Interesting article on Tri-X I found while reading about Anton Corbijn

CropDusterMan · Dec 16, 2015

http://www.intelligentlifemagazine.com/content/features/bryan-appleyard/tri-x-factor

It's a good read...perhaps it's been on here before.
Enjoy

CJBo001 · Dec 16, 2015

Nice article - thanks for posting

Gerald C Koch · Dec 16, 2015

Thanks for posting, an interesting article. However the slant of the article is that the choice of film means everything. Things such as lighting and development are meaningless. While Tri-X is a very good film it does not have mystical properties.

My concern is that newbies will latch onto the concept that Tri-X will solve all their problems.

Sirius Glass · Dec 16, 2015

Thank you

Pioneer · Dec 16, 2015

Enjoyed the read. Thanks for bringing it to our attention.

doughowk · Dec 16, 2015

Last week,for the first time, I had an issue with Tri-X. In looking at the test prints, noticed a repeat pattern like a smudge. The negative showed a varying group of pin-prick holes repeated about every 10mm's. Yesterday, with some trepidation, shot a roll inside an AME Church in Jax; but the negatives look perfect, so my faith is restored. Hopefully, QA will continue to be important at Kodak Alaris.
Thanks, for the article.

SchwinnParamount · Dec 16, 2015

I would say that the author has captured quite eloquently, the reasons why I use film. Tri-X mostly, but also HP5+. Reading this makes me want to get my F2 (or Cannon F-1, I have both) and go out into the streets of Seattle today.

pentaxuser · Dec 16, 2015

Gerald C Koch said:
Thanks for posting, an interesting article. However the slant of the article is that the choice of film means everything. Things such as lighting and development are meaningless. While Tri-X is a very good film it does not have mystical properties.

My concern is that newbies will latch onto the concept that Tri-X will solve all their problems.

By the first few paragraphs I was expecting it to make the blind see, the lame walk etc. It had captured that essential rough, dirtiness that started with James Dean in Rebel Without A Cause and metamorphosed into that kind of "in your face" black and white honesty and grittiness of the 1960s as epitomised by McCullin, Bailey etc.

Let's not forget the part played in all of this by Jon Hamm as well. The article was certainly more Jon Hamm than Edward R Murrow.

We can only hope that everyone reading this article will ask themselves what lay behind it. I suspect it was a journalist being paid to produce an article weaving what he thought was the zeitgeist for the 1960s with a rosy nostalgia for the great days of film and the characters who used Tri-X.

I remember feeling the same warm glow that this article is attempting to evoke when watching "washed-up" Stoker Thompson refusing to throw a fight in the "Set-Up" although he desperately needed the money.

"Warm Glows" are fine. I need them just before I go to bed but I need to wake up the next day without expecting that I'll ever have the 1966 version of Raquel Welch beside me

Products, even Kodak products, characters and life in general are seldom, if ever, that rosy.

pentaxuser

blockend · Dec 17, 2015

I find Tri-X film base too thin and flexible. Was it always so, I don't recall it being like that in the 70s/80s? HP5+ is substantially thicker, as is 35mm Foma.

blockend · Dec 17, 2015

I find Tri-X film base too thin and flexible. Was it always so, I don't recall it being like that in the 70s/80s? HP5+ is substantially thicker, as is 35mm Foma.

Dr Croubie · Dec 17, 2015

Gerald C Koch said:
Thanks for posting, an interesting article. However the slant of the article is that the choice of film means everything. Things such as lighting and development are meaningless. While Tri-X is a very good film it does not have mystical properties.

Exactly. Just considering that image at the top of the guys herding the animals, I've got almost the exact-same 'grain look' from throwing FP4+ through Rodinal and 'old' (1990s-vintage) Tri-X through Xtol.

This guy sounds a bit strange though:
“I bought 2,500 rolls. My studio in Holland has three floors and there’s a fridge on each floor, all full of Tri-X. They must all be near their expiry date now. I don’t know what to do.”
Sorry, but he's 58 and doesn't realise that film is perfectly usable past its expiry date?
He's got in in a fridge, should be good for another 10 years at least. (and worst case, sell it on fleabay and make a small loss and go buy new because they're still making it)

bence8810 · Dec 17, 2015

Thanks for the article!
I love Trix - it's a great film minus the curl which is hard to tame.

Too bad it's so ridiculously expensive in Japan now that hardly anyone buys it. 100% price increase in the last 12 months. The fact that the Japanese Yen also hit rock-bottom isn't exactly helping either.

Ben

NB23 · Dec 18, 2015

I like Tri-X like all of us do. But HP5 is a magical film and perfectly equal to Tri-X.

It happens many times that while looking at some of my prints I am stunned at the exquisite quality of the image hitting my eyes. The Grain, the gradation, the tones, the manly yet caressing edge from dark tones to highlights. HP5 is giving me a great show each and every time.

MontanaJay · Dec 18, 2015

Great article. Thanks!
I started shooting Tri-X in the 1960s as a teenager and shot of lot of it through my 30-year newspaper career, to the point my eyes served as a light meter for my Nikon F.
It was, and is, an "honest" film, as the story points out.

pentaxuser · Dec 18, 2015

MontanaJay said:
It was, and is, an "honest" film, as the story points out.

Can you say what distinguishes an "honest" film from a "dishonest" one?If it is easier tell us which films are dishonest or at least "less than completely honest" compared to Tri_X and why if possible.

Thanks

pentaxuser

Ken Nadvornick · Dec 18, 2015

pentaxuser said:
Can you say what distinguishes an "honest" film from a "dishonest" one?If it is easier tell us which films are dishonest or at least "less than completely honest" compared to Tri_X and why if possible.

Just a gently differing opinion here, but sometimes words and phrases mean more than their literal dictionary entries tell us. That may be the case here. As it was also for a certain wonderfully compelling comment a few months ago regarding a certain Stearman photo...

Ken

Sirius Glass · Dec 18, 2015

MontanaJay said:
It was, and is, an "honest" film, as the story points out.

pentaxuser said:
Can you say what distinguishes an "honest" film from a "dishonest" one?If it is easier tell us which films are dishonest or at least "less than completely honest" compared to Tri_X and why if possible.

Dishonest articles start out stating the film is dead. Then it repeats that mantra again and again and again repetitively and redundantly many times over.

Bob Carnie · Dec 18, 2015

I am please do see Mike Spry mentioned as I consider him one of the greatest photographic printers of all time. Basically his magic brought many photographers to the forefront.

Interesting article on Tri-X I found while reading about Anton Corbijn

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