what film for a noctilux ?

[kwpatlaw]

Hello there. Can anyone tell me what is the preferred speed film to use with the noctilux when shooting ( color or B& W ) bands in darkish bars ? I have only tried fuji 400 with mixed results with some pictures looking fine but others suffer from a red or pinkish tint.
Thanks again.

Ken

[innerimager]

Ken- I think XP2 is great for the nocti because of it's huge Iso latitude. You can rate it at 50 and use it in much brighter light when you still want very narrow DOF, and all the way to at least 800. Some of the band shots you saw with my nocti were rated 800 and further pushed 2 stops with underexposure for a virtual Iso 3200, and they still held up well. It's almost like shooting a digital camera with adjustable Iso! best...Peter

[bullis]

Originally Posted by kwpatlaw

Hello there. Can anyone tell me what is the preferred speed film to use with the noctilux when shooting ( color or B& W ) bands in darkish bars ? I have only tried fuji 400 with mixed results with some pictures looking fine but others suffer from a red or pinkish tint.
Thanks again.

Ken

With BW, generally the way the film is handled is at least as important as the film itself. Where typically people push the film, this tends to aggravate the problems inherent in the environment. That kind of environment has ridiculous amounts of contrast, and the extended development makes it worse than it already is. The basis of the observation by the old timers (expose for the shadows and develop for the highlights) doesn't suddenly disappear just because you go into a dark, contrasty place.

What I've done with situations like that is to go the other direction. Use the fastest film I can find, shoot at generally (varies with results of tests) about half the rated ISO, and develop in Windisch pyrocatechin. Those shadows need all the help they can get, and the immense capacity of compensation obtainable with the developer mentioned can keep the highlights from burning out even when they are really blasted (you may have seen images of clear envelope light bulbs with the glowing filament clearly defined). My favorite film component with this combination was the old 2475 recording film shot at 800 ISO. Can't get that anymore, but it would be worth testing with Delta 3200.

[bullis]

Originally Posted by kwpatlaw

Hello there. Can anyone tell me what is the preferred speed film to use with the noctilux when shooting ( color or B& W ) bands in darkish bars ? I have only tried fuji 400 with mixed results with some pictures looking fine but others suffer from a red or pinkish tint.
Thanks again.

Ken

With color, you have an additional problem in that faster emulsions never seem to come balanced for tungsten light. The lights on the band may be modified with color filters, and you can't do much about that even if you want to, but it would be helpful to start with film balanced to the color of the bulbs that the light bulbs emit. The filters over the lights would be part of the scene.

The color also varies according to the voltage that the lights are receiving; dimmers will shift progressively red. Few bulbs found in situations like that are 3200ºK to begin with, and the farther they go in that direction, the more they differ from daylight requiring more correction, which eats up the speed. I can't remember the factor offhand, but converting daylight balanced film to tungsten, even to 3200, loses a lot of the advantage you might otherwise achieve by using a fast film. If you don't filter, your color layers in the negative or slide will be out of balance, and correcting in a print will result in a compromise, at best.

This is one area where, if I have a digital option, I won't hesitate to use it because digital color corrects color shift without the kind of loss you inevitably have with film.

It has been a long time since I've done this, but maybe someone can tell me if things have improved. I doubt that they have. I've always wished for a high speed tungsten film. Seems to me Kodak made a film that was moving that way a long time ago, but never was fast enough.