Pushing film?

[scottbt320]

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Hi Gents,

 

I'm am an M8/9 owner and just purchased an M2 to try out a comparison. What does it mean when you push the films ISA from say 400 to 800? Is it done during the taking or developing stage, and what is the advantage in doing this?

 

 

Regards Scott

[topoxforddoc]

Sccott,

 

It’s much easier to push B&W film than colour. Your M2 does not have a meter. But effectively what happens is that you meter as if the film were ASA800 (instead of ASA400) and shoot the film like that. Then when you develop the film, you develop the ASA400 film for longer to compensate for the altered exposure (and the less exposed film). It works fine with some developers eg XTOL, but less so with others eg Ilfosol. The downside is the fact that the negative has more contrast - fine if you;re shooting rock concerts, but less so if you want portraits or still life.

 

Charlie

[StS]

Pushing will be done either, because one has no high-speed film in a low-light situation or because one likes the more grainy look in the print. When using an enlarger, the dense areas of a high-contrast negative can be mitigated by "burning" *. On the other side, film areas, which didn't get enough exposure will not show any structure, and this can't be changed any more, so my advice for enlarging would be to over-expose, if in doubt, to be on the safe side.

 

Pulling means the opposite: over-exposing film, which is compensated by under-development. Several people including me like to pull their black-and-white films slightly to catch the full tonal range in the scanning or enlarging step. Since the dynamic range of a film scanner can't be increased, it is better to have less contrasty negatives, to be on the safe side for scanning.

 

My advice to someone new to the world of film would be to use the box speed as a starting point; a slight pull of black-and-white films (for example exposure at 320 ISO with 10% reduced development) should not hurt either.

 

For colour films, my advice would be an exposure at box speed. Slide films should be spot-on (no pushing/pulling) and even my pro-lab advises against pushing C41 (negative) colour film by more than one step. If in doubt, I buy an 800 ISO film, instead of pushing a 400 ISO C41 film to 800.

 

Stefan

 

 

*"burning" means adding more exposure to the very dense areas by covering the less dense areas. The mask should be moved during exposure to get a smooth changeover between normal exposed and burned areas.

[philipus]

The "advantage" is two-fold (at least): to be able to shoot in lower light situations and to affect the result. In some ways it is like raising the ISO on a digital camera; grain/noise increases but one can use shorter shutter times.

 

Whether one wants to do it depends on what one wants to achieve and the "quality loss" one is willing to accept.

 

I regularly push Tri-X to 1600 and love the results since I don't care for flat lifeless b/w images.

 

As for not pushing slide film, that's a truth with some modification. I've never been able to go as wild on pushing as I do with colour and b/w negative films, but whenever I shoot Velvia 50 I expose it at 100 to get really rich colours.

 

Some colour negative film pushes well, particularly Portra 400, which is also wonderful at box speed. Incidentally Portra also scans very well.

 

Enjoy the M2

philip

[schimmey]

Philipus,

 

Thanks for your bit about pushing Velvia 50 to 100. I am currently looking at buying a load of film to take on a holiday. I have previously used Fuji 160, a negative film. It's ok but I don't think it compares to slide.

 

Anyway, I am looking at Velvia 100 and have read that you can push it by +1 stop without much problem and upto +2 stops if the environment allows. So effectively I can shoot as if it were ASA200 or ASA400, though I probably would not go to ASA400. This helps with planning what I want to take.

 

My question is whether anyone has any examples of pushed slide to show what impact +1 stop has?

 

Thanks,

 

Paul

[StS]

I haven't tried it yet, Fuji say on their website, that Velvia 100 can be pushed by one stop "with little photographic variation".

 

However, if I need high-speed film, I use high speed film (Fuji's offering for slides would be Provia 400X) with no photographic variation rather than pushing with little photographic variation.

 

Are you trying to achieve a special look by pushing the film?

 

Stefan

[robert_parker]

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I'm told of good results pushing Kodak Portra, particularly the 400 and 800 versions.