Kodak Colorplus 200

[Photo Engineer]

I could tell you a tale of 2 Kodak films that were exactly identical except for one very tiny difference that changed nothing appreciably, but people went on and on about the qualities of one over the other. But then, I won't.

People see differences, or not, regardless. It is more in what they want to see or see due to process differences in lab output.

PE

 

[BrianShaw]

I’m not surprised. I also wouldn’t mind hearing a tale. Got my pijamas on and a mug of hot cocoa. Please... a bedtime story. Just make sure it begins with “in a land far, far away” and ends with “and they lived happily ever after”.

 

[Raghu Kuvempunagar]

I could tell you a tale of 2 Kodak films that were exactly identical except for one very tiny difference that changed nothing appreciably, but people went on and on about the qualities of one over the other. But then, I won't.

You should tell PE.

 

[Photo Engineer]

I'll wait on that.

 

[Agulliver]

There are always incidents of the emperor's new clothes....but the differences between Color Plus 200 and Gold 200 are repeatable and quite obvious. A lot of people like Gold because it tends to make dull days look brighter. Not to my personal taste but happily we still have Gold and Color Plus.

As far as anyone is aware, EK are still making VR 100, 400 and 800 when the Lomography folk put in an order. It seems likely they'd be able to make VR 200 also. PE, do you have any more info on the arrangement between EK and Lomogrpahy? The received wisdom is that the Lomo C41 films are Kodacolor VR but I don't know if it's been proved. Some of the Lomography 100 film says "made in China"...at least the 120 rolls do. The packs of 400 that I've had, the location of manufacture was obscured by a label placed there by the vendor. I think my 1350 Lomography 800 film pack said "Made in USA" but I dumped the cardboard carton long ago and used the last film in December.

 

[trendland]

I could tell you a tale of 2 Kodak films that were exactly identical except for one very tiny difference that changed nothing appreciably, but people went on and on about the qualities of one over the other. But then, I won't.

People see differences, or not, regardless. It is more in what they want to see or see due to process differences in lab output.

PE

I agree with you because I realy could imagine that some differences are so far tiny that the impact of developement is much higher. In the 80th you got different quality from different labs. Remember 1 hour photo labs. To that time you got a different color palette sometimes if you have just change your lab.
BTW Kodak often stated that the proffessional films came from selected production and were the base of amatheuric films. That would mean Kodak designed a new film, higher the quality from production process, selected the best results, offered these films as proffesional films and some months later they produced an amatheuric film with simular characteristics in a further production run and used a simular recipe so the " basis " of that amatheuric films came from the professional films " family " !

I see this different because the basis ( the first design ) was always to the amatheuric film version ( in much much more scales ) later Kodak designed a proffessional version of these films via special selection and with tiny difference to the amatheuric recipe. That would mean
the basis of Kodak proffessional films was ( in many cases ) the amatheuric version.

Would you agree with this ?

with greetings

 

[trendland]

There are always incidents of the emperor's new clothes....but the differences between Color Plus 200 and Gold 200 are repeatable and quite obvious. A lot of people like Gold because it tends to make dull days look brighter. Not to my personal taste but happily we still have Gold and Color Plus.

As far as anyone is aware, EK are still making VR 100, 400 and 800 when the Lomography folk put in an order. It seems likely they'd be able to make VR 200 also. PE, do you have any more info on the arrangement between EK and Lomogrpahy? The received wisdom is that the Lomo C41 films are Kodacolor VR but I don't know if it's been proved. Some of the Lomography 100 film says "made in China"...at least the 120 rolls do. The packs of 400 that I've had, the location of manufacture was obscured by a label placed there by the vendor. I think my 1350 Lomography 800 film pack said "Made in USA" but I dumped the cardboard carton long ago and used the last film in December.

Is that indeed still the case ? I am not so far up to date with Lomo films - are there still Iso 100 films ? The origin of Lomo films is a little more special. I could imagin that Lomo put different films ( that what they got ) into their Lomo canisterrs ( I refer to the pratice of Lomo some years ago !

In any way : it is a shame that c 41 ISO 100 films are no longer avaible ( exept Kodak Ektar ). BTW are you scanning your films Aguliver ? Or do you use a conventional workflow via darkroom ? Because if you are printing from digital the color palette of a film seams not to be
that " outstanding " criteria any longer.

with regards

PS : To me there is no way with scanning workflow exept I need a scan for the net - at all I own just some hands of scans ( less than 50 )........... - that is a goot think to me ( less than 50 )

 

[trendland]

There are always incidents of the emperor's new clothes....but the differences between Color Plus 200 and Gold 200 are repeatable and quite obvious. A lot of people like Gold because it tends to make dull days look brighter. Not to my personal taste but happily we still have Gold and Color Plus.

As far as anyone is aware, EK are still making VR 100, 400 and 800 when the Lomography folk put in an order. It seems likely they'd be able to make VR 200 also. PE, do you have any more info on the arrangement between EK and Lomogrpahy? The received wisdom is that the Lomo C41 films are Kodacolor VR but I don't know if it's been proved. Some of the Lomography 100 film says "made in China"...at least the 120 rolls do. The packs of 400 that I've had, the location of manufacture was obscured by a label placed there by the vendor. I think my 1350 Lomography 800 film pack said "Made in USA" but I dumped the cardboard carton long ago and used the last film in December.

To explain the issue that the original color palette is a great thing with film - but with scanning workflow it isn´t so much important as many scanning people see - just from my point.
I have an extreme example from a 5 years old shot ( today I would not repeat that practice from workflow ) :

wow - what film was it ????

with regards

PS : I can´t say for sure because I first have to look at it but if I remember correct it could have been Color Plus 200 - so what is remaining from original film characteristics ? In short : Nothing

PPS : The original shot was miserable because the model had a bad day - at the same evening when I got the results I saw " In the electric mist " - with Tommy Lee Jones. That inspired me to change anything into a misty look via post.
The new result I named " Gost " and yes for a look like a gost this model had a good day and made at last a fine job....

( some still found this shot miserable - some as you can see not..... )

 

[Agulliver]

I am not currently developing my own colour film, I send all my C41 film to one lab which has been operating for over 30 years and which knows what it's doing. Sometimes I just have them scan negs, sometimes I get prints too....and sometimes I scan the negs myself after I get them returned. There are certainly consistent differences between Color Plus and Gold (and Ekatar, if you wish to include it)....no matter who scans it. As long as the processing is done properly and with fresh chemistry...and in my 40 years of photography I am happy to say I've only had one incidence of actual bad processing - and even then I was able to immediately tell the colour palette of Ektar from Agfa Photo Vista 200 (both processed badly by a local Boots which was winding down their lab).

As far as I am aware, only one person is alleging that Color Plus and Gold 200 are the same. Everyone else is getting different edge markings and different results from the two films.

 

[Agulliver]

@nusproizvodjac I can see a small difference even in your "dumb phone" photo. All I can offer by way of suggestion is that every lab occasionally screws up. The bottom neg does look under developed judging by the edge markings.

 

[Photo Engineer]

Probably low temperature then.

 

[foc]

Yes I can see that the bottom one has faint edge markings (low developer activity). You say it was processed by a Noritsu machine. They are normally very reliable and foolproof. The chemical replenishment , temperature control and timing is all controlled and if one is not within the specifications set up on the machine then it should alarm and the machine won't allow any more film to be processed.

The only thing I can think that could cause this is not enough throughput in the processor, faulty dev rep output or faulty processor.
(this looks like a dev problem as the neg mask is clear and so shows no sign of retained silver which would be a bleach problem)

Did you go back to lab and show them what you have shown here?
I know all labs make mistakes, just some are better than others at covering it up !!!!

 

[MattKing]

I would be cautious using the edge printing as a reliable indicator.
They are exposed on to the film at the time of packaging, but they do change over time, and are as susceptible to storage and environmental conditions as the rest of the film. What you see might very well be due to how the films were treated - both before they came to you and after - prior to development.
If you had two rolls that were bought fresh from the same source and either used directly or stored properly and carefully before exposure and then developed separately, the differences between the edge printing would be more reliable indicators.

 

[Photo Engineer]

Matt, I doubt that the edge conditions shown would be the result of any keeping problem in view of the low fog level!

PE

 

[koraks]

I have many rolls of Superia 200 that are 14 years old, always stored in a fridge, that develops quite a heavy overall fog while retaining good color rendition. The edge markings are indistinguishable from fresh film. C41 film seems to be quite good in terms of latent image preservation.