Why slide film instead of print?

flavio81 · Jan 19, 2017

OptiKen said:
Pardon my ignorance, but why would you choose slide film instead of print film for color prints?

Print films give purer colors, much wider latitude, and if i'm not mistaken, higher resolution and higher sharpness. The movie industry uses negatives which are then printed to create positives for projection.

On the other hand, with slides you have an exact, direct visual reference of the image you have captured. And you can project it as well. This is very fun, really.

Slides also are supposed to be finer grained, this due to the nature of the reversal process.

But colors differ a lot among slide films, while not so much among print films. Some people like to be able to use a certain "palette" brought by the slide film.

I find slide film much fun to use. On the other hand, whenever i've needed prints from slides i have had to use a digital process and it wasn't so good, compared to analog prints from negatives.

captain ZZM · Jan 19, 2017

Ilford Harman positive paper should can be printing b/w photo from slide film l think however l couldn't find someone do it, all just use it for pinhole photography.

Roger Cole · Jan 19, 2017

RPC said:
The colors may have popped, but they were technically not as accurate as with prints from a color negative.

I printed on Kodak Type 2203 (I think that was the number.) Still contrasty but a bit more "normal" looking than Ciba. I did switch to the RC Pearl Ciba later (and yes, they made an RC based, not glossy, version - we had that argument on here before and others posted ads for it. I still have prints on it.)

In answer to the OP question, personally I wouldn't. I shoot transparencies for projection. If the final intent is a print, I shoot negatives.

wiltw · Jan 19, 2017

RPC said:
The colors may have popped, but they were technically not as accurate as with prints from a color negative.

When photographing sunsets or other scenics, it isn't always necessary or even desirable for realism in color portrayal!

When I wanted realism of color, it was EPN, but not to make prints!

RPC · Jan 20, 2017

I wasn't saying that one has to have accurate colors in prints, just that prints from negatives are more accurate, since some do want that!

MattKing · Jan 20, 2017

There really isn't anything that remains current and available that will let you make high quality slides from C-41 negatives. So if you want to leave open the possibility of projection, your options are slide film, and movie film.

iakustov · Jan 20, 2017

I enjoy shooting slides for nature and even portraits, and print using hybrid process (on ra4 paper), albeit skin colors from Portra film are much more pleasant to the eye in the final print.
For me it is all about "the look" which is the reason for shooting slides, whether you project it or print from it.

AgX · Jan 20, 2017

I think we are comparing apples to oranges.
Slide film is designed for slide projection. This is the way on which it should be evaluated.
Comparing it based on a light box view to a print from a negative already forms a deviation.

dE fENDER · Jan 20, 2017

captain ZZM said:
Ilford Harman positive paper should can be printing b/w photo from slide film l think however l couldn't find someone do it, all just use it for pinhole photography.

I did it, but contrast is extremely high, even in very diluted developers. Maybe it we better in developer with hypo.

Lachlan Young · Jan 20, 2017

dE fENDER said:
I did it, but contrast is extremely high, even in very diluted developers. Maybe it we better in developer with hypo.

Or just mask the transparency, as per Ciba/Ilfochrome.

guangong · Jan 20, 2017

RA 4 sounds interesting. I'm going to give it a try. For prints, i shoot bw and if color I use slide film. Slides from 35mm to 6x7. Got a Hassy 6x7 projector (made by Leitz) to add to my 35mm and 6x6 projectors. Finding glass 6x7 slide mounts was quite a task but I found a couple boxes. Nothing beats a room filling projected slide!

removed account4 · Jan 20, 2017

OptiKen said:
Pardon my ignorance, but why would you choose slide film instead of print film for color prints?

hi optiken

gavin smith ( coigach on apug ) shoots b/w and has DR5 Chrome make
b/w transparencies that he uses. i remember someone asked him a long time ago
why he uses b/w slide film ( processed by someone on another continent ) and he
said ( and i am paraphrasing cause i can't find the thread ) that the slides look
absolutely beautiful AND if he turns them into a file it is easier to work with a slide than a negative or print.
maybe i have interpreted what he said wrong, but i think tha tis what he said ...

i think slides ( and reversal movie film ) are beautiful to look at and hold in one's hands and put in a window ( in a frame )
so they light up light stained glass. i have never printed them, except by the modern method ( electrify>lab>print ) and they are a piece of cake
to work with, ( totally agree with gavin ) whether they are b/w or color .. and in this day and age it is easy to have negatives made to do traditional work ..,

dE fENDER · Jan 20, 2017

Lachlan Young said:
Or just mask the transparency, as per Ciba/Ilfochrome.

I'm using Ilfochrome without masking. It's contrast is greatly lower than Ilford Direct Positive + it's possible to control it using dilution/temperature/using different developing agents.
But masking should work, of course.

removed account4 · Jan 20, 2017

dE fENDER said:
I did it, but contrast is extremely high, even in very diluted developers. Maybe it we better in developer with hypo.

coffee based developer is your friend with high contrast paper or film.
you can make it the traditional way with tablespoons/teaspoons ( cheap instant coffee, sodium carbonate and vit c )
and a 15cc of whatever normal paper developer you like to use, and make a 2nd bath of your dilute print developer
as soon as the image appears or begins to appear in your print developer, put it in the caffenol, then again in the print developer
then in the caffenol ... you could always flash your direct positive paper to tame your contrast joe vancleave has a few threads
on making paper negatives that might be helpful, this one is for his afghan box camera/ karma-e-faoree
(there was a url link here which no longer exists)
good luck !

john

dE fENDER · Jan 20, 2017

jnanian said:
coffee based developer is your friend with high contrast paper or film.
you can make it the traditional way with tablespoons/teaspoons ( cheap instant coffee, sodium carbonate and vit c )
and a 15cc of whatever normal paper developer you like to use, and make a 2nd bath of your dilute print developer
as soon as the image appears or begins to appear in your print developer, put it in the caffenol, then again in the print developer
then in the caffenol ... you could always flash your direct positive paper to tame your contrast joe vancleeve has a few threads
on making paper negatives that might be helpful, this one is for his afghan box camera/ karma-e-faoree
(there was a url link here which no longer exists)
good luck !

john

I'm afraid, that in case of Direct Positive, playing with developer may not help at all - cause a great Dmax (~ 4) of slide, shadows are just not exposed well, but if I will increase time to get correct exposure in them, even a little lighter areas in the shadows will be overexposured, saying nothing about light places. But I've done only a pair experiments, so I may be wrong. Perhaps, it will be suitable, if using usual b/w negative film processed as reversal.
And, of course, DP is a great paper if it used for it's purpose in LF camera.

removed account4 · Jan 20, 2017

admittedly i don't use much ilford DP paper but joe has ( who i linked to before )
while his work seems to be all in -camera, you might gleen some technique
for taming the contrast/getting better exposure ( filter? flash? )
by reading some of his threads that relate to the DP paper ...
(there was a url link here which no longer exists)
regarding printing slides, onto paper ... there are a few more steps involved but you can the direct positive kit
made by galaxy ( maybe you can get it where you live through slavich ? ) it is similar to the kits
kodak made and sold as direct postive kits for tmx100 film back in the day. galaxy sells it with their own paper
( high iso ) but it is worth using with regular photo paper you might have seeing it is based on
the well known reversal methods ( develop/bleach/fog/develop/fix) just reformulated+modified to be a little easier.

GregW · Jan 20, 2017

Another user echoing the amazing look of stereo slides. It is waning a bit (digital 3D effect on the market) so the prices of cameras has dropped a bunch, a good time to get into it. There really is no comparison to a print. Just went through some Velvia 50 from 20 years ago of Oregon coast tide pools up close. Stunning.

markbarendt · Jan 20, 2017

OptiKen said:
Pardon my ignorance, but why would you choose slide film instead of print film for color prints?

It used to be that magazines and such required slides so that they had an objective reference for the colors. They could hand a commercial printer a slide and say "match this".

The nature of the negative system doesn't provide that option.

Agulliver · Jan 20, 2017

Sometimes I like to have the option of projecting a slide and having a print. That isn't really possible with negative/print film....unless one scans and projects digitally.

ME Super · Jan 20, 2017

+1. My favorite way of looking at photos is projected on a screen. If I want a print, and don't mind a hybrid process (which I'm OK with, actually), then I have the best of both worlds.

Of course, I can also take a scanned negative and send it off to Dwayne's and they'll send me back a slide for projection. But that route is actually a bit more expensive than starting with the slide and then getting a print made from a scan. Best of both worlds if you ask me, to be able to project the slide AND have the print when I want it.

ic-racer · Jan 20, 2017

OptiKen said:
Pardon my ignorance, but why would you choose slide film instead of print film for color prints?

Projection.

msage · Jan 20, 2017

I have not used transparency film many years. Negative film has better grain, better laditude in exposure and processing. Granted, if they for projection slides are the way to go but how often would you subject friends/family to slide shows?

Mainecoonmaniac · Jan 20, 2017

Back in the film days, a lot of art directors preferred transparencies because it was easier to view the photography. Sometimes seeing a positive image allows for color correction of an image. With color negative film, you have to proof it before color correction happens.

Transparencies tend to be sharper. But color neg film has better latitude.

Sirius Glass · Jan 20, 2017

msage said:
I have not used transparency film many years. Negative film has better grain, better laditude in exposure and processing. Granted, if they for projection slides are the way to go but how often would you subject friends/family to slide shows?

Yes

Sirius Glass · Jan 20, 2017

Mainecoonmaniac said:
Transparencies tend to be sharper. But color neg film has better latitude.

Yes

Why slide film instead of print?

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