Kentmere 400

brofkand · Aug 25, 2011

Has anyone used this film? Just ordered a 100 foot roll from B&H, but I haven't seen many reviews of it anywhere.

Mostly what I've seen is people say it's grainy, but otherwise good. Any thoughts?

Jadedoto · Aug 25, 2011

I used a 100' roll of it for a class two years ago. I found it too grainy for my tastes, and the film base was a little thin. Otherwise, it performed alright.

brofkand · Aug 25, 2011

I figure I'll try it; it was only $30 which is cheap as far as bulk rolls of film nowadays. If it's no good for me, I'll go back to HP5.

marcmarc · Aug 25, 2011

Grainy? I heard from a rep at Freestyle that it's a T-grained film possibly Delta 400. I don't know if this is true or not.

Jadedoto · Aug 25, 2011

It is most definitely NOT t-grain. To me it looked like a more salt-and-pepper HP5. that is, unless they changed it in the past year or two. I shot it back in fall 09 I believe.

erikg · Aug 25, 2011

Not Delta 400. Not even close. Not HP-5 nor Pan 400, but closer to the latter than the rest. Grainy, but otherwise good is a decent description. Dries flat. Has a rather classic look. Nice really, a good value.

Dennis S · Aug 26, 2011

I am still using up a large (100ft) roll of Kentmere 100 and find it a very worthy film. I develop it 1-50 Blazinal (Rodinal for the rest of the world).
It dries very flat so it is good for scanning. I have only printed a few but they were good where they should be. Next film order will contain several more large rolls and I HAVE to try out the 400 as well. I say go for it. Don't let fear or common sense hold you back.

brofkand · Aug 27, 2011

Just spooled a half dozen rolls...going to shoot it tomorrow. Hopefully it's good! Does Harman have the ability to make bad film?

dnjl · Aug 28, 2011

There has been a lot of speculation about the Kentmere films (100 and 400). Some say it's rebranded Delta or HP5, or even an older Ilford emulsion, but I recall Simon denying this somewhere on these forums.
I'll order a brick or two myself when I'm through my current stash and see for myself. There's not much documentation available for these films though, hopefully that'll change.

Jerevan · Aug 28, 2011

Good films, with a bit more grain than FP4 and HP5 (I think it is most prominently seen on the K400). The QC seems as good as the regular Ilford films. If I wasn't so lazy with bringing the tripod outside, I'd shoot tons of K100, it's really nice! I've been doing it in XTOL 1+1, 12 minutes or so.

brofkand · Aug 28, 2011

Developed a roll in D-76 1:1 at 14 minutes; the recommended time for the film from Kentmere. Seems fairly dense; maybe overdeveloped or overexposed. Used the built-in flash on my A2 for most of the shots. Usually my camera's meter is very good, even while using flash. I'll do some more testing and see what to make of it.

First impressions: it dries flat. Takes 2.5 minutes to clear in Kodak Fixer. Outside of that, we'll see. Looking forward to scanning some of these shots. I don't have a darkroom setup at the moment to print any properly.

brofkand · Aug 28, 2011

Grainy film. Quick and dirty scan on my v500.

JMC1969 · Aug 29, 2011

marcmarc said:
Grainy? I heard from a rep at Freestyle that it's a T-grained film possibly Delta 400. I don't know if this is true or not.

waltereegho said:
There has been a lot of speculation about the Kentmere films (100 and 400). Some say it's rebranded Delta or HP5, or even an older Ilford emulsion, but I recall Simon denying this somewhere on these forums.

This is a quick quote from Simon in a thread I started a couple of years ago when the lab I worked at first received the film.

"KENTMERE film is absolutely BRAND new, 2 new emulsions, 35mm only, at a competitive price, it is not a 'rebadged' ILFORD Film, I think I have stated many times WE DO NOT SUPPLY PRIVATE LABEL even to a BRAND we own.
Kind Regards

Simon ILFORD Photo / HARMAN technology Limited "

If you are interested in the thread it is 19 pages long, and the above statement is on page 2. Simon is very present within the first 10-12 pages and answers a lot of questions.

1/2 way down on page 15 I posted some results of testing Kentmere 400 while running a separate test on developers, but is a good reference for these purposes as well. There is a link to a second thread in that post.

Link-pg 15 - (there was a url link here which no longer exists)

Hope this helps.

Jody

brofkand · Aug 29, 2011

That is some thread! It's a shame this film has been around for 3 years and there's so little talk about it. On the surface it seems like a decent film.

I will do much more testing with it. It appears at first glance my first roll was either consistently overexposed, overdeveloped, or both. I was skeptical about developing it for 14 minutes at 1:1 with D-76, but that's what Harman calls for.

I'll use Rodinal next.

michaelbsc · Aug 29, 2011

Kinda looks like an attempt to horn in on Tri-X. With Kodak falling faster than apples around Newton's head maybe this is worth looking at.

piu58 · Aug 30, 2011

Maco company in Germany sells a developer which works fine with that film named RPX-D. You can get real 1000 ASA from it, with decent shadow separation. I have tested it. You can see the results in this pdf-file. "belichtet wie" means "exposured like", the vertical text "entwickelt wie" means "developed like".

If you use the minimum amount of developer (21 ml per film), which means developed like 400 ASA, you get real 800 ASA which is quite a good result. By doubling the developing costs (developed like 1600 ASA) you gain half a stop.

The grain is typical for a 400 ASA film and does not increase with forced development. In this image you see a detail, the tree at the right edge, the upper part shows developed like 400, the bottom show developed like 1600.

Dennis S · Aug 30, 2011

I mostly shoot my K 100 @ 50 Which is recommended by DD charts with Rodinal Dev.

brofkand · Aug 31, 2011

Developed a roll in Rodinal 1:25 at 9m. Contrast is much better controlled, and it seems less grainy (probably because the negatives aren't overdeveloped).

So far this seems to be the winning combo. As Ansel said, "D-76 is a universal developer, but not one that I use."

paulfish4570 · Sep 2, 2011

it is good stuff with a vintage look to it when developed in tmax. it does fog/mist very well. its dried-flatness is a big plus ...

brofkand · Sep 26, 2011

It does not do well in Rodinal at 1:50, at least not at 20 minutes. Seems very contrasty and grainy as in D-76. Still doing some testing, but as of now it seems that Rodinal at 1:25 9m seems to be a good combination.

presspass · Sep 26, 2011

Anyone tried either Xtol or one of the two bath developers based on D-23? Both give tighter grain with Tri-X than D-76 and the Xtol, either 1:3 or replenished, does well for pushing Tri-X. I would like to switch to a Harmon/Ilford film, simply because they seem to be the only firm around supporting a full range of products for B&W shooters.

Jerevan · Sep 27, 2011

Xtol 1+1 works fine. You need to work out your own times, my own starting point is 12 minutes 30 seconds, but I haven't had time to finetune it for my process.

Kentmere 400

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