Portra 400 vs Fuji Pro 400h

skysh4rk · Nov 12, 2014

wblynch said:
I love Pro 400-h when it's fresh. But in my limited experience it goes bad quickly and once stale becomes dull, muddy and lifeless.

Portra 400 holds up longer for me. Even years expired and poorly stored I can get wonderful colors from Portra.

I will keep my next Pro 400-h in the freezer and use it quickly.

I've never had a problem with expired 400H, so I'm wondering if your experiences are due more to differences in storage or other factors rather than differences between the films themselves.

I do tend to shoot 400H a stop slower than Portra 400 though, even when fresh.

wblynch · Nov 12, 2014

Rolls were from the same batch that worked so well when fresh. At 6 months past expiry date they were bad. Same camera, same metering, same processing regimen.

Rolls were kept at mild room temperatures.

Chems were not my problem as the Portra rolls, developed right after in the same liter, came out perfectly.

As i said, it's just my experience but enough for me to prefer Portra.

film_man · Nov 13, 2014

wblynch said:
Rolls were from the same batch that worked so well when fresh. At 6 months past expiry date they were bad. Same camera, same metering, same processing regimen.

Rolls were kept at mild room temperatures.

Chems were not my problem as the Portra rolls, developed right after in the same liter, came out perfectly.

As i said, it's just my experience but enough for me to prefer Portra.

Pro film really need to be kept in a fridge, otherwise it goes off really quickly, unlike consumer film which is made to be kept wherever. I have all my film in a freezer and take it out as needed. Right now I've got about 20 rolls left of Portra 400NC that expired 11 years ago. It was in a fridge, I have to rate it 100 instead of 400 but it still comes out great.

film_man · Nov 13, 2014

wblynch said:
Rolls were from the same batch that worked so well when fresh. At 6 months past expiry date they were bad. Same camera, same metering, same processing regimen.

Rolls were kept at mild room temperatures.

Chems were not my problem as the Portra rolls, developed right after in the same liter, came out perfectly.

As i said, it's just my experience but enough for me to prefer Portra.

Pro film really needs to be kept in a fridge, otherwise it goes off really quickly, unlike consumer film which is made to be kept wherever. I have all my film in a freezer and take it out as needed. Right now I've got about 20 rolls left of Portra 400NC that expired 11 years ago. It was in a fridge, I have to rate it 100 instead of 400 but it still comes out great.

wblynch · Nov 13, 2014

It's funny because I bought 20 rolls of Kodak Gold 100 consumer film that expired in 2003 and was not cold stored yet it still works beautifully.

While I do keep most of my film chilled or frozen, 6 months out of date is quite early to go bad.

Is it the difference between Kodak and Fuji?

I don't know but maybe the lesson is to not waste money on "PRO" film and use the cheap consumer film that works so much better?

Lamar · Nov 14, 2014

The UK Film Lab article was interesting. Definitely no worries for overexposure. Here are my Kodak Portra 400 and Fuji Pro 400H shots on Flicker. I've done quite a bit of underexposure with Portra but I've only shot 400H at box speed. All 135.

Portra 400 Album. I've noted the ISO and processing used for most of the shots:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/lamarlamb/sets/72157648736661309/

Pro 400H Album. All box speed:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/lamarlamb/sets/72157648747348938/

film_man · Nov 14, 2014

wblynch said:
It's funny because I bought 20 rolls of Kodak Gold 100 consumer film that expired in 2003 and was not cold stored yet it still works beautifully.

While I do keep most of my film chilled or frozen, 6 months out of date is quite early to go bad.

Is it the difference between Kodak and Fuji?

I don't know but maybe the lesson is to not waste money on "PRO" film and use the cheap consumer film that works so much better?

I find pro film (I particularly like the Porta series) to be more finer grained than the consumer stuff with nicer colour and more consistent results. In the end, the good thing with film is that you use whatever works for you. If you want to buy film and not worry too much about storage consumer stock is better. Some stocks will give you a certain look and some pro films will give you certain qualities. Whatever works for you is whatever works!

With all said and done, I think it is more important who dev/scans your film than the actual film.

Chris Livsey · Nov 14, 2014

film_man said:
With all said and done, I think it is more important who dev/scans your film than the actual film.

+1 (at least)

DREW WILEY · Nov 14, 2014

I tend to concentrate on the Kodak products simply because I can get a full range of film sizes in this country, all the way from 35mm to 8x10. So if necessary, I can test and undergo some of the learning curve with relatively inexpensive film before going broke on the big stuff.
Otherwise, I'd probably have zero problem with Fuji equivalents. I've used them before. But each variety of film has specific little nuances
in terms of tonality and subtle hues that are nice to know about, just in case certain tricky colors get encountered, or one versus the other
has a slight advantage in terms of ethnic skintones.

Portra 400 vs Fuji Pro 400h

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