E6 & C41 processing, whats the diff?

AshleyC

AshleyC

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Just looking to get some colour 120 film processed and there seems to be 2 options, E6 and C41. Theres nothing on the film roll i can see to say what it should be so could someone clarify it?

I have 2 rolls of kodak iso400 Portra and 2 of iso100 Ektar to get done.
 
They are both C-41. C-41 is the process to do colour negatives, and E-6 is the process to do colour slide (or positives).
 
There are more exhaustive explanations of the difference between colour negatives & colour slide on things like Wikipedia, should you be interested. Are you positive (no pun intended) that your rolls don't say C-41 on them, because I remember my Portra possibly having it written on it - the roll of Velvia in front of me says E-6.

Practical differences - colour negative has far more latitude, the colours with slide film (especially like Velvia) can be far more saturated and vivid.
 
Defenitly cant see it written on the roll, unless its at the other end of the film strip for when its wound off the camera.
 
Just out of interest, it does say Exposed somewhere on the backing paper that you can see, or the strip that binds and holds the roll on completion (that you seal it in)?
 
The C-41 and E-6 processes are very similar, but in the E-6 process after the first developer that generates a B&W image a reversing agent is used to get a positive, before a colour developer is used to generate the colours over the B&W image which is then bleached away. In the C-41 there is just 1 developer that generates both the colour and B&W image which is then bleached away.
Hence the reason that you can crossprocess E-6 and C-41 films in each others chemicals.
 
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