Push/Pull Film

[giannis]

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On 5/21/2020 at 4:01 PM, tommonego@gmail.com said:

I mostly used an R72 filter, with that filter I found a loss in the shadows, could have been inaccurate metering

This is an inherent characteristic of infrared light. If your shadows are due to actual shade (and not low-reflecting subjects), then they're gonna be really dark in infrared. There just isn't much infrared light in shade.

When an object is in shade, it's lit by the scattered light in the atmosphere, and not directly (Rayleigh scattering). Blue light (and UV) scatters the most, red (and IR) scatters the least. This is also why the sky appears blue btw. Anyway, long story short, this is the reason shade looks blueish, say with slide film. So if there isn't much red light in shade, there's even less IR. This creates harsh shadows when your main source of illumination is IR light, like when shooting with an IR72 filter. It can be an interesting effect when used creatively. (This is also the reason why the areas around the eyes, shaded by eyesocket and cheekbones, appears dark on IR film, giving an eerie/demonic look  )

All that said, I find IR400's box speed of ISO400 to be optimistic, in most developers. Also telling is that the dev time listed for ISO400 is quite long for normal development compared to other films, it looks more like a push time. I almost always shoot it at 200, with slight reduction in dev time.

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Edited June 4, 2020 by giannis
typos

[Stealth3kpl]

16 hours ago, Ornello said:

Again, development does not increase or decrease film speed.

I don't think I said that:

 

On 5/21/2020 at 10:56 AM, Stealth3kpl said:

Underexposure in the example above will mean there's less information in the shadows and overdeveloping it won't put it back.

 

On 5/21/2020 at 10:56 AM, Stealth3kpl said:

Overdevelopment brightens the highlights, builds up the midtones and leaves the blacks about the same.

i.e. development doesn't alter film speed. Development time affects contrast.

Pete

Edited June 4, 2020 by Stealth3kpl

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[Ornello]

On 6/4/2020 at 12:35 PM, Stealth3kpl said:

I don't think I said that:

 

 

i.e. development doesn't alter film speed. Development time affects contrast.

Pete

If 'pushing' actually worked, shadows would increase in density to the same degree as the highlights and mid-tones. They don't. Ergo, pushing doesn't work as intended.

[adan]

2 hours ago, Ornello said:

If 'pushing' actually worked, shadows would increase in density to the same degree as the highlights and mid-tones. They don't. Ergo, pushing doesn't work as intended.

The function of pushing film is not to increase shadow density. Never has been.

It is to increase overall average density from a limited amount of light - for which it can work exactly as intended.

Great photojournalists have been pushing film for decades. And they understood, and understand, full-well that it can produce limited or non-existent shadow density or detail. The result is chalk-and-charcoal pictures - but pictures that would not otherwise exist at all.

Important pictures that still stand the test of time, such as:

https://www.life.com/history/robert-kennedy-assassination-photographs-by-bill-eppridge-june-1968/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W._Eugene_Smith#/media/File:W._Eugene_Smith_-_Tomoko_Uemura_in_Her_Bath.jpg

https://richardnilsendotcom1.files.wordpress.com/2013/12/nurse-midwife.jpg

https://richardnilsen.com/2013/12/09/through-a-lens-darkly/

The shadows of a picture are where one puts the unimportant stuff that no one needs to see.

[Stealth3kpl]

7 hours ago, Ornello said:

If 'pushing' actually worked, shadows would increase in density to the same degree as the highlights and mid-tones.

 

It's as though you're deliberately misinterpreting what people are writing.

Pete

Edited June 6, 2020 by Stealth3kpl

[Stealth3kpl]

In this example exposing for shadows and pulling development allowed retention of shadow detail and the brighter tones through the window. There's no talk of changing the film speed. Don't bring that up again. This is pulling development. Your argument seems to be that this isn't possible. 

7 hours ago, Ornello said:

If 'pushing' actually worked, shadows would increase in density to the same degree as the highlights and mid-tones. They don't. Ergo, pushing doesn't work as intended.

Pete

[Stealth3kpl]

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On 5/24/2020 at 12:25 AM, Ornello said:

Film has little to no latitude for underexposure. It cannot be pushed or pulled. That is a myth. You can give more than the absolute minimum exposure, several stops, in fact, but there is no underexposure latitude at all. Changing the degree of development is completely ineffective.

 

On 5/21/2020 at 10:56 AM, Stealth3kpl said:

Overdevelopment brightens the highlights, builds up the midtones and leaves the blacks about the same.

Overexposure brings more information into the shadows. Underexposure in the example above will mean there's less information in the shadows and overdeveloping it won't put it back.

We are agreeing here (and nobody is talking about changing film speed). What Adan and I are saying is that pushing and pulling is a useful technique to get a better range of tones on the negative for printing/scanning if you have under/over exposed film or if you have shot at box speed but the range of tones in the scene is wider or narrower than "Normal".

Pete

Edited June 6, 2020 by Stealth3kpl

[Stealth3kpl]

Here's a nice example of the effect of over exposing but pulling development to tame the highlights.

Pete

 

[Ornello]

Alterations in the degree of development cannot compensate for, offset, cure, remedy, or make amends for errors in exposure. Period.

Facts are stubborn things!

 

Edited June 20, 2020 by Ornello