Digital BW, The Print

Sanders asks:

> Anthony, or anyone else using Portra b/w 400:
> What was your experience with reciprocity failure
> shooting the film at night?

There isn't any.  According to Kodak, Portra 400BW doesn't require any
compensation at all for exposures between 1/10,000 and 120 seconds.  I just
exposed by the book without worrying about reciprocity, and the results were
excellent.  I can't imagine going outside these exposure-time limits in any
of the shots I take, so reciprocity failure isn't an issue for me.  In this
respect, Portra 400BW is just like my beloved Provia 100F, which also shows
virtually no reciprocity failure.

The color Porta films are not quite so tolerant, but they still require no
changes between 1/10,000 and ten seconds ... except for the Portra 800 film,
which starts to drift a bit beyond 1 second (then again, one second is a
long time at ISO 800).

> If I take a few midtone readings off of my Digisix
> in streetlit night shots and dial them into my
> Rolleiflex, how much do I need to bracket?

I'm not sure what kind of meter a Digisix is, but I metered this with a
Minolta Spotmeter F, carefully metering the darkest and lightest parts that
I wanted to capture, and then estimating the best overall exposure to get as
much detail as I could.  I didn't bracket at all; just one exposure, and it
turned out fine.  In fact, the broad range of the film captured a lot more
detail than I expected to get (I guess I shoot too much slide film, eh?).  I
could coax a great deal out of the shadows and highlights, and it was a
pleasure to be able to get detail in practically every spot on the image,
despite the sharp nighttime contrasts.

> If, on top of the other things you've mentioned,
> Portra is more predictably exposed at night, you may have
> converted me.

Unless you have exposures longer than two minutes, you don't need any
correction.  Meter carefully and the first shot should also be the last.
This is indeed an advantage when shooting expensive larger formats.

Because of my experiences with Portra 400BW, it will probably become my B&W
film of choice for night shots.  The same slight flatness that results
during the day from the panchromatic response of the chromogenic films turns
out to be an advantage at night.  Sharp contrasts and widely variable light
sources all get rendered nicely.

Now, if I just had a nice B&W printer, I could try some big enlargements of
these images.  With proper printing, I bet they'd look pretty good hanging
on my wall.  The detail just goes on and on, so I could cover one wall with
them and they'd still look good, I think.

Sanders writes:

> (1) Is there any benefit to be had from taking
> Portra 400BW to a professional lab?

That depends entirely on the kind of labs to which you have access in your
area.

In my area, I find that a pro lab does slightly better work on C-41 in
general, including Portra 400BW.  The development is fine even at the
one-hour labs, but the work from the pro labs is spotless, whereas negatives
from the one-hour labs occasionally show specks of dust or (much more
rarely) tiny scratches.

For 135, I take everyday stuff to the one-hour lab.  For important work for
clients, I take it to the pro lab, just to be safe.  For 120, I always take
it to the pro lab, because I haven't found any one-hour labs that can do
express development on 120 in-house.  The one-hour labs tell me that this
isn't because they can't do it--they have the same machines as the pro labs,
after all--but it's just that they run 135 all day long through the
minilabs, and 120 film tends to pick up the junk that accumulates outside
the 135 path if they run it through the machine.  Pro labs run a lot more
120 and keep their machines cleaner (hopefully), so they don't have this
problem.

> A Kodak one-hour shop just opened up on my block,
> and they seem to be using new machines, and their
> prices are cheaper than Duggal and the other professional
> labs in Manhattan.

Try a couple of rolls and see.

They all use the same equipment.  If the one-hour lab is conscientious, it
can easily match the pro lab.  But it can be hard to find that when you are
paying five times less at the one-hour lab; pro labs can afford to be
meticulous.

> (2) How well does Portra 400BW handle pushing and
> pulling?

I've never tried it.  The Kodak data sheet says nothing about pushing or
pulling, which is perhaps ominous.

However, Portra 400BW has an exposure range of about 9.5 stops, and it's
very linear, so if you are dealing with, say, a seven-stop range in your
scene, you still have over two stops of latitude, so you may not need to
pull or push in many situations.  Controlled lighting situations give you
even more flexibility.  Like I said, I was surprised at how well it did on
very contrasty night scenes.

> (3) Is there a way to minimize the "flatness"
> that Anthony suggests is a problem with the film,
> when used in daylight exposures?

Filters should do it, although they slow the film down.  I haven't tried it
myself.

> BTW Anthony, very nice work on your site!

Thanks!

> It is a testament to the enduring value of Tri-X, yes?

I never tire of Tri-X.  I don't care for the grain much, but it sure is nice
in other respects.  In MF, the grain is pretty discreet, too, so I like it
even more when I shoot MF.  And Tri-X is a breeze to develop, and very
forgiving.  I'm kind of sloppy in development and I still get nice results.

Photo 134 in my street scenes was shot on MF Tri-X Pan Professional.  About
half of it is cropped away, and it still looks smooth.

> It also makes me realize how many photographic
> opportunities I let slip past me every day here
> on the streets of New York.

New York must be a gold mine for photos, as long as people aren't too
paranoid.  Any big city is like that, I think.