Increasing the ASA?

[Chan Tran]

Having taught photography a beginner needs one teacher, and whether it's a person, a book recommendation, or a web site the worst thing is lots of part formed differing suggestions coming from every direction. Yes, ignoring them would be better than that.

I didn't try to teach the OP anything. I just wanted to answer his question not to teach him. Because I you teach him he wouldn't ask the question.

 

[koraks]

Moderator note: it's a given that there will be differences in didactic preferences between forum participants. A discussion about this is welcomed, but please make a dedicated thread for it in this forum: https://www.photrio.com/forum/forums/photrio-forum-feedback-collaborate-improve.6/

The basic principle will remain that all advice and/or input offered in a thread is well-intended and also welcomed by the community at large.

 

[fstop]

Another consideration is the metering of consumer cameras and "pro"* cameras is different. Consumer camera metering is geared toward negative film while "pro" cameras meters are geared toward slide film.


* pro or advanced amateur

 

[DREW WILEY]

Huh ??? Every day I learn something new on this forum, even if it's incorrect.

 

[RalphLambrecht]

Hi,

Simple question -

If I set ASA 200 on my camera, for an ASA 100 film, will it give me a darker negative, please?

If you set 200 on your camera and your fm is 100, then your camera thinks the film is twice as sensitive as it actually is and your negatives will be underexposed (lighter). I think from our post that may be the opposite of what you want. push processing(extended (extended development) will compensate some of that but shadows will be thin and contrast will be increased.

 

[RalphLambrecht]

If you do not compensate by increasing your development time, you will have less shadow detail in the print and lower contrast.

increasing the development time will not increase the shadow detail but will increase the contrast!

 

[Castrillo]

Hi,

Simple question -

If I set ASA 200 on my camera, for an ASA 100 film, will it give me a darker negative, please?

Allowing less light into the camera ought to achieve this, for this method, I feel.

ND filters won't do it, because the camera's light meter will automatically compensate.

Thank you.

Your assumption is correct, you will get a darker photo, you should not use the word negative here.
The negative is an intermediate step to get the photo and the negative will be lighter.

 

[88E30M50]

It depends on what the OP is trying to do. By their original question, it might be that they are struggling with thin negatives and are looking to improve on that. Raising the iso will not increase negative density but would make them lighter, or, thinner. If the OP is looking to improve negative density, then either lowering the iso or increasing development time might work for them. The listed iso on a roll of film is just a starting point and should not be seen as gospel. The same goes for development time.

Experimenting with different iso settings and development times would make understanding the link between iso settings and how dark the negative is much easier to understand. I only develop b&w right now, so if the OP is asking the question in regards to color, the development time manipulation might not apply. I'm not familiar with the C-41 process and while the same principle would apply, I have no experience with it to allow comment on color.

 

[Chan Tran]

The OP made one post 2 days ago and that's it.

 

[jimjm]

increasing the development time will not increase the shadow detail but will increase the contrast!

You're correct Ralph. There's not much hope If the shadow detail wasn't captured at the time of exposure. Thanks.

 

[pentaxuser]

The OP made one post 2 days ago and that's it.

Maybe we told him all he needed to know that day?

pentaxuser

 

[fstop]

Huh ??? Every day I learn something new on this forum, even if it's incorrect.

In the 70s 35mm cameras had the meters "tuned" for the film they were expected to use.Fort example A canon AE1 would be tuned for print film while a F1 would be tuned for slide film. Its minor difference but it does exist and its well known fact among those who service these things.

 

[miha]

Poor OP, this might be confusing for them.

 

[DREW WILEY]

fstop - I never knew any kind of camera was "expected" to use just one particular category of film, unless it was a pre-loaded disposable camera, or some cheap point n' shoot with no meter at all. Plenty of pros shot color neg film (as if those particular films were all the same, which they weren't), and plenty of amateurs were interested in giving slide shows and not just having album snapshots. It doesn't make sense. But I've been using handheld spot meters that whole time for all my cameras anyway.

 

[koraks]

cameras had the meters "tuned" for the film they were expected to use

What's the basis for this claim?

 

[BrianShaw]

I took that to imply that professional cameras were starting to use center-weighted exposuer meters versus the averaging meters in the lower line cameras.

 

[250swb]

In the 70s 35mm cameras had the meters "tuned" for the film they were expected to use.Fort example A canon AE1 would be tuned for print film while a F1 would be tuned for slide film. Its minor difference but it does exist and its well known fact among those who service these things.

So Canon set out to screw you if you wanted to use 'print film' in an F1? The F1 was Canon's pro camera choice and would usually be loaded with negative film for fast processing in newspaper darkrooms ready for immediate reproduction in print. Maybe metering patterns between the two cameras were different and the AE-1 was geared towards a more amateur ''get something at any cost' approach to metering but you can't change sensitometry like it's the wallpaper, both cameras need to read the same at some point.

 

[MattKing]

The "tuned meters" reference has better applicability to cameras that used some sort of evaluative metering algorithm. Those systems would have behaved differently if optimized for slide film - where highlights need to be protected - or for print films - where shadows need to be protected.
The simpler metering systems - including the ones that offered auto-exposure - varied more in how they centre-weighted (or not) the metering pattern.

 

[fstop]

It was done with a EV change much like the ev dial on a lot of cameras., but was done internally. There is an old thread on this on this forum somewhere, I'm not spending the time to look for the documentation that verifies this.Anyone that shot film in the 70s like I did can tell you first that shooting slide film in a consumer grade camera does not yield the best results without a small change to exposure, but move to a higher grade camera abd voila proper exposure. Maybe 30 years ago I found documented proof the meter bias was different, go shoot some film and see for yourself, but you can't get Kodachrome anymore so its going to be a challenge.

 

[cerber0s]

Another consideration is the metering of consumer cameras and "pro"* cameras is different. Consumer camera metering is geared toward negative film while "pro" cameras meters are geared toward slide film.


* pro or advanced amateur

That may very well be correct, but makes no sense at all to me. Why would professionals use mainly slide film? I can think of very few applications where the customer would ask for slide film.

 

[MattKing]

That may very well be correct, but makes no sense at all to me. Why would professionals use mainly slide film? I can think of very few applications where the customer would ask for slide film.

When those cameras were current, editorial and commercial content was often submitted by way of transparencies.
There was a reason that National Geographic magazine had its own 35mm Kodachrome processing line - and that line had the highest volume of Kodachrome 35mm still Kodachrome film only in the world!

 

[cerber0s]

When those cameras were current, editorial and commercial content was often submitted by way of transparencies.
There was a reason that National Geographic magazine had its own 35mm Kodachrome processing line - and that line had the highest volume of Kodachrome 35mm still Kodachrome film only in the world!

Interesting! Thanks for clarifying that. Do you think (guess/estimate) that constituted the majority of all professional photography?

 

[pentaxuser]

I took that to imply that professional cameras were starting to use center-weighted exposuer meters versus the averaging meters in the lower line cameras.

For what it is worth I feel that instead of it being about cameras' different metering systems it maybe harks back to a variation on a statement that I have seen before on Photrio which is raging now in this thread that some cameras' metering was specifically designed for correct exposure for slide film rather than negative film. If I recall correctly this was alleged to be true for the meter in an F5

pentaxuser

 

[MattKing]

Interesting! Thanks for clarifying that. Do you think (guess/estimate) that constituted the majority of all professional photography?

Depends on how one might measure "the majority".
And in particular, in what era and market you were considering - it varied tremendously!

 

[Alan Edward Klein]

Interesting! Thanks for clarifying that. Do you think (guess/estimate) that constituted the majority of all professional photography?

Most shots were with chromes as there was no time to print negative color. Advertisers in all industries would simply look at direct positive chromes, compare, and pick the ones they wanted. Imagine the extra work if there had to be prints and conversion made from thousands of negatives? Kodachrome fell to the wayside when Velvia chromes came out that required a simpler process to develop and especially for outdoor photography had more intense colors. Ektachrome was similar to Velvia.