Who'd Like Kodak To Re-Introduce Portra 400UC/ 400UC Film?

I used some rolls of this film in both its name sakes, and really loved the look it had. It was as fine grained as Gold 100, punchy colors, decent skin tones, and also a 400 speed. I really wish Kodak would reintroduce this film, as it would fill a hole in their lineup right now. I find the Portra 400 film they have now too unsaturated for my liking. Yes you can fix this in post, but then why bother shooting so many other variants like Ektar 100? 400UC is a film that is hard to find these days, especially in its original packaging. During its later years, it came in multi packs for 35mm, like rolls of 3 or 5. Im trying to do a video of this film, plus its slower variant 100UC. There are way more 100UC films available online lately than the 400 version. Its tricky with the 400 one, as 400 speed film doesnt age well.

I also liked the look of the 160VC film, though never used the 400VC version. 160VC is too close to the now available Gold 200 in 35mm and 120. But 400UC was a bit more different then the VC films, and could stand out compared to current Portra.

Anyone here use this old film back in the day? Who here would like to see Kodak reintroduce it? I shot one of my most important shoots on this film, though it was labelled Portra 400UC at the time. I'd love to get more of this stuff, fresh. I dont often shoot 400 speed films, prefering slow films. But this is one film I would gladly shoot a roll of.

How about an Ektar 400?

Ektar 400 would essentially be 400UC renamed. Same basic premise for the film.

braxus said:

Yes you can fix this in post, but then why bother shooting so many other variants like Ektar 100?

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Exactly. If you introduce digital manipulation into your workflow, the need for variety disappears. You can build a LUT that converts Ektar to Portra 400 and vice versa. And since wet color printing appears to be dead (Kodak is gone and Fuji's papers can't be used without a computerized lazer exposure), digital post-processing is unavoidable.

So crank that saturation dial.

I remember how much I despised Ektachrome SW. I tended to steer clear of the Portra UC, concerns I had about excessive contrast IIRC. I seem to equate UC with commercial photography.
Ektar is great as is. I am quite happy with Kodak's range of color negative film.
Ektachrome 200 with ability to push to 400 would be neat.

Steven Lee said:

Fuji's papers can't be used without a computerized lazer exposure

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No, this is an oversimplification that does little justice to reality. These papers can still be used for wet prints. They won't produce the same color accuracy or gamut as when exposed digitally, but still produce nice prints right out of the box from enlarged C41 negatives.

Optical RA4 printing is also not 'dead'. While the community of practitioners doesn't appear to be huge, it's still quite significant and the interest in this is active and alive.

Other than that, I agree with you that introducing a C41 film with a subtly different color rendition to an already existing product in today's marketplace does not make technical or commercial sense. For wet printing, it would be sort of nice, but since the product will just eat away a bit of the existing market of Portra 400, for Kodak, the net result would just be a sunk investment on R&D that they're unlikely to recoup.

Dreaming of course is always permitted and can be a fun pastime

What about Kodak UltraMax400? It seems like a pretty good substitute...no?

koraks said:

No, this is an oversimplification that does little justice to reality. These papers can still be used for wet prints. They won't produce the same color accuracy or gamut as when exposed digitally, but still produce nice prints right out of the box from enlarged C41 negatives.

Optical RA4 printing is also not 'dead'. While the community of practitioners doesn't appear to be huge, it's still quite significant and the interest in this is active and alive.

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I read your original blog post very carefuly. And I applaud your optimism but I will not use a product knowing that it wasn't designed for my use case, especially when the inkjet alternative is easily available. Moreover, building a color darkroom from scratch when there's just one kind (the compromised kind) of RA4 paper is available in retail makes no sense to me. In the context of sizing the market for a new CN film with a slightly different palette for 100% analog workflow, this is pretty dead in my book.

@Steven Lee YMMV and the decision is of course a personal one. I see your point of view for sure. Personally, I still have a lot of fun working with this technology. If my game were more about highly exacting color reproduction, I certainly would not be heading in this direction.

It is easy for me to find Kodak UltraColor 400 in 35mm and 120 and Kodak VividColor 4"x5" sheet film in my freezer. I am keeping those films and others from the hoarders.

I get that Sirius. You should see my film freezer fridge. I dont shoot much 4x5, so I never really bought any 160VC in 4x5 when I saw some on EBay. How is your 400UC holding up today, being its at least 10 years old from expirey?

braxus said:

I get that Sirius. You should see my film freezer fridge. I dont shoot much 4x5, so I never really bought any 160VC in 4x5 when I saw some on EBay. How is your 400UC holding up today, being its at least 10 years old from expirey?

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I shot four rolls recently in San Francisco in 35mm and 120 and the film came back looking like it was new film.

Ektar 100 has better neutral balance. And if they were to re-design anything, it would be to clean up the cyan imbalance in it. Ektar is also available in all sizes, all the way from 35mm to 8x10. And for me, 160VC was a convenient stepping stone once the handwriting was on the wall concerning the demise of Cibachrome, and I was exploring RA4 alternatives.

The huge flaw in thinking you're going to get better color reproduction outside a darkroom is that the majority of folks will simply default to inkjet, which has way more gamut idiosyncrasies than current RA4 papers.
Current CN films have come a long ways too, though you can still get older looks if you wish with Kodak Gold etc. Ektar comes by far the closest as any CN film ever to filling the void in terms of a realistic substitute for chrome film. But there are a few filtration tricks to optimizing it in that respect.

In an ideal world Kodak would be able to produce all these films to satisfy everyone.

In my world, I tried 400UC and never liked it. Far too much contrast and the colours were just off. If I want a highly saturated colour negative film I'll use Ektar. Ultramax 400 is actually far better than 400UC ever was, at least to my eyes. Of course YMMV.

I'm with those who might appreciate a faster Ektar or even a faster Ektachrome. But it's baby steps for our big yellow cousin. They need to stabilise production of their current range of films first.

Steven Lee said:

Exactly. If you introduce digital manipulation into your workflow, the need for variety disappears. You can build a LUT that converts Ektar to Portra 400 and vice versa. And since wet color printing appears to be dead (Kodak is gone and Fuji's papers can't be used without a computerized lazer exposure), digital post-processing is unavoidable.

So crank that saturation dial.

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Fuji papers most certainly can be used without being exposed by laser, and optical printing is not dead.

Steven Lee said:

I read your original blog post very carefuly. And I applaud your optimism but I will not use a product knowing that it wasn't designed for my use case, especially when the inkjet alternative is easily available. Moreover, building a color darkroom from scratch when there's just one kind (the compromised kind) of RA4 paper is available in retail makes no sense to me. In the context of sizing the market for a new CN film with a slightly different palette for 100% analog workflow, this is pretty dead in my book.

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Suit yourself. I don't give a #$% what it was DESIGNED for, so long as it WORKS for me.

It's really pretty easy, as long as one has a decent colorhead. Everything has a learning curve. And today's Kodak CN films and Fuji's RA4 papers are a happy marriage. A few misunderstanding are inevitable, just like in any any marriage.

Did Steven really say that? Guess so. "Convert Ektar to Portra or visa versa"? Well, I guess one could convert a banjo into a violin if they had to; but I doubt they'd ever sound the same. "Wet color printing dead"? - heck, all laser printing onto RA4 papers is itself wet, no different than when optically enlarging onto it first. Potentially even the same processing machine if it needed to be done large or in volume.

I do zero digital manipulation. Don't even have the means. But how come I get much better RA4 prints than those labs around here who do have high-end scanners and expensive laser printers? It's simply because there are certain things you can do real home cookin' slow style that aren't commercially practical when one is on the clock, cranking out sheer volume via automation. Sure, curve adjustments might be faster that way, if needed, but not necessarily better. Besides, those who print for themselves, like me, also tend to shoot in the first place with a specific medium in mind - we hunt out the subject matters and color correspondences best suited to the printing route we have chosen, which generally leads to more precise hue responses that just submitting a color neg or chrome to a machine, and then trying to force the foot into a wrong shoe size.

Agulliver said:

In an ideal world Kodak would be able to produce all these films to satisfy everyone.

In my world, I tried 400UC and never liked it. Far too much contrast and the colours were just off. If I want a highly saturated colour negative film I'll use Ektar. Ultramax 400 is actually far better than 400UC ever was, at least to my eyes. Of course YMMV.

I'm with those who might appreciate a faster Ektar or even a faster Ektachrome. But it's baby steps for our big yellow cousin. They need to stabilise production of their current range of films first.

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UltraColor works well with red rock in the US southwest.

What faster is Portra 400. But it's got a fair amount of that artificial warming which has long characterized color neg films being oriented toward skintones. It's called Porta (Portrait) for a reason. That means that earthtones will gravitate toward the warm side regardless - nowhere near as bad as ole Vericolor products did, or 200 Gold, but a little more than 160 VC did. Only Ektar gives excellent earthtone neutrality among CN films. I don't want all those nuances of hue dump-trucked into the same bin like Misrach did in the desert using Vericolor L back in the 70's and 80's - every damn rock or patch of clay looking like the same generic "skintone".

Last week I was in the desert shooting both 120 and 8x10 Ektar. I like to relieve saturated colors with complex neutrals, and play the two off. Otherwise, all you get is "heavy metal" noise with no harmony at all. Even
Jackson Pollock was a master at allowing breathing room between his color elements.

If Kodak is thinking about reviving a discontinued film like Portra 400UV, I'd like them to revive Kodachome 25 first.

faberryman said:

If Kodak is thinking about reviving a discontinued film like Portra 400UV, I'd like them to revive Kodachome 25 first.

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Why? I know I'm a heretic here but I liked 64 for some things, but 25 is just too slow to be of much general use for me. It's very rare that I photograph outdoors, under clear sunny skies, through the brightest part of the day.

In any case, it would be much, much easier to bring back or re-create a C41 film than Kodachrome. You'd need the processing infrastructure and that would be huge, and I'm sure that wouldn't even be the all of it. Closest they might come if they were inclined would be an E6 film designed to mimic the Kodachrome color palette (thought please without the ghastly white washed out Caucasian skin tones - no need to go to the extent of Portra to neutralize that) but I don't think that's very likely either.

Bringing back a previously made C41 film would probably be pretty easy, unless its composition used some chemical no longer readily available or environmentally acceptable. Tweaking an existing one might be even easier, or upping the speed for a faster version of Ektar.

While we're dreaming...how about HIE in 5x7?

Roger Cole said:

Why? I know I'm a heretic here but I liked 64 for some things, but 25 is just too slow to be of much general use for me. It's very rare that I photograph outdoors, under clear sunny skies, through the brightest part of the day.

In any case, it would be much, much easier to bring back or re-create a C41 film than Kodachrome. You'd need the processing infrastructure and that would be huge, and I'm sure that wouldn't even be the all of it. Closest they might come if they were inclined would be an E6 film designed to mimic the Kodachrome color palette (thought please without the ghastly white washed out Caucasian skin tones - no need to go to the extent of Portra to neutralize that) but I don't think that's very likely either.

Bringing back a previously made C41 film would probably be pretty easy, unless its composition used some chemical no longer readily available or environmentally acceptable. Tweaking an existing one might be even easier, or upping the speed for a faster version of Ektar.

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My comment was intended to be satirical. It sounds like an old folks home around here when people start reminiscing about discontinued films. And comparing film freezer sizes? What are you guys compensating for?

How about the best of both worlds? - 5X7 Kodachrome again. Let see... say, twelve million dollars for the processing equipment and refreshed coating R&D, and a sales potential of maybe a dozen 10-sheet boxes the first year. That means they need to charge $100,000 per sheet just to break even.

faberryman said:

If Kodak is thinking about reviving a discontinued film like Portra 400UV, I'd like them to revive Kodachome 25 first.

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UC or VC not UV.