Favourite IR films...

[Vlad Soare]

As far as Rollei Infrared in large format is concerned, there's something you should be aware of. It's coated on the same base as its rollfilm counterpart, which means it's very thin and flimsy. Loading it into the film holders (and anything else that implies handling it in the dark, for that matter) will be a frustrating experience to say the least. So frustrating was it, that I ended up throwing away half a box and swearing I'll never buy it in 4x5" format again (I do use it in 120, though).
That being said, it's a gorgeous film. It's also nice as an all-around ASA 400 film - it has a nice tonality and fine grain.

I am curious to hear from anyone who has had experience using the Jobo 2509 reels for developing Rollei IR. Or for using Pyro on Rollei IR.

Al, my experience with using Rollei IR on a 2509 reel was absolutely horrible, precisely because of the thin base you're mentioning. I usually have no problem loading the reel. Fomapan or T-Max are a piece of cake. But the Rollei was an absolute nightmare.
I really threw away half a box. I'm not saying it figuratively. I literally threw the remaining sheets into the trash can. But I kept the box, just in case I needed it later to store exposed film.
Speaking of the box, that's another thing that used to annoy me. It's very small. It's a perfectly tight fit, no room to spare. But this is no big deal; I could have lived with it if it hadn't been for the flimsy base.

[Wallace_Billingham]

Curiously, in June in New Hampshire I made some images in the woods with sheets from the same box. I again used EI=0.5 and 15 minutes in D-76 and my negatives came out very dense, but printable.

This experience seems to defy my assumption that at high elevations there should be sufficient IR in the sunlight. Perhaps the winter sun angle has an effect on the IR. I like the Efke, however, and I will continue to shoot with that film.

Green leaves like you would have had in June on the woods both reflect quite a bit of IR light but also fluoresce visible light into near IR.

Winter sun has plenty of IR light in it, however unlike with UV, air is a pretty poor filter for the extra long wavelengths of IR as such altitude does not really matter much so it really does not matter if you are on top of a mountain or at sea level.

I have found the biggest influence of IR light on exposure to be how much reflective (to IR) material is around. If you have lots of leaves (even dead brown ones) and/or snow you will have much more IR than if you don't.

Also with the Efke IR films anyway they don't like underexposure at all and the line between no exposure and working exposure is very thin

[al olson]

Thanks, Vlad, for your information. I got as far as loading the Rollei into the 2509 reel. The film is so flimsy, though, that it did not feel firmly seated in the tracks. I put the lid on and then thought about what would happen to the film with the developer sloshing around.

I then removed the film and put it into storage while I thought about other alternatives for development.

My current thinking is to first develop six sheets at a time in a Yankee tank using Pyro. The tank is 1.5 l. but since the A and B solutions are very small, the fact that Pyro is a one shot developer doesn't matter.

Then I would use Rubbermaid sandwich containers for stop and fix. I think the smaller volumes would be more economical for 6 sheets and it would be easier to grab the negatives to shuffle because they would be constrained to a smaller area.

The unknown here is that I have never used Pyro on Rollei film, nor have I found any information regarding the use of Pyro with Rollei. There is only one way to find out.

[rguinter]

Bob,

The 0% transmission for an 87 filter is at 720nm and the 50% cutoff is at 795nm.

Examining Ilford's wedge spectrogram, the sensitivity of SFX peaks at 720nm and then takes a steep dive to zero at around 750nm. Ilford actually claims: "SFX 200 has a peak red sensitivity at 720nm and extended red sensitivity up to 740nm."

Thus the transmission of the 87 filter has a very small overlap with the sensitivity of SFX.

I use either a Hoya RM-72 or Cokin 007, both of which are comparable to the 89B with a zero transmission at 680nm and 50% transmission at 720nm. This provides greater overlap with the SFX sensitivity than you will get with the 87. This is why I am able to use an EI of 12 with this film, whereas your exposures are many minutes.

I use a meter to measure the visible light at EI=12, but I have not tried spot metering with my Sekonic C-508 through the filter. In the past, metering visible light at EI=12 has produced consistent results.

Taking your suggestion, it would be informative to measure the EVs, both visible ambient light and through the filter to determine the EV difference. I will try that on the next sunny day. I would expect the results to resemble ISO/EI = 200/12 ~= 16 or four f-stops.

Right now we are recovering from almost 36 inches of snow over a three day period. This was from the same series of storms that were flooding California. Forecast says we will get a break in the weather (sunshine!) tomorrow.

Al: I envy you. I haven't seen actual 3-feet of snow in my neck of the woods in a very long time. Sometimes we get a surprise though in February with a couple of feet. I like the photo ops the deep snow produces but in the congested East it makes for a difficult time getting to good spots for photos. Just too much traffic.

Yes I have the same filter set that you have and the SFX works better with a larger overlap and my ev measurements are the same.

Have you tried the Efke IR 820 plain or aura versions? I have these in 120 and 4x5-inch but haven't had the chance to shoot more than a few sheets.

Bob G.

[rguinter]

As far as Rollei Infrared in large format is concerned, there's something you should be aware of. It's coated on the same base as its rollfilm counterpart, which means it's very thin and flimsy. Loading it into the film holders (and anything else that implies handling it in the dark, for that matter) will be a frustrating experience to say the least.

Vlad: Ditto here. The curl with Rollei IR is so bad that I gave up after only a few 120 rolls and I never bought any 4x5. I still have a bunch of it in the freezer but am reluctant to waste time with it. It does produce really nice images though, although trying to get the film to stay flat on the flatbed scanner is near impossible. So I really haven't been able to scan them Bob G.

[al olson]

Al: I envy you. I haven't seen actual 3-feet of snow in my neck of the woods in a very long time. Sometimes we get a surprise though in February with a couple of feet. I like the photo ops the deep snow produces but in the congested East it makes for a difficult time getting to good spots for photos. Just too much traffic.

Yes I have the same filter set that you have and the SFX works better with a larger overlap and my ev measurements are the same.

Have you tried the Efke IR 820 plain or aura versions? I have these in 120 and 4x5-inch but haven't had the chance to shoot more than a few sheets.

Bob G.

Bob:

Before these storms we had gone perhaps 6 weeks or more without more than a trace of snow, but with a foot of accumulation on the ground. The interesting thing is, because of the elevation and clean air, the snow stays white except along the road edges. There is no dirt that comes to the surface when it melts or sublimes.

I have more than enough snow photos to last me two lifetimes. Now days I only take a digital point and shoot so I can email snow photos to friends and family.

Yes, I have used both a box of MACO 820c and Efke IR 820. I have not purchased any since my experiences at high elevations during winter light.

After the photos I took last June, however, I intend to buy more Efke. I have also burned a few rolls of Efke in 120 as well. I like the results.

My only complaint is how slow it is in the IR spectrum. It is not even close to the visible sensitivity. Its lack of speed makes landscape work difficult with just slight breezes blurring the vegetation. Around here, except early in the morning, there is always a breeze coming down the slopes.

Recall that with Kodak's High Speed IR you could obtain a Wood Effect with just a red filter. Not so with Efke.

I have not tried the Aura. It was marketed for a while, then withdrawn, and then being sold again. I was stocking up when it was not available and now I have an abundant supply of outdated film that I need to use first.

[al olson]

...
Have you tried using your light meter with an IR filter to see if you can correlate an exposure value to the film? My old Adorama spot meter is sensitive to IR through the 87 filter and I've been thinking of trying this experiment myself. Just waiting for the proper weather and foliage to make it work. Bob G.

I just tested my meter against an IR filter. I used a Sekonic C-508 with 1 degree spot to meter against a clear blue northern sky. Then I metered again through a Cokin 007 filter which is equivalent to an 89B. With the meter set at 100 ISO, the first reading averaged 15.5 EV and the second 9.0. (I repeated each of these several times and the spread was never more than 0.2 EV.)

According to the meter, the measurement drops off by a factor of 2^6.5 or about a factor of 90. It would be interesting to further compare this drop off with what it would be at midday during the summer at higher sun angles.

Using Efke, a good EI from experience for this filter is 1.5. Dividing the ISO of 200 by this EI gives a factor of 133.3 which is slightly more than 128. (128 is 2^7) So there is a difference between visible and IR of slightly over 7 EV.

As I calculated above, SFX with the Cokin filter loses about 4 EV. So there is a difference of 3 EV for a factor of 8 between the IR sensitivities of these two films.

Now to be careful about this, the exposure readings that I am making for the IR films are measurements of visible light, not the IR that is transmitted through the filter. If I were making my exposure reading through the filter, I would be getting an additional 2.5 EV of overexposure for the SFX (because the meter is reading 2.5 EV less than the EI that I would use) and 0.5 EV underexposure for the Efke.

[rguinter]

Al: Great data. Thanks for sharing it. I plan to do something similar as soon as some foliage appears. Although I don't usually think in terms of the zone system, I usually use side-lit green foliage in the summer as my preferred exposure which I guess is usually zone V. Since I now have two spot meters my plan was to buy a second set of IR filters to fit the spotmeter and do essentially the same comparison that you did above.

Regarding winter photos to me they are some of my favorites and I don't think I will ever get tired of doing it. But getting more difficult as I get older and more sensitive to the cold. This one from a few weeks ago when we had a few inches snow. Sun came out for a few minutes late in the afternoon and there was time for one quick test sheet of HIE that I bought from someone who was cleaning out his freezer.

Cheers. Bob G.

[brianam]

Thanks Vlad and rguinter for saving me some trouble with the Rollei in sheets. I was about to buy a large box from freestyle.
I've shot a lot of IR in the past few years; HIE, SFX, Rollei and Efke, in 135 and 120. wanted to try out a sheetfilm IR to get a wee bit more grain reduction.

I've had a similar experience to others with the Efke -- even rating it as slow,slow,slow the negs can still be thin. it's somewhat unpredictable. Though, I should pay really more heed to the amount of visible IR (sun) in the scene and mentally adjust exposure time..

I use Rollei IR in 120 quite a bit --usually passing it through a Mamiya 7 or Fuji 690. I find scanning still somewhat exaggerates the grain of this film, though it's pretty fine grained for IR. Hence going as large as possible. (next up, 6x12?:-)
Scanning in a Nikon CS8000 with the glass holder you can certainly keep it flat, since it's sandwiched between AN glass.

Attached is a Rollei IR shot, sans the usual tree foliage. It's fun, but leaves no doubt as to the film stock ;-)

[brianam]

oops, sorry for the large image. Shoulda downsized it first. it's from Mussel Rock, just north of Pacifica, CA.