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suggestions in Daylight street photograpgy film


Old Gregg said:
Isn't this the other way around? I always get more dynamic range from ISO400 films than ISO100 ones.
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Old Gregg has it right. You are looking antipodally.
 
I think Moriyama uses Tri-X but to obtain images like his, you need extended developing times, dodging/burning and the choice of filter/paper compbinations. If you scan you'll have to work the contrast in Photoshop.
Here is a picture of Kodak's darkroom guide with examples printed on Kodak Polycontrast III RC paper using different filters. The film stock is Tmax 100.
So the film does not matter much, you can also use Ilford films, paper and filters if you go the darkroom way.
 

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Does anyone cares what final look, contrast back then was achieved on darkroom prints.
Seems like next to no one does and thinks is all film and scans. Even if you scan you still have to think about post processing.
 
Old Gregg said:
@awty I think I know what you're referring to, FP4+ does have a certain "look" which makes higher contrast scenes smoother. This recent example comes to mind:
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I'm only lately becoming more methodical about my film choices and have settled on FP4, but that "certain 'look'"... I live in a city that manages to be cloudy more often than not and am getting negatives that feel tonally flat and need more work in printing. Cloudy though it is, a lot of daytime shooting is too bright for a 400 film unless I want to carry around filters. Keep looking for the light and stop shooting boring scenes?
 
Old Gregg said:
@Geoff Bartlett

Delta 100 in particular is suuuuppeeeeerb under flat light! Significantly different from FP4+
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I've only recently acquired a 6x6 camera and have been putting FP4 through it so far, but I will try a couple of rolls of Delta.

I've tried pushing the FP4 one stop to I couldn't really see much difference.

What would you suggest for lit portraits?
 
I agree with T-Max looking great under flat light. I also use it on "grainy" subjects such as sand. For everything else: Tri-X 400.

 
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Old Gregg said:
Matt, that's a wet print. Not fair.
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Okay then, here is a scan from a TMY negative - haven't spent any real time on this in the darkroom, but I have tweaked it a bit digitally to make it presentable:


TMY in particular is an extremely flexible film. It certainly doesn't look digital to me, whether I'm printing it in the darkroom, or presenting it digitally.
It and T-Max are very fine grained, but once you become accustomed to it, it will reward you.
Both this example and the one posted earlier were processed in replenished X-Tol.

Just for the heck of it, this is on 35mm Plus-X, and it too is scanned from the negative:

 
Old Gregg said:
TMY was the first film I bought. I almost changed my mind about film, when I looked at the lab scans.
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There is your problem - the lab scanned the TMY to make it look digital. So you assigned blame to the film.
TMY is like a good actor - it can be made to play all sorts of characters.
You just happened to hand it to a hack director - one who figured that you were looking for something that you weren't.
 
Here is another couple of looks from TMY - because I can:






All three are negative scans. The last two print really well in the darkroom.
 
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