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Thread: Anyone Made RA-4 Color Prints From Ektar Negatives?

  1. #11
    Drew Wiley
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    Re: Anyone Made RA-4 Color Prints From Ektar Negatives?

    It's partially the native steepness of the respective dye curves which makes minor cc correction have a greater impact with Ektar than Portra, but is also what allows this particular film to distinguish many hues better, along with the more cleanly separated dye spikes. But where crossover does occur with Ektar, it is mainly an exposure symptom, namely, a lack of proper color temp balancing at the time of the shot. But with respect to initial colorhead settings, Ektar is really no different than other current color neg films. You still have to fine-tune things somewhat afterwards relative to the specific neg and paper batch anyway.

  2. #12

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    Re: Anyone Made RA-4 Color Prints From Ektar Negatives?

    Quote Originally Posted by agregov View Post
    I print RA4 primarily with Portra films. When I have tried Ektar, I found it challenging to color correct. It was quite sensitive in the green/magenta, sometimes requiring under 1 point corrections to get rid of a magenta cast. All Kodak films were reformulated some years ago to make them scan easier. Ektar changes likely caused it to become more difficult to deal with in the color darkroom. If your normal starting point is 50M/50Y in the color pack, you might try removing 5 points of magenta and start with 55M/50Y. But color heads vary so much, just pick a starting point and go. You'll get to a new range quickly.
    The only scan specific changes were to the supercoating layers. Ektar is intended to deliver a print result closer to the look of transparency film - and that makes some of its behaviour rather anomalous compared to the softer toned, broader latitude Portra films.

  3. #13

    Re: Anyone Made RA-4 Color Prints From Ektar Negatives?

    There are many mixed opinions about it, but frankly - Ektar 100 is my favorite current c-41 film. I also enjoy using Vision 3 which gives me similar results, but it requires ECN-2 processing (which I do).
    I have used both Kodak's old Endura paper, and I currently print on Fuji's crystal archive paper, and Ektar works excellently with both. Using a Beseler 23dga head, I make my contact proofs at 50M and 50Y (Fuji CA paper).
    I am attaching a print that I made from push-processed 35mm Ektar (2 stops) - I was shooting handheld! - on Fuji CA paper (70M 58Y).
    Filtration values will always be specific to your color head/ paper/ chemical combination, so keep in mind that you can only use someone's values as a starting point.
    This is one of my favorite color prints - unfortunately the scan doesn't do it justice, there is a lot of interesting shadow detail on the real print.
    Click image for larger version. 

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    I still have to say, IMHO, that nothing beats a good transparency film for color work!

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