, 2020

Daire Quinlan said:
tons of examples extant of people who've loaded instax into other cameras with a bewildering array of lenses. Here's one I took in a mamiya press.

Correspondence

I'd say it's sufficient for what it's designed for, to be viewed as an image as it is. Low resolution aside, there's also the problem that it's not completely flat so it's difficult to get a solid FP. All that said, that back is pretty interesting. Instax does have an amazing look to it, and their B&W is lovely.

Is that available light? How did you do that? Are you using a 80A filter?

Daire Quinlan · Sep 4, 2020

ic-racer said:
Is that available light? How did you do that? Are you using a 80A filter?

yes available light, hand held, no flash. It's an 80mm from a Mamiya TLR mounted onto an Instax mini. Combination of f/2.8 and 800asa gives pretty good flexibility.

Frankinstax

AgX · Sep 4, 2020

What are those two wires for?

Daire Quinlan · Sep 4, 2020

AgX said:
What are those two wires for?

There's a little contact switch on the instax that is closed when the lens is pulled out (effectively turning on the camera), so to eject a sheet from my frankinstax, you have to hold the ends of those two wires together, then hit the shutter button

I keep on meaning to put a little latching switch there.

AgX · Sep 4, 2020

I would shorten that open circuit and check if there is any extra (or substantial) drain by that on the battery, when the camera is switched on, but not released. If not, put the wires back into the body and solder them, closing that lens-out-signal circuit for good.

darkosaric · Sep 4, 2020

That is great result Daire! And with Instax Mini, not Wide. I am guessing that with Wide and this new 5x4 back - results will be even better. I use a Mini SP2 hybrid printer, it gives me better results as regular Mini camera. But this frankinstax looks awesome .

AgX · Sep 4, 2020

darkosaric said:
I use a Mini SP2 hybrid printer, it gives me better results as regular Mini camera.

That means that camera optics are of effect on IQ nonetheless.

Daire Quinlan · Sep 4, 2020

AgX said:
I would shorten that open circuit and check if there is any extra (or substantial) drain by that on the battery, when the camera is switched on, but not released. If not, put the wires back into the body and solder them, closing that lens-out-signal circuit for good.

No, that means that the camera would be permanently on. The instax mini (or at least the model I have) is powered up when the lens is extended, a little reed switch inside the lens housing is pressed. That's the switch the two wires are from. So to take a picture, I trip the mamiya shutter, then press the wires together, which powers up the camera, then hit the shutter button, which ejects the sheet of film. Easiest thing to do would be to put a small press switch on the body of the camera and wire those two contacts up to it. Better still would be to refactor the internals a bit so that you can just hit a button and it pops out the film, bypassing the entire bit where the instax thinks it's taking a picture

darkosaric said:
That is great result Daire!

Thanks Darko, bunch of others here: https://www.flickr.com/search/?user_id=31589949@N00&text=instax (and one instax wide which was taken with an actual instax wide, that's next for the chopping block)
They can look great, once you appreciate their limitations.

neilt3 · Sep 4, 2020

I can see this back with the film in it should work well for portraits , still life , and close ups in nature .
But not so much for regular landscapes .
I'm getting an idea of some things this will work well for , so I've pretty much made my mind up to get one .
Thanks again .

MattiS · Sep 4, 2020

Maybe you want to test/play a bit in advance.

radiant · Sep 4, 2020

MattiS said:
Maybe you want to test/play a bit in advance.

Has anyone "processed" the film without camera, like DIY rollers or something? Tempted to try but would not want buy Instax camera only for "developing" ..

MattiS · Sep 4, 2020

I tried it and it did not work well. One presses too hard and the chemicals pour out, one presses uneven and the result is uneven, too. So I grabbed a used camera with a crack on the flash cover for 30€ that does the job. If one only needs the processing part malfunctioning cameras are sold in my area for 15 to 20€ which is ok.

radiant · Sep 4, 2020

MattiS said:
I tried it and it did not work well. One presses too hard and the chemicals pour out, one presses uneven and the result is uneven, too. So I grabbed a used camera with a crack on the flash cover for 30€ that does the job. If one only needs the processing part malfunctioning cameras are sold in my area for 15 to 20€ which is ok.

Ok, good to know. Found one working camera used 45€ shipped. Should I go for it. Or not. Tempted. Is the processing part easy to remove usually?

MattiS · Sep 4, 2020

As far as I remember some youtube tutorials it´s like Lego. Just a motor and two wires.

warden · Sep 4, 2020

Daire Quinlan said:
yes available light, hand held, no flash. It's an 80mm from a Mamiya TLR mounted onto an Instax mini.

Cool!

Daire Quinlan · Sep 4, 2020

vedostuu said:
Has anyone "processed" the film without camera, like DIY rollers or something? Tempted to try but would not want buy Instax camera only for "developing" ..

I've done that, with somewhat ... varying ... results i.e.

That was an instax sheet that was manually squeezed through a set of polaroid rollers. Didn't really work. I ended up sourcing a broken instax to use.

ic-racer · Sep 4, 2020

Daire Quinlan said:
yes available light, hand held, no flash. It's an 80mm from a Mamiya TLR mounted onto an Instax mini. Combination of f/2.8 and 800asa gives pretty good flexibility.

Frankinstax

Awesome camera!!!
I was asking more about the color balance, as my 3200k incandescent studio lights make the images very very yellow with no filtration. In this case I was putting the instax film in my 8x10 , so I needed a lot of light. I used the instax camera only for 'processing' the film.

AgX · Sep 4, 2020

ic-racer said:
I was asking more about the color balance, as my 3200k incandescent studio lights make the images very very yellow with no filtration.

The times that there was an "inbetween" film have long gone, and it was not even instant film. I thus do not find it surprising that Instax film is balanced for dayligh (and for electronic flash).

Or wanted you to emphasis "yellow" versus "red"?

neilt3 · Sep 4, 2020

I'll be finding out soon enough what what the films capable off .
I've just bought a Fuji Instax 200 , a double pack of colour film , a single pack of black and white paint and 6x9 DDS to adapt to a 5x4 camera .
So it seems the only effective way of processing the film after a shot is to put it back in the camera , take a "shot" with the lens covered , and allow it to do it's business and roll it out to develop ?
Rather than putting it on a board and rolling something over it ?

Oren Grad · Sep 4, 2020

AgX said:
The times that there was an "inbetween" film have long gone, and it was not even instant film. I thus do not find it surprising that Instax film is balanced for dayligh (and for electronic flash).

To be precise, Fuji says 5500K. In my experience, in addition to going very orange under incandescent light, Instax goes very blue outdoors in shade. There's just not much latitude to the color balance for pleasing results. Taking into account the design of the cameras as well, I think Fuji intended the system first and foremost for party snapshots and assumed that most pictures will be made at close range with the cameras' built-in flash.

So far, my best results technically have come from some experiments with studio flash and my modified Wide 300. With a bit of trial and error to control the contrast ratio and get the exposure right, the prints can be really lovely. I'm very much looking forward to more studio tinkering with the Lomo back on a 4x5 camera. For those who are into miniatures, it should be a wonderful tool for portraiture and still life work.

Image quality of Fujifilm Instax Wide .

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