The best BW 4x5 film for night photography?

[l2oBiN]

I am using Foma 100 at the moment, and its not so good at night. I have a friend who uses TriX and the images are amazing in comparison.

Which film would you recommend for BW night photography?

[Peter De Smidt]

Acros because of it's amazing reciprocity characteristics.

[SocalAstro]

+1 for ACROS.

I also like T-max 100, but it's not as good as ACROS as far receiprocity.

Foma/Arista Edu are terrible in that regard BTW.

-Leon

[l2oBiN]

How about for capturing maximum detail in shadows/highlights?

[Joanna Carter]

Once again, Acros.

[l2oBiN]

Acros is good for shadows and highlights?

[Drew Wiley]

Another vote for ACROS.

[Joanna Carter]

Acros is good for shadows and highlights?
Like I said, yes.

[Ash]

Acros is probably my favourite b&w film in smaller formats. Not used it at long exposures but it did an amazing job at slow speeds at night when shooting people (casual shots)

[l2oBiN]

when shooting across in the night do you overexpose and develop it less?

[Joanna Carter]

No, because of the, almost, non-existent reciprocity, just treat it normally.

[bobwysiwyg]

I thought T-Max had pretty good reciprocity characteristics, no?

[Brian C. Miller]

According to the Fuji Acros 100 datasheet (pdf) (http://www.fujifilmusa.com/shared/bin/NeopanAcros100.pdf), the film doesn't need correction under 120 seconds (2 min) exposure. Between 120sec to 1000sec (16-2/3 min) add 1/2 stop exposure.

[Peter De Smidt]

You may need to develop less than normal depending on the contrast of the scene.

[gevalia]

Haven't tried it fpr over 60 seconds but I'm wondering how Adox CHS 25/Efke 25 would do. Seems to have pretty low reciprocity - although Acros gets my vote if you have it.

[bobwysiwyg]

According to the Fuji Acros 100 datasheet (pdf) (""), the film doesn't need correction under 120 seconds (2 min) exposure. Between 120sec to 1000sec (16-2/3 min) add 1/2 stop exposure.

Wow pretty impressive!

[l2oBiN]

I was aware of Acros reciprocity, but I am unsure of it's ability to capture shadow and highlight detail?

[Joanna Carter]

Then take a look at these images, both taken on Acros, with over 12 stops of light range, compressed into 8 stops by exposure and development, for scanning.

http://grandes-images.com/en/Heritage_%26_Restoration_files/Media/OakworthStationMastersOffice/OakworthStationMastersOffice.jpg

http://grandes-images.com/en/Heritage_%26_Restoration_files/Media/MorlaixLeGrandCafeDeLaTerrasseN%26B/MorlaixLeGrandCafeDeLaTerrasseN%26B.jpg

Not all the shadow detail is visible in these web versions but, in the original all the detail is there from the deepest shadow to the brightest highlight.

[bobwysiwyg]

Some range! I'm going to have to try some.

[Ron Marshall]

Another vote for Acros.

Scroll down to graph of various film reciprocities:

http://silvergrain.org/Photo-Tech/reciprocity.html

[John NYC]

Sigh. I wish Fuji was not such a ridiculous company... and that they'd offer Acros in 8x10 in the U.S.

[l2oBiN]

That seems pretty amazing Joana. How was that shot and processed?

[Joanna Carter]

The way to get large ranges of light onto a negative is best described in Ansel Adams book "The Negative" and known as the Zone System.

What Ansel Adams describes applies to wet printing, so I have experimented and changed the "rules" to suit scanning better - the main difference being that the original system is meant to give a negative with around 5 stops of range whilst, for scanning, I have determined that I can work with a range of 8 stops (from zone 2 to zone 10).

Essentially, you need to determine the Subject Brightness Range of the scene before you. If that range is greater than the target range for your printing process, then you need to adjust the exposure and plan to adjust the development to compensate.

For example, for scanning, I might find that I have a SBR of 10 stops, from zone 2 for the deepest shadow detail. This means I need to determine the zone 5 exposure at 3 stops less than the zone 2 reading and then over-expose the shot by 1/2 stop per stop over the 10 stop target range. So, for the station office scene I used a zone 2 exposure of 30 seconds, I needed to reduce this to 4 secs for zone 5 and then increase that to 8 secs to allow for planned under-development.

When developing, it is usually reckoned to reduce the time by 15% per stop of over-exposure.

But nothing beats taking those ideas as a basis for experimentation to determine what your particular film and developer combination gives you.

[Joanna Carter]

Some range! I'm going to have to try some.
Ilford Delta 100 is also pretty amazing for wide exposure range, especially for scanning. I once, accidentally, under-exposed a shot by 4 stops and still managed to get some sort of scanned image from, what looked like, a clear sheet of film!!! And that was without any kind of development compensation. Had I compensated, I think I might have got a printable image:o

[Marek Warunkiewicz]

ACROS all the way....

[Rory_5244]

Strangely, I've been finding that Delta 100 doesn't require much reciprocity correction at all for exposures 20 minutes or less; a far cry from Tri-X Pan! I certainly agree with Joanna about Delta's ability to retain info (on scanning) with gross exposure errors (which I often did while compensating for non-existent reciprocity failure). :o

Here's one on 8x10 Delta about 45 minutes after sunset.

http://i1114.photobucket.com/albums/k532/moobie1/wc3.jpg

[Joanna Carter]

Wonderful shot Rory, demonstrating why digital will never beat film in the smoothness of gradation :)

[EdWorkman]

A C41 film would help a lot, but I see XP2 is limited to 35 & 120.
TXP 320 is a good choice for controlling the hi lites and higher speed emulsions tend to be less contrasty than the slower. For development, try two bath Pyrocat HC