Tag Archives: Exposure

Metering through filters..

Filters for Black and White.
The Web is awash with advice for young photographers and not all of it is good advice. Some of it has been around for a long while and myths become perpetuated by people who don’t think carefully about the technique, and/or don’t bother to test the theory. One such myth is that you can get a reliable exposure by using a cameras TTL meter reading with a filter attached. This might be true if you have a neutral density filter or a polariser, but it is certainly not true for coloured filters. The meter does not respond to all of the colours of the spectrum in exactly the same way as the film. Another problem is that the filter will lighten its own colour and darken its opposite, so your exposure could be affected quite strongly by the colours in the scene.
All filters reduce the amount of light passing through, and this must be compensated for. Generally, the stronger the colour, the more correction is needed. Filter manufacturers sometimes put a number on the edge of the filter, but some don’t. Kokin for instance, give no information about how much to correct for. The usual method of informing the user of the exposure correction needed, is to give a filter factor. This is a number that your exposure should be multiplied by, to arrive at the correct exposure. Why this method was universally adopted mistifies me, why not just give the correction in stops? that would be much more useful out in the field. Who has time to multiply 1/250th of a second by 1.5? Why not just write; 1/2 stop adjustment?
The following conversion chart gives filter factors and the actual exposure compensation needed in stops.

If you have bought your filters from a well known company, there should be information provided to indicate the correction needed. This can easily be written on a sticker on the filter case for reference when out shooting. Of course, some people acquire filters from all sorts of places and from a range of makers. The exposure correction, if not printed on the filter ring is then a mystery. Finding the correct advice is sometimes very difficult, even when looking at information online. Not all filters are the same density/depth of colour. For instance, I have three reds, two different orange filters, and three different green filters. See scanned sections below. They can’t all be the same in use.

FILTER COLOUR COMPARISONS

A quick search for information about how much exposure difference there is with filters will throw up a lot of forum threads with conflicting advice. On the forums there are comments to the effect of; ‘I do it my way and it works for me’, or ‘filter factors are basically useless’. which are misleading and hardly scientific. This type of advice is way off the mark and is bad for beginners.

In photography there are many areas where exposure and density can go astray; There is reciprocity correction, filter factors, bellows extension, and temperature and dilution when processing. Reliable, accurate information is needed to avoid wasted film and ruined shots. Each photographer has different lighting scenarios, film choice, and tonal preferences, so I would suggest testing around the manufacturers stated exposure corrections and making notes about your preferred result to establish how near the mark your filter factors are in your work.

Most photographers don’t bother with testing, they see it as a boring waste of time and film, so they carry on making the same mistakes, which is wasteful and frustrating.
A simple test could be set up to establish the correct exposure compensation for your own camera meter, filters and film of choice (There will be slight differences in spectral response with different films, but not too significant). A 36 exposure film is long enough to test 4 different exposures for each of 6 filters. This test will give you the information you need to avoid incorrect exposures in the future, so it is cost effective.
Shot 1. take one shot at the metered setting. Shot 2. Meter through the filter and take one shot at that setting. Shot 3. Open up half a stop and take a shot. Shot 4. Open up another half stop (one stop over the reading through the filter) and take a shot. Make notes of your exposures and corrections, and of the manufacturers filter factor. Process the film and make a contact sheet so that the unfiltered frames look correct. Look for the filtered frames that look as close as possible to those exposures and make a note of the amount of correction. Your results will probably suggest an extra half stop for readings through a yellow, or yellow green, and one extra stop when metering through an orange or red filter.
Personally, I prefer to meter the scene with a hand held meter, even if the meter in my camera is very good. I then apply a correction, depending on the filter factor. The meter I use, has the facility to set a correction before you take a reading, so that you can just forget about it. See picture.
LUNASIX WITH FILTER CORRECTION.

Looking at the scale on the front of this Lunasix meter you can see the red mark. This indicates that filter correction has been applied and reminds you to set it back to normal when you have finished. Here I have applied three stops correction. Follow the black rim leftwards from the red marker and you should see a small white mark aligned with the number 3. You must remember to reset the meter back to normal when you stop shooting with that filter.

I hope that information clears things up a bit. If you have enjoyed this post and the information here and elsewhere on my blog, would you consider a small donation via Ko-fi please? You can send as little as £3.00, or more if you are feeling generous. This money goes towards materials used for the tests and printing for these articles. The link is; Ko-fi.com/andrewsandersonphotography

Sunny 16 is not always correct.

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Sunny 16

I have been meaning to write this post for about two or three years. I pick up the subject, do a few test shots, write a bit, then shelve it. I don’t know why that is, perhaps because I’m doing it out of annoyance, rather than because I am excited to share something with you all.

The thing that has been annoying me is the constant advice on social platforms to beginners that you can just shoot ‘Sunny 16’ and all will be perfect. There are a few myths in photography that regularly crop up in articles, blog posts and comment sections, and If you try to suggest that any of these commenters might be mistaken, you are immediately pounced on by a number of people who are totally convinced of the thing, despite never having tested it. The Sunny 16 Rule is one such myth in my opinion. Perhaps I should qualify that statement and say that it’s not so much a myth, because it does work sometimes. More a mistaken belief that this method is going to produce perfect results all of the time.

The sunny 16 rule is very old, and was originally devised as a way of shooting transparency film at a time when light meters were less common, and not very reliable. It was important to avoid overexposure with transparency film, so slight underexposure was preferable. Exposing for negative films is different, they benefit from slight overexposure (but not over development).

Let me explain what Sunny 16 actually is for those of you who do not know. The rule states that; ‘In sunny conditions, the camera can be set to f16, and the shutter speed will be the same as the ASA/ISO’. My preferred film is Ilford HP5 400 ASA/ISO, so for the purposes of this article I will be using that as a example. In sunlight the setting would then be a 400th of a second at f16. Now there are no cameras that allow you to manually select 400th of a second (actually I can think of just one, -Mamiya RB67), so most people go for the nearest speed, which is 500th. If you wanted to compensate for this slightly faster speed you could open your aperture to between f11 and f16, but it is my belief that you will still be underexposed in a number of situations (and anyway, that wouldn’t be sunny 16 would it?).

I shoot Ilford HP5 every day (Inland in the UK), and I’m consistently getting 125th at f16 in sunny conditions. This is two stops away from the sunny 16 setting and I’m not getting really overexposed negatives, this exposure gives me just enough shadow detail for the type of negative I like to print from. When I am at the coast, I get 250th at f16, and only at mid day there, with the sun behind me do I get 500th at f16.

The difficulty with a statement that suggests all exposures to be the same, is that location is not taken into account, never mind the time of day. brightness of the sun is not constant from the Arctic to the equator, and even varies a full stop between coast and countryside. In the UK, bright sunny days are not common, so the rule might not be any use for 80% of the year anyway.

In the UK in summer, if you are near the sea, you might just get sunny 16 if you have the sun high in the sky and it is directly behind you. Inland, earlier or later in the day it will be less, and if you turn 90 degrees to the sun it will be reduced even more. Extra exposure is needed to bring tone to the areas not lit by the sun, so the rule does not apply any more. This is never mentioned when the rule is suggested, the advice is passed on because the reader saw it somewhere, but never tested it.

If you photograph in a city, you may be getting extra light reflected off pale concrete and large glass covered buildings, so you might find my setting quite different from your own. From my tests it would seem that the best time of day to get enough light for sunny 16 to work is mid day, but the harshness of the light at that time is not good for photography. Personally, I think it is the worst time of the day for pictures, but street photographers might disagree with me on that one. There is a fashion among current street photographers for solid black areas in pictures. This is basically underexposure with the highlights lifted afterwards. If this is the look you are after, then sunny 16 is probably fine for you.

One thing that needs clarifying here is that most new film photographers these days are scanning their negatives, rather than printing in a darkroom and underexposed negatives can be easily rescued in Photoshop. if you have never tried to print your negatives in a darkroom, and have only used software to make images, then you might not be aware that your negs are a bit underexposed. Printing in a darkroom requires negatives with more density and a different approach to estimating exposure. If you make the switch from scanning to printing, you may find your negatives are not dense enough.

You may think that I am making this up, but you can test it even with a digital camera, and they don’t need as much exposure as a negative. Set your camera to 400 ASA/ISO, set the aperture to 16, and your shutter to 500th, it’s the setting that most people use when shooting sunny 16 with a 400 speed film. Go out and shoot a number of frames in different directions, and don’t chimp, don’t look at the pictures until you have done 10 or 12. If the theory is correct, then all of your pictures should be perfectly exposed. I’m betting that they are not.

The first of these digital shots was taken at 1/500th at f16. The camera was set to 400 ASA/ISO. The second shot was with aperture priority and the camera chose 1/140th.

Now try shooting in sunlight with film. Take one shot at ‘sunny 16, and then take an incident reading and do a shot at that setting. If you have the time, repeat this with a number of situations and with the sun behind you and also to your side. Process your film and look at the difference in the negatives.

Some of the comments I have seen online illustrate the attitude many have; Sunny 16 is ‘incredibly reliable’, and ‘It has been the standard for over a century’, (actually only since 1960 when ASA standards were set). ‘It’s not foolish to believe in Sunny 16, because it’s not an opinion, it’s a fact’, -It’s not a fact, it only applies in limited situations.

One person even showed a picture with the details; ‘Sunny 16, Kiev 4AM (camera)’ -the picture was a night shot!

Don’t believe what you read, test things for yourself and make your own mind up.

If you have enjoyed this post and the information here and elsewhere on my blog, would you consider a small donation via Ko-fi please? You can send as little as £3.00, or more if you are feeling generous. This money goes towards materials used for the tests and printing for these articles. The link is; Ko-fi.com/andrewsandersonphotography

Are your film negatives good enough?

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Are your negatives ‘good’?

As a film user, do you process, then scan, or do you print in a darkroom?
How do you know if your exposure and processing method is giving you the best negative for the kind of work you wish to produce?

If you use a scanner, followed by photo editing software to bring your pictures to life, you can manage with negatives that are way off the mark for exposure, processing, or both. Because of the tremendous ability of software to control and alter the contrast range of an image, many film photographers are producing negatives which are technically incorrect, then ‘pulling’ images out. I see this quite often when a picture is put online in an Face Book group, Twitter, or shared on Google +, I can see at a glance if a shot has poor shadow detail or is overdeveloped. Recently, someone had posted two images and had also included the negatives. It was obvious that the negatives were two stops underexposed, but the photographer was showing the shots as examples of his great talent.

Last year I did a little research into stand development and in a few places on the web there were photographers claiming that all monochrome films could be stand developed in Rodinal for an hour and all of them would be perfect. yesterday I watched a video in which the photographer claimed that two hours was the correct stand time for Rodinal. It didn’t take many films for me to realise that these opinions were started and perpetuated by people who were not printing them in a darkroom. When you print your negatives in a darkroom, you very quickly find that poor exposure and development of your negatives causes difficulties in contrast control and tonal representation. The better your negatives are, the easier and more productive your printing session will be.

So how do you know if your negatives are good?
A difficult question to answer using only the written word. Depending on subject matter, the negative should have a range of tones that run from clear film base, through the tones, up to areas of quite dark grey. You should NOT have any areas that are jet black, even if the subject or scene has the sun in the sky. If you have solid black, you have over processed, either by having the developer mixed too strong, or the temperature too high, or by giving it too long. Beginners often give their films longer in the dev because they are worried about not having anything on the film, but they create negatives which are a real headache to print. Many beginners don’t realise they are over developing, because they like the contrasty look that they get. High contrast negatives can be very creative in the right hands, but how many of us have the graphic vision of Bill Brandt, or Mario Giacomelli? Both of these photographers overexposed and over developed their film (grossly overdeveloped, in the case of Giacomelli), but made very strong work.

The way to prevent over dense negatives is to lower your dev times. This is where beginners start to panic; What if I cut back too much and there is nothing on the film? Well hopefully the detail and tone has been established by proper exposure, so you would have to cut back development severely to lose it all. Taking your processing time down by 25% will make a difference, but won’t lose the images unless your original time was wrong in the first place.
If you are a darkroom worker there is a simple test which will help you determine if your exposure and development regime is within acceptable limits (whatever they might be). Of course this can come down to personal taste, but this sequence will help you get it nearer to the middle mark.
Load your favourite 35mm film into your camera and find a normal scene with a good range of tones. Take a meter reading in the way you normally do and take a shot underexposed by two stops. Take the next shot one stop underexposed, then one at the indicated exposure. Follow this with one frame shot at a stop over and the next, two stops over. You now have a bracketed sequence of five frames with the indicated exposure in the centre. Repeat this sequence until the film is finished. (it is worth wasting one film on this, as it will clarify a number of things).
In total darkness, pull out the whole length of the film and cut it into three roughly equal sections. Load them into separate developer tanks (or, if you only have one tank, load one and store the other two bits in something totally light tight until your tank is clean and dry).

Now develop the first length of film at 20% less than the time you would normally use, keeping temperature and dilution the same. The second section of film should be processed as you would normally do, and the third section should get 20% extra dev time.
When the films are fixed, washed and dried, a contact print should be made of a five frame sequence from each of the three strips. The important thing though, is to realise that you must expose these for the shortest possible time that will give you a black under the clearest parts of the film, ie; the edge of the film, or the gaps between frames. So, your test exposure and the way you read it, must be done in a way that will give you this information. The exposure should be the same for each of the three strips. When the time has been established, contact all three strips (or sections of) on the same piece of paper. Look at the finished contact print and see which frame gives the best representation of the full tonal range of the scene. There should be one frame that looks right and some that are too flat and others that are too contrasty. This will tell you how far out your exposure or processing is. Try that frame as a print, using the same criteria that you used to judge the test for the contact sheet; Choose the first exposure that gives you a black in the clearest part of the film. Check the test, the highlight detail should be the same as the contact sheet. Make a full print at this exposure and compare it to your previous work. Adapt to the new information and establish a repeatable method for creating good negatives from that point forward..

Good luck with it all and let me know how you get on.

Contrast control.

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I promised in an earlier post that I would tackle the subject of contrast control. My original idea was to explain the methods I use in the darkroom, but I think I need to mention why you might have contrast problems in the first place.

Are you having problems with excessive contrast in your negatives? are you finding it difficult to print them in the darkroom without a lot of messing around with filters? I could give you some pointers for methods to create good prints from them (and I will), but perhaps we should look at why those negatives are so contrasty in the first place.

The first thing I would like to say, is that you might find it strange that exposure is not the cause of your contrast problems. By that I mean that overexposure is not your problem, gross underexposure might give you very thin negs which are difficult to pull detail from, but I am referring to excessive contrast. You only get heavy negs if you overdevelop, and this is the real crux of the problem; Film development is where the contrast is caused. Over development causes increased contrast and grain.

Where are you getting your dilution, time and temperature information from? Some random person who wrote on Flickr? Something another student told you? Check your information with a reliable source, but still be cautious.

Following the developing instructions on the box or the bottle will get you a result, but your negatives could still be over developed if your thermometer is a little bit out, your measuring jugs are not very accurate and if you tend to ‘give a little bit more, just to be sure’. Another thing I’ve seen with students is, they take too long between pouring out the dev and getting the stop bath in, adding another 30 seconds to a minute to the development time. All of these things can make a difference and if you have a combination of them you might be quite a bit out from the ‘norm’. Remember; Over development causes increased contrast and grain.

So perhaps this is one area you might need to look at. If high contrast negatives are giving you problems, then I would suggest running a test film through and processing for 15% less time than normal (this is just a rough estimate, as I have no idea what your negs look like).

Normal and high contrast negatives (simulated).

Normal contrast

High contrast

The contrast is caused by allowing the dense parts of the negative to develop too long. This extra density prevents light getting through, either when printing, or scanning, leaving those areas to be totally white and without detail as a positive image. By careful control of temperature, volume and time, you can stop development at the correct point, giving you a negative with a long tonal scale that will print or scan properly.

Printing

If you have negatives in your files which are dense, how can you get a better print from them?

Split grade printing can be very useful for difficult negatives. There are many conflicting ideas about split grade printing, but I shall give you a simple and effective method. The secret to getting good results is in making the Grade 00 exposure first (I am assuming you know how to do the basics). Put a Grade 00 filter in, and do a test strip in the densest part of the image. Find out the exposure time for the subtle highlight detail you need, remembering that many papers dry slightly darker. Once this time has been established (and it could be a long exposure if the light has to get through your dense neg and the filter), expose a strip of paper for this indicated time Next, put a Grade 5 filter in and do a series of test exposures over the top. These exposures will not be as long as the Grade 00 because you are printing the thinner parts of the negative. Make this second test in a shadow area of the image.

When this two part test has been developed and fixed, look for the point where the black appears, and you will have your Grade 5 exposure. Give the full print these two exposures, working in the same sequence as before and develop the print.

The reason this method works better is that the Grade 5 exposure is not increased by the Grade 00 coming after it. (The effect is slight but it does happen).

To add to the technique above, you could pre-flash the paper to lower its contrast, though to be accurate, you would need to pre-flash the test strips and the final piece of paper to the same amount of light. If you want to get really ambitious, you can pre-flash through a mask to confine the pre-flash exposure to the highlight areas! This technique is a bit too much for this article, but I’ll be happy to explain and demonstrate if you would care to come for a workshop.

Let me know how you get on and write to me via the comments here or on Facebook and Twitter.

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Is your metering method causing you problems?

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Following on from my previous post on comparisons between meters, I thought it important to point out that HOW you use your meter has a significant effect on the exposure you get on the film. There are basically two ways to meter a scene, but a few variations on how those measurements are actually taken and interpreted;

The two main ways of taking a light reading are Reflective and Incident. Reflected readings are measurements of how much light is falling ON THE SCENE and Incident readings are measurements of how much light is falling ON THE METER. Spot meters measure small areas, but are still reflective types and when you take a reading through the camera lens (TTL metering), you are also taking a reflected reading. The trouble is, your choice of subject, or the angle that you shoot from, will influence the brightness that the camera reads. For instance, If I point my camera at a bunch of trees from thirty feet away, I will probably get a reasonable reading from the camera. If I then walk up to the nearest tree and lie underneath it, pointing the camera up through the branches at the sky, I will get quite a different reading, even though the light levels are the same.

In another scenario; I have in front of me two garage doors. One of them is painted black, and the other is white. If I stand some distance away, my reflective reading will average out the lights and darks, giving me an exposure somewhere in between. If I then walk towards the garage doors and take a reading from each, I will have TWO OTHER readings, even though the light levels are still the same.

This kind of subject influenced reading happens on sunny beaches, snowy landscapes, stage photography, night photography, or whenever you photograph any object, scene or person with a predominance of dark tones, or light tones. Given the infinite range of everyday lighting situations and possibilities for error, it is amazing that most shots come out at all. The reason they do, is because film is so forgiving, especially if you are scanning from your negatives and working on the images in photo-editing software. When I say film, I am referring to black and white, or colour negative films. Colour transparency film is far less forgiving and needs more careful metering.

The other method of metering I mentioned was the incident reading. With this, there is usually a white plastic cone which goes over the light cell and this then allows the meter to read the light falling on the meter, and this is not affected by the tone of the subject. Incident readings are a quick and very accurate way of establishing a reading and are correct in most situations. If used in a back lighting situation, they will favour the shadow tones and give you an exposure which will show the lit areas as overexposed, so use them intelligently.

There is one rule when taking incident readings, and that is that you must point the cone from the scene towards the camera, -not towards the light source. The reason the white thing is a cone, and not a flat disc, is so that in side lighting, one side will be lit and the other shaded, the meter can then average them out. If you point the meter at the light source, it will not take shaded areas into account and you will have an underexposed shot.

If you have a meter with the facility for taking both types of reading, you can take two readings beginning with an incident, then decide if the reflective is giving you a proper mid tone. I usually take an incident and check that against a reflective reading off the grass, or tarmac on the road, both of these are very close to mid grey.

In certain weather conditions, fog for instance, or snow scenes on a grey day, the light remains constant for a number of hours and one meter reading will be sufficient for many shots. Take one incident reading and the light will be the same for every shot.

Spot metering. The spot meter is an excellent invention, but needs careful thought when being used. Typically it will take a reflected reading from a small area, indicated by a circle in the viewfinder of the meter. Anything outside of this area will not be metered, though they do pick up a bit of stray light if you have areas of brightness nearby, or are pointing into the light.

Some people think that all you have to do is take one reading from the shadows, and another from the highlights and put your setting right in the middle. This can be done, but it will depend on how high your bright areas go. Are you reading off a white painted door, or the clouds nearest to the sun? A far more accurate way to do it is to read the exposure for the darkest tone that you would like detail in and underexpose from that reading by two stops.

The important thing to remember is that exposure determines shadow detail and development determines highlight detail.

Just let that sink in a bit; Exposure determines shadow detail and development determines highlight detail. There is no shadow detail that can’t be rendered on film if given enough exposure. Leave the shutter open long enough and the film will record light that your eyes cannot detect. Okay, we’ve got that, but what about contrast? Well, if you have exposed so that the shadow detail will produce some pale greys on the negative, but you have areas where a lot more light reached the film, say for instance, a gap in dark woodland with a sunlit area beyond, this area will have obviously received an excess of light. This will only become unprintable if you keep it in the developer long enough for it to go to black. You don’t want that, you want a dark grey that you can print through, so the answer is to cut back the developer so that this doesn’t happen. I’ll be covering this subject in my next post.

Metering through the camera lens (TTL). This is a quick and practical way to get your exposures pretty close to correct as long as you understand a few things; What you point the camera at for the picture, doesn’t have to be exactly the same thing you point it at to take a reading. For instance, if you were shooting tall buildings in the city from ground level, you would most likely be pointing the camera up and getting lots of sky. Point the camera at the building, excluding sky, take the reading and use that for the up shots. If you are shooting a band on stage, exclude the lighting rig from the frame when you take the reading, then set it and fire away.

For street shooting, a 35mm camera is ideal, but you won’t have time to take a reading as you compose the shot. Think about the tonality of the scene, take a reading from something typical, then set it and forget it.

Metering in low light.

Metering in situations where there is low, even light only requires a good incident reading, a reciprocity chart and a tripod. Metering in situations where there are areas of deep shadow, coupled with hotspots of intense light, such as a concert needs a different approach. Uprating is commonly used in these situations, but this creates negatives of higher contrast, requiring very careful metering. Whenever I see images online and the photographer is claiming that the film was rated at 12500 ASA / ISO or some such high number, my first thought is; Yes, but where did you meter from? If the shots are taken at a concert, or some dark restaurant or club, there will be areas of deep shadow and very bright spots of light. In that kind of situation, a 12500 ASA reading from dark clothing in the corner of the room will give pretty much the same exposure settings as a 400 ASA reading from a well lit face. TTL metering will give you a result, but if the shot is important, then a carefully taken incident reading would be better.

Outdoors in changeable weather conditions: If you have one of those days when the sun is in and out every two minutes messing up your readings, remember that the exposure will only drop by one to one and a half stops when a small cloud comes over. Proper storm clouds will take much more light away, but a typical British summer day with fleeting clouds is easy to meter; If you meter the grass for the sunny areas, the shadows from the clouds will be 1.5 – 2 stops darker than mid grey, but if you meter for the grass when the cloud comes over, the sunny patches will be 1.5 – 2 stops brighter than mid grey. Meter the scene according to the look you are after.

Go out and try these methods and let me know how you get on. If there are any other lighting situations you are having difficulty with, then please leave a comment or question.

Brainwave.

4 Replies

Sometimes, a simple solution to a problem takes ages to appear. I’ve been using a couple of cameras that rely on zone focusing for many years and the depth of field scale on them has been vague and difficult to work out. I have got used to them now, but the other day it suddenly occurred to me that I should look up the actual depth of field for these lenses online and find out what they were capable of when stopped right down.

I went to the website; ‘Depth of Field Master’ and put in the various settings until I had worked out maximum depth of field for these two cameras and my 24mm lens. The brainwave came when I realised that I only had to colour code five aperture markings; f5.6, f8, f11, f16 and f22 and I could establish a quick and easy way to set the lens for depth of field without any calculations or messing about.

I decided to mark f5.6 as dark green, f8 as light blue, f11 as red, f16 as light green and f22 as yellow. If I put the colours next to the apertures, and also at the point on the lens where the hyperfocal distance was, I could get away not worrying about focus.

I used Humbrol enamel paint which is sold for model painting and I applied it with a fine brush (stir well first).

I’m not bothered about the resale value of these cameras, I expect to use them for the rest of my life, so why not make that job simpler?

Ilford XP2 -An under appreciated film

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Having recently worked intensively with the whole range of Ilford 35mm films, I thought that I would write a few articles on the special qualities or quirks of some of them.

In this post I’d like to discuss a film which I think is under appreciated; Ilford XP2. This film is a little out of the ordinary, both in the look which it gives and the way it is processed. It is a Chromogenic film, this means that the silver grains are converted to dyes during processing, giving it a unique quality. There is a smoothness to the tones in the mid tones, going up through to the highlights. It looks virtually grainless in these areas, especially on medium format negatives.

With conventional films, when you have a grainy neg from overexposure and over development, the grain of the film is not what you see on the print. Light passes between the grains to expose the paper, so what you are seeing is the gaps between the grains.

With XP2, overexposure is an advantage. The image is formed in the same way as with normally developed negatives, but during processing the film grain is replaced by overlapping, semi dense ‘platelets’ of dye. Because they overlap in the heavily exposed areas, there is no actual gap between the grains, and hence, no impression of grain on the print.
In areas of shadow, less of the platelets are created, allowing more light through the larger gaps. This gives a grainy look.
So the shadow areas look grainy and the lighter tones look smooth and grain free. This is an exaggerated reversal of the grain problem found with normal films. Burning a sky in from a 35mm negative on a conventional 400 ISO film can result in heavier grain which some find unpleasant. A burned in sky from an XP2 negative is smooth and creamy. This quality is also apparent in other images where light tones are important, such as a wedding dress, or a portrait. Snow scenes also have a lovely smoothness.

It needs to be processed through C41 Colour chemicals, this means it can be processed by any lab. I have used XP2 since it’s very first release (as XP1) in the early eighties. I’ve always loved it for certain types of image when it gave me great negs and great prints, but that wasn’t always so. It took me a while to understand how to use it properly as it needs to be used with its own special properties and quirks in mind.

With conventional films, quality suffers with overexposure if development is not reduced and this shows as harsh grain. the opposite is true of this film. White hair, white dresses, skies etc, all have a beautiful, smooth tonality, which will come as a pleasant surprise if you are used to seeing the bleached out highlights of a digital image. Portraits on XP2 also have a different look, the lighter tones of the image: the skin etc, display a very smooth tonality. The shadow areas, such as dark clothing will show the grain (with 35mm film), but this is not too much of a problem, in most prints you would have to look closely to see it. From a medium format negative it really wouldn’t be a problem.

So if over exposure produces better results, then XP2 is best over exposed. For instance; rated at 200 ISO. The important thing is to not alter the processing, let the lab treat the film as normal. Your negs will be a bit denser than usual, but this is an advantage. If you wish to check this for yourself, just shoot two frames of the same subject, one rated 400 and the next frame overexposed by one stop (i.e. rated 200). Make a print from each frame and compare, you will see an improvement in the one rated at 200.

I believe XP2 to be an exceptional film when used for many applications and always have some in my film bag for the times when I want that look.

Oh, and I almost forgot, -it is amazingly sharp.

11 Comments

Thomas Binsfeld

Posted 17/06/2014 at 6:42 pm | Permalink | Edit

Thank You for this, Andrew!
Normally I stick to the films I am used to and I never tried XP-2 because of the C41 process.
I am very concerned about the durability of my negatives and I have my doubts about that in case of XP-2. Or are my doubts for no reason?
Thomas

2. Paul Hillier

Posted 23/06/2014 at 6:47 am

I used XP1 when it first came out and then XP2 . They were great films and being able to process it in C41 was great for when I were traveling. We had a lot of our XP1 turn green over the years and appear to lose some of its density. I haven’t had access to this film for quite a few years now so I am not sure of its current state.

Another one of my favorite films was Kodak’s Panatomic X. This film was so sharp and great film.

Cheers Paul.

3. Keith

Posted 11/07/2014 at 3:37 pm

XP2 Super is a film that I never cared cared for personally, but I am glad that you like it, as it does have it’s fans. However, I am not one of them.

4. Mark Magin

Posted 16/07/2014 at 2:58 am

Recently found your site and am enjoying reading it. There is so much stuff out on the web to sift through a jewel such as this is easily missed. Hope you continue!

5. John Panya

Posted 02/08/2014 at 10:17 am

Thanks for your nice post.
I’ve used nearly every kinds of Ilford film that still be available in the market but XP-2. It’s the film I’ve never tried because of C41 process. And I thought there was no special thing I could get from it.

But I may be wrong.
The quality it create impress me.

Regards,
John

6. Thomas Binsfeld

Posted 07/08/2014 at 8:46 am

After returning from a 2 week holiday with a lot b/w films to develop in ID-11, I realized an other advantage of this film:
Just give it to your local photo shop and let it develop under perfect standard conditions and save time!
So I will try some for the next time.
Thomas

7. Mark Voce

Posted 26/08/2014 at 12:01 pm

Thank you for the interesting post Andy, I’ve never used XP2 and knew sod all about it. Sounds like it could have it’s uses though

8. JR Smith

Posted 29/08/2014 at 7:53 pm

Just stumbled across your site and found it very interesting! Nice job!

9. cr mayer

Posted 16/09/2014 at 3:44 am

I just discovered your blog. Very interesting stuff! Thanks for sharing your work.

10. Steve

Posted 19/09/2014 at 5:03 pm

Also never thought to try this. May pick some up and stuck it in my Contax G1 and see how it fares. Sounds like it’s best for hi(gher) key subjects/treatments?

11. Keith

Posted 07/10/2014 at 6:32 am

Hi Andrew, when will you write a review about the other Ilford B&W films?

Very soon I hope.

Thanks for your excellent articles.