Kodak Ektar 100: skin tone EI?

markbarendt

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CGW,

I use a lab too. That's not the issue, because I don't need to know anything about scanning to get good work from a lab.


Scanners are nothing more than "specialized digital cameras" and they require a different set of skills outside APUG's scope.

DPUG is perfect for film scanning questions.
 

CGW

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"At any rate, we've said our pieces, and let's just move back to helping the OP."

You first!
 

2F/2F

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CGW said:
"At any rate, we've said our pieces, and let's just move back to helping the OP."

You first!
Click to expand...

I answered the OP before making any sort of point along these lines. Then, I wrote six paragraphs about the area in a non-inflammatory fashion, split between two posts on two separate days. This information does not support your opinion that I am pressing the issue to the point of uselessness and distraction. You, on the other hand, are just trying to cause trouble with that statement.
 
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CGW

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Right. Disagreement/criticism=causing trouble. OK...
 

Markster

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I'm trying not to take your comments personally, but frankly it's hard because you're criticising my exact words. I find it unpleasant to be discarded out of hand so readily.

All you need to do is do some bracketing tests for yourself. Don't just shoot a shot, look at the print, and say "that's fine" -- compare the box speed vs over exposures up to 2 to 3 stops of overexposure. You will see there is a very specific effect whereby the colors bleed out, aka leach out, aka fade out aka whatever the hell you want to call it. The color goes bye bye. It's not just desaturation.. it's rapid desaturation.

I'm overall impressed with it as a film, but this is not something to ignore. If you want to say "I disagree" that's fine, but please refrain from calling me "internet nonsense" please. I've actually done some testing and the results match up with some other online bracketing results you can find and compare.

As a matter of fact I'll find it for you. Here:
http://darktopography.blogspot.com/2009/02/ektar-100-darktopo-film-test.html
Edit: And another here that also concurs with loss of color and contrast:
http://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/...ion/66735-ektar-exposure-tests-2-2-stops.html
/Edit

So, with all due respect, the film is nice and I like the way it works, but it's not as perfect and forgiving as you suggest, and it's NOT a processing error. It's just one of the quirks of the film.

At half the price of Portra, I'm willing to work around such flaws. Even manipulate such flaws to my advantage (intentional desaturation, etc).
 
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2F/2F

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CGW said:
Right. Disagreement/criticism=causing trouble. OK...
Click to expand...

You did not even bother to disagree or criticize. You made a two-word sarcastic comment with no basis in reality. I had already done what you apparently thought I should be doing.
 

hrst

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Markster; I didn't mean anything personal. Sorry. More likely, I hope I could be of some help.


I'm sorry, but your test shows some VERY peculiar problem I've never seen with Ektar. It certainly isn't normal for Ektar, or any color neg film for years. I haven't seen it by myself, and I haven't seen it in another examples. For example, see the examples with car, color patches and step wedge that have been linked somewhere here. They went up to +5 stops and differ very much from your results. They start showing some shouldering or washing out at +5 stops, not at +2 stops, but still nothing serious.

I still suspect something in your workflow.

BTW, that is usually called "washed out" look. In fact, all of your scans of the hand grenade scene look somewhat washed out and the colors are odd. I've seen this when using severely expired film or faulty developer. But due to complexity of the scanning process, it may be the cause as well, even with perfect negatives! I have seen that as well. It may simply be something with level adjustments, but this is something to be discussed at DPUG.

Generally I found with Coolscan V that Nikon Scan did usually better with color negs than VueScan. Actually, you are talking about "scanner calibration" with one frame. This is already where you may go wrong. I don't know what you mean by "scanner calibration", but if it is the black point, or Dmin calibration, it's the same as settling with one exposure time in optical printing - a completely wrong action if you have frames exposed differently. You HAVE to adjust for every frame unless they are close in lighting and exposure.

As for Pentaxforum example, some color crossover can be seen. This looks like a problem in digital image processing. The author of the test claims he has "adjusted exposure for equivalent values of white highlights", which clearly wasn't successful, because highlights go from blue to white to green. So, judging the results, the "adjustment" has gone somehow wrong, and thus we cannot know what the initial state was, since the adjustments may have messed up anything or everything! Then just imagine that these kind of adjustments are also done automatically, hidden from user.

Now, I hope this also shows the benefits of optical printing. No hidden state in software, no hidden "calibration", no hidden levels, no hidden curves, no hidden auto exposure, no hidden auto focus. No "color balancing" tools that would simultaneously do something else than just affect color balancing. For example, AFAIK, even today, Adobe Photoshop curves and levels tool mess up color integrity (causing color crossover) because of misunderstanding of gamma correction by the programmer. In fact, I haven't found one single tool in Adobe Photoshop that could be used to adjust color balance, like Magenta/Yellow knobs in enlarger when you print optically!

But when you print optically, you have: fixed contrast (designed to look "good"), fixed curves (designed to look "good"), adjustments for "brightness" (exposure time) to adjust for differently exposed negs, magenta & yellow knobs to get any color balance you want, but no other color adjustments - you can only adjust color BALANCE, but you cannot mess up color purity or cause crossover. Then, these may sound like restrictions, as they are, but in fact you can do 99% of your images even with these restrictions just perfectly. Then, there are many tricks you CAN use if you need to to overcome these restrictions; you can control contrast if you WANT to, but you don't do it accidentally like in scanning. Dodge, burn, preflash, ferricyanide (SLIMT), sulfite, H2O2, pH, dev time, bleach bypass, partial BW dev, etc.

It seems to me that there are people who can easily scan and get easily very good results. I'm a bit jealous of them . I can get good results in scanning too, but I find it tedious. Then there are people who cannot get good results from scanning at all.

But I have yet to see anyone who cannot get good results from optical printing!
 
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benjiboy

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If we're talking about skin tones Ektar's reproduction of them for my tastes is far too red, the OP would be much better advised to use Kodak Portra in any of it's incarnations, although for general photography Ektar is an excellent film even Kodak don't recommend it for producing natural skin tones in portrait photography.
 

Athiril

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Ektar has great skin tones, I would suggest a problem with your colour balancing method, as I have both brilliant reds in objects that are actually red with great skin tones in the same frame on a linear colour balance.

All my Ektar - I'm seeing huge separation between actual strong reds and skin tones. I don't think people are treating it correctly - red's are red, skin tones are not.




And saturation does descrease with increased exposure - like all colour negative films. Before someone tries to chime in with "there is more dye on the film!" - that is exactly the reason there is less saturation.

IE: You have a red object. (IRL scenario: perhaps a sunset sky or sunrise) Increasing exposure decreases the amount separation of cyan (red) to magenta (green) and yellow (blue) dyes, doubly compounded as the cyan will shoulder off for a red object with ever increasing exposure, while magenta and yellow will increase in a straight line in relation to it, triply compounded as the shouldering will cause the object to have ever subtler (lower contrast) gradiations, and hence less brightness change to the adjacent reds of the red object.

I always thought colour negs were rubbish for things like sunset and sunrise and simply couldn't reproduce those colours at all, but it was internet advice that was rubbish, telling people to overexpose more for better saturation, or just expose for the foreground or shadows - in the specific reply to such scenarios as a colourful sunset.
 
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Athiril

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perkeleellinen said:
They are when your models are 85 and have spent their lives soaked in whisky!
Click to expand...

That's reflection of reality then.

Exposure makes a lot of difference too.

I've had nuclear green grass on the new Portra 400.
 

lns

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I totally agree; this has been my experience too.

Yes, any film can be used in a pinch, but like Ben I'd rather pick the best film for the job as long as I have the time to do so.

-Laura
 

hrst

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And, Kodak recommends Ektar for fashion photography - that usually involves some skin, too .

Portra is just guaranteed to render many different skin types in a very predictable manner, based on years of experience from Kodak on skin tone test shootings involving models with different skin types, in different kind of lightings.

Ektar is not specifically designed for skin tones (unlike the Portras, as the name suggests), but this does not mean Ektar wouldn't be able to render skin tones nicely. I have very good results, too. Definitely nothing like Velvia. Testing how it exactly looks with different skin tones is just left to user.

Kodak's representative has said in interviews that they are happy to see that people find their products even more flexible than they market them. IIRC, he specifically mentioned how Ektar can be used in portraits and Portra in landscapes. lol.

There are no rules in photography, and there is no absolute "best" or "worst". This is always up to tastes and needs.
 
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c6h6o3

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Caucasian skin is generally Zone VI. So simply meter the skin at box speed and then open it up one.

This was shot that way on Ektar:



I love the way it renders skin tones.
 

Athiril

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And Ektar also isn't "garish" at all... people seem to be copypasta'ing what they read on the net from someone else and not putting their money where their mouth is.

A photo of skin tones next to a red object will reveal that the film isn't "garish" or overly red (and in fact does very well for subtle gradiations in red objects itself) but their work flow/reproduction method is what is "garish".
 

benjiboy

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Athiril said:
So you're restig your "case" on a tag line rather than with critical thinking and evidence?
Click to expand...

No, I base my thinking on my experience of shooting a lot of both films and comparing the results, I don't dispute that Ektar is a wonderful general purpose colour neg. film that can be used for portraiture at a pinch, but is not the best film for producing natural skin tones in various different lighting conditions that Kodak Portra or Fuji Pro 160S films that were specifically devised for portrait work do.
 
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c6h6o3

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I agree. Even though I like the look of Ektar in certain situations, Portra yields the most natural skin tones among currently available films, and even it can't hold a candle to many of the discontinued Kodak color films. (Pro 100T,Vericolor III, Ektachrome 64T). I would've used Portra 160 NC to make the picture I posted above had I had any at the time.

The photo posted above was made at sunset with flash fill, so it's probably not a good benchmark for color rendition.
 
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