I'll take your word for it. I just remember reading in one of the Kodak Tech Pubs back in the mid 1980s (?) when TMax first arrived that it would stay linear past 20 stops. But I was still a "Tri-X man" at that point and didn't pay a lot of attention to it, and certainly couldn't be bothered to test it to find out. Which was a major loss on my part, but I've got to own my own stupidity. Sigh...Originally Posted by Oren Grad
Bruce Watson
Just as you can put a shoulder into TMX via choice of developer, you can also give it a very long straight line via different choices. (There are other, stranger curves, useful only for very special purposes, that can also be achieved.) So TMX can be an excellent film for those who want a straight line as well.
An issue I have with the "Expose for the shadows and develop for the highlights" approach is that developing less reduces contrast across the full range. Picture an outdoor scene with a normal subject in diffused light. Two cameras are setup and fired at exactly the same time with the same settings and film. In one shot a long lens is used and the sky is excluded. With normal development this produces a perfect print. In another a wide angle lens is used and it captures some bright clouds. If developed the same as the first the foreground subject will print identically to the first picture, but the clouds will be blown out on the print. If developed less using that old truism the clouds will now print on the paper with a straight print because the contrast was reduced, but the rest of the print will look flat since all the contrast was reduced. You will then need to fix that with other tricks.
I don't think there's one right answer, but if the offending extreme highlight is going to be easy to burn in I'd rather give normal development and fix it during printing.
Having a film that rolls off in the highlights is another way to handle this. You get variable contrast on the film based on exposure.
Except that it doesn't. The exposure anchors the shadow end of the contrast curve. Development anchors the highlight end of the contrast curve, and therefore determines the slope of the curve. Development can not normally translate the curve in X or Y dimensions. It only changes the slope.
Or are you talking about something different?
Bruce Watson
I'm saying by developing less (which reduces the slope) you are affecting all tones in the image. To fit more subject brightness range into the same film density range (as "develop for the highlights" implies) you will make the image flatter (lower slope).
T-Max 100 is probably not the best film for outdoor scenes with sky. Try FP4 +.
Why?
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Because of the curve shape. It does not 'roll off' in the highlights. In general, there are two basic types of B&W film curves, those with 'n-shaped' curves and those with 'u-shaped' curves. In the past, Kodak made several B&W sheet films for different purposes: Portrait Pan, Super-Panchro Press Type B, Super XX, Royal Pan, etc. Each was tailored for specific uses. In general, films intended for 'uncontrolled' light conditions had 'n-shaped' curves which tend to flatten out highlights. This is good for outdoor scenes and helps prevent clouds from becoming too bright. T-Max 100 has a 'u-shaped' curve and does not flatten out, but just keeps going.
https://www.photrio.com/forum/proxy....b0c9e69417f82b
FP4+ has the 'n-shaped' curve you want. Similar to Tri-X Pan:
https://www.photrio.com/forum/proxy....36330cc00037ea
See:
https://imaging.kodakalaris.com/site...6_tmax_100.pdf
The highlights are 'there', but they are too dense to print easily. Using a dilute metol-based developer (e.g., D-76) will help, but FP4 is better.
https://www.ilfordphoto.com/amfile/f...9/product/686/
In a typical outdoor scene (especially with clouds), the sky is much brighter than the foreground. There is also the flare issue. The light from the bright clouds tends to 'bounce around' inside the lens and cause veiling flare, which lowers contrast within the darker areas. Films with 'n-shaped' curves tend to have higher contrast in the lower-density areas, which helps to offset this veiling flare.
I have two problems with that answer. First, failure to read an entire thread before responding is annoying and leads to misinformation. Second, TMX has a malleable curve shape depending on developer and dilution, so your reply is not universally correct.
In post #3 of this thread, more than 2-1/2 years ago, I provided a link that offered the OP a film/developer combination to do what was desired:
Looks good. D-76 would probably work well too. But why not use FP4 to start with?
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