Which slide film for 'juicy' greens?

[Marek]

Hello Forum,

I have been a satisfied user of Velvia 50 especially for landscapes on overcast days or in the shadow. Recently I started with serious scanning of my own slides and realized that scanning Velvia 50 is a challenge.

Would like to move to a more modern emulsion which scans better but keeps as much of the Velvia 50 characteristic. Especially the greens need to be good.

Think about Velvia 100F. If it is just a bit cooler than Velvia 50 I would have no problem correcting this with a filter. But I am a bit concerned because several comments say that Velvia 100F is not able to show good greens.

What is your experience?

Thank you very much.

[Thilo Schmid]

Marek,

try Kodak E100VS. Bold and vivid greens, better and warmer browns than Velvia and slightly warmer than the Fuji F-Types (like all Kodak E-Types are). However, E100VS can be *very* cold in deep shadows.

[Dan Fromm]

EPN will give you accurate colors, but if you like Velvia you'll hate it. Liking Velvia is an indication of an addiction to false colors or, as some say, artificially enhanced reality.

Thilo, deep shadows are often quite blue. That's reality.

Cheers,

Dan

[Jean-Marie Solichon]

Marek I shoot a lot of plants and vegetation. In my opinion, Velvia 50 is the best at rendering the different shades of green. Velvia 100 is my second choice. Jean-Marie

[Roger Scott]

Marek,

I don't scan my own slides so take this with a grain of salt. You don't mention what problem you're having with scanning Velvia 50 but I'm assuming you're losing shadow detail due to the dmax of the film. Velvia 100F has about the same maximum density as Velvia 50 however its curve begins to taper earlier so in this respect you may find it easier to scan. The downside of this is that the colours don't appear quite as saturated. Also as others have noted the colour pallette between the two films is subtlely different and whether you prefer one over the other is going to be subjective. As an initial experiment I'd rate a sheet of Velvia 50 at an EI of 40, process as normal, and see if you like the results. It would also be worth considering one of the lower contrast films, especially if the previous test blows out the highlights, such as Astia or the older Ektachromes (EPN was previously mentioned). They won't look as 'punchy' on the lightbox but they should be easier to scan. The nice thing about sheet film is it's easy to shoot the same scene onto different film for comparison.

Roger.

[Guy Tal]

Maybe I'm misunderstanding something but if you're scanning your film, you should be able to digitally tweak the greens to your liking. A lower contrast film like Astia 100F should be much easier to scan.

Guy
Scenic Wild Photography (http://www.scenicwild.com)

[Kirk Gittings]

I can recommend Velvia 100f for alot of reasons. It is finer grain than the 50, not so goofy in color but still very saturated and it is very stable in terms of both color and reciprocity with very long exposure. It has become my film of choice for architecture where it shines as a very forgiving mixed light source film. We are shooting upwards of 15 120 rolls of it a day.