Executive Summary: What B&W films are currently in production that are as fine grained as Tech-Pan 25 was?
Greetings. My name is James and I have been a photo hobbyist since my father introduced me to the art almost thirty years ago. I helped my dad build our first darkroom in an unused basement utility bathroom when I was ten years old. I was raised on Kodak products and I came to know the Kodak line and the capabilities and limits of the various Kodak products. With the exception of an introductory B&W photography class i took in college in the early 90s I never used anything other than Kodak. Kodak was tried and true. Although I will admit that my brief fling with Ilford paper was a pleasant experience.
In 1999 I bought my first house, which had an open floor plan basement that was just begging for a darkroom. I had all of the space I needed for a luxury darkroom. I religiously read the Pennysaver every week and in just a few months after moving into my house I had an eight foot long stainless steel sink and a great cabinet both built by the previous owner and his high school shop teacher/dad for their home darkroom until sudden blindness took him away from the art. A few weeks later I got a Beseler 45 MCR with a stand/enclosure built by the architect who owned it before me and was getting out of chemistry based photography after having discovered digital photography. I was now able to design my darkroom around my equipment and I built my eight foot by eight foot darkroom in the corner of the basement. I did not realize how bad the moisture problem in my basement was. I used the darkroom very often and I took a liking to Kodak Tech-Pan 25. I also acquainted myself with color processing; both negatives to print and slides. I borrowed (so far; permanently) my father's Speed Graphic 45 and jumped into the world of LF. A year later I got a really good deal on a mint Hasselblad 500 c/m.
A few years later the first of my three children was born and very shortly thereafter I went back to school. Between kids and school, which I did not anticipate would be a seven year journey, I had no time for the darkroom. I did, however, want to preserve the memories of my kids growing up so I bought my first digital camera; a Pentax point and shoot. The darkroom had become a dismal mess: A mildew laden storage room for stuff we had no use for but was too valuable to trash. After years of basement flooding and high humidity I bit the bullet and had the foundation waterproofed and drained from the outside. A few months ago I took a look at my darkroom and decided that I've been away from the art for too long. I rolled up my sleeves and removed everything piece by piece wiping each instrument and piece of furniture with bleach. I completely repainted the inside of the room, this time adding mildewcide to the paint, replaced the warped hollow-core door and my darkroom is now back to its original glory. Last night I introduced my seven year old son to film processing on a few rolls of 120 Portra 160 that have been piling up in the refrigerator for the past nine years. I have not purchased any LF film and only purchased a few boxes of 120 film since 2002.
About three years ago I learned that Kodak had long since discontinued my beloved Tech-Pan 25. Two or so years ago I read about the demise of Kodachrome which was in itself no consequence to me. I have no plans on taking a trip to Afghanistan to take a very nice thought provoking picture of an Afghan girl to grace the cover of National Geographic. I am taking a look on the B&H website and it seems that only a fraction of Kodak's product line with which I was familiar is still available. I read a few threads here suggesting that Kodak stock certificates will soon be wall paper with a $1 par value. What films out there are as fine grained as Tech-Pan 25? From the looks of it I may have to learn a blend of brands to get the ISOs in the formats I like. Are the film processing chemistries the same across brands? I.e can I process al B&W film in HC110 or D-76? I feel like I am starting to learn photography all over again.
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