Shooting outside box speed

Ruffmeister

Ruffmeister

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Hi All

I am a little new to film photography and while it's been great getting used to manual operation, something keeps crossing my mind. Apologies if it sounds a real vague / obvious question but I just haven't been able to find this out by searching.

I hear a lot of people shoot outside of box speed. E.g. Portra 400 being shot at 100 or 200, HP5 at 800 or 3200 etc. How does this work with regards to developing etc? I don't develop the film myself, I have always used AG so the process is alien to me and I have always just played 'safe' as it were and shot at what the box says.

Could I say for example shoot part of a roll of HP5 at standard 400 and the rest at 3200 in low light and expect good results from AG? I'm guessing I would just meter the same as the metering would be based on what ISO I have set anyway.

Thanks

Dan
 
With black and white negative film (which is what I use) it is quite common to give an extra stop of exposure and to reduce development time by 25% in order to get more shadow detail.

You can do extensive testing to determine your 'personal film speed' or you can do what I did...

http://www.stevesmithphoto.webs.com/personal.html

And this is related...

http://www.stevesmithphoto.webs.com/contrast.html

Ruffmeister said:
Could I say for example shoot part of a roll of HP5 at standard 400 and the rest at 3200 in low light and expect good results from AG
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Unfortunately, the film can't read your mind and work out how sensitive you want it to be! You can only develop it for one length of time so if you have EI 400 and EI 3200 shots on the same roll, they will always be three stops different. You might get away with it but it won't be optimal.


Steve.
 
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Ruffmeister said:
Hi All

I am a little new to film photography and while it's been great getting used to manual operation, something keeps crossing my mind. Apologies if it sounds a real vague / obvious question but I just haven't been able to find this out by searching.

I hear a lot of people shoot outside of box speed. E.g. Portra 400 being shot at 100 or 200, HP5 at 800 or 3200 etc. How does this work with regards to developing etc? I don't develop the film myself, I have always used AG so the process is alien to me and I have always just played 'safe' as it were and shot at what the box says.

Could I say for example shoot part of a roll of HP5 at standard 400 and the rest at 3200 in low light and expect good results from AG? I'm guessing I would just meter the same as the metering would be based on what ISO I have set anyway.

Thanks

Dan
Click to expand...

With many negative films, whether colour or black and white, you can usually overexpose several stops, develop normally, and get good, perhaps even preferable, results. Personally, I would say 'playing it safe' with negative film is shooting about one stop overexposed and not box speed, as negative film handles overexposure much better than underexposure, and this gives you a bit of breathing room.

Shooting faster than box speed can be a bit trickier and will almost always require adjustment of developing time (known as pushing) and sometimes different developer may be preferred (in the case of black and white). Pushing film typically increases contrast and, in the case of colour negative, often causes colour shifts.

Pushing can achieve good results, usually after a bit of experimentation, but I wouldn't ordinarily recommend mixing such extreme EIs such as 400 and 3200 on one roll though as it'll be difficult to balance the three stop gap in exposure during development.
 
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With negative film overexposure is fine, as it tends to increase the dynamic range, shadow detail etc, but underexposure tends to increase the contrast and grain where the print/scan has to be brightened to recover detail from darker parts. You'll likely get an acceptable image, but with the stated attributes.

With B&W film you can generally over-expose by 2-3 stops safely without needing any change in the developing stage, but more than a stop underexposure will likely require pushing, where the film is overdeveloped to compensate (which does result in slightly increase grain and contrast, but nowhere near without pushing it). Just tell AG you need an X stop push (they will probably charge a fee for this), but be mindful that the push applies to the whole roll.

With most colour negative films you can overexpose by up to ~2 stops, or underexpose by a stop to get an acceptable result with normal developing, but some professional films, especially Portra 160 and 400, can be safely overexposed by up to 3 stops or underexposed by 2 with normal developing. The underexposure with these usually results in only small increases in grain/contrast, and they are truly amazingly flexible films regarding exposure.
 
skysh4rk said:
With many negative films, whether colour or black and white, you can usually overexpose several stops, develop normally, and get good, perhaps even preferable, results. Personally, I would say 'playing it safe' with negative film is shooting about one stop overexposed and not box speed, as negative film handles overexposure much better than underexposure, and this gives you a bit of breathing room.

Shooting faster than box speed can be a bit trickier and will almost always require adjustment of developing time (known as pushing) and sometimes different developer may be preferred (in the case of black and white). Pushing film typically increases contrast and, in the case of colour negative, often causes colour shifts.

Pushing can achieve good results, usually after a bit of experimentation, but I wouldn't ordinarily recommend mixing such extreme EIs such as 400 and 3200 on one roll though as it'll be difficult to balance the three stop gap in exposure during development.
Click to expand...

Cheers for the advice especially re: one stop overexposed. I'm sometimes a little bit too fussy on it being perfectly metered so it helps to know
 
s162216 said:
With negative film overexposure is fine, as it tends to increase the dynamic range, shadow detail etc, but underexposure tends to increase the contrast and grain where the print/scan has to be brightened to recover detail from darker parts. You'll likely get an acceptable image, but with the stated attributes.

With B&W film you can generally over-expose by 2-3 stops safely without needing any change in the developing stage, but more than a stop underexposure will likely require pushing, where the film is overdeveloped to compensate (which does result in slightly increase grain and contrast, but nowhere near without pushing it). Just tell AG you need an X stop push (they will probably charge a fee for this), but be mindful that the push applies to the whole roll.

With most colour negative films you can overexpose by up to ~2 stops, or underexpose by a stop to get an acceptable result with normal developing, but some professional films, especially Portra 160 and 400, can be safely overexposed by up to 3 stops or underexposed by 2 with normal developing. The underexposure with these usually results in only small increases in grain/contrast, and they are truly amazingly flexible films regarding exposure.
Click to expand...

Thank you. Some Portra 160 / 400 is on my list next :) It's good to know there is some flexibility to be had with it.
 
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