Film Delving Into Fomapan 200

Location
Seattle
Name
Andrew
I just developed only the second roll of Fomapan 200 that I've shot, and I find it a very different film. Unique, and kind of hard to wrap my head around. It's well spoken of, and often out of stock, pointing to either higher demand, or more difficulty in manufacturing than Foma 100 and 400. I decided to snap up a 100' roll on Adorama, which hasn't arrived yet, but developing this roll has reminded me that it's not going to be the relative cakewalk that shooting Foma 100 is. Foma 200 is less easy to anticipate. Also not that easy to scan, at least using Silverfast. So I decided to create this thread to go into my observations using it, above and beyond what I'd want to post in the showcase thread for this film. Oh, and observations and recommendations are appreciated. I'd like to get the best out of this film, since I sort of committed myself to shooting around 18-20 rolls of the stuff...

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I'm thinking slight underexposure might suit this film well. The normal exposures above tended to produce pretty flat negatives, and one thing I noticed in scanning them was that the film really doesn't like any negative exposure adjustment being added during scanning. Shadows, which tend to look dark gray, get chunky with erratic blocks of black when trying to lower the exposure. However, Foma notes on their website that this film is suited by slightly unfavorable lighting conditions, so I'm thinking the shadows might look more pleasing if it's shot at 400 instead of 200. Foma suggests it can be shot at up to 800 speed without adjusting processing at all. I guess I'll have the chance to find out!

I've seen this film described as a mixture of traditional cubic as well as more modern tabular grain, which might be why the shadows act so oddly with negative compensation. Foma, rather unintelligibly, describes it thus: "properties of hexagonal core/shell tabular silver halide grains."
 
These are very nice. I have heard from another film shooter that he really liked Foma. I'm going to have to give it a go, that is if I get through these 20 some odd rolls of T Max, HP5 and what ever in the hell else I have in the fridge. I'm behind.
 
I really like Foma 100, this is way different stuff though. I have three hand-rolled rolls (the first two I may have scratched all up, we will see. I didn't fully grasp the orientation of the spindle + emulsion side + correct way to wind on the film, so I had to reroll them more times than I'm ready to admit to anyone) ready to go, and loaded one into the 500G to take some snapshots with. Hopefully more coming soon.
 
Well, I shot a couple rolls in the past couple weeks, and developed them yesterday. I am still shooting at 200, but developed these in Rodinal 1:25 instead of 1:50 for the last ones, with a bit more aggressive agitation (first full minute instead of 30 seconds, ten seconds a minute instead of 5). I like the look of these a little better, they have more contrast but are very sharp, and have good detail retention such that a few of these I really dialed down highlights or opened up shadows in post. The shadows ones are obvious because they take on a really grainy look, but I was surprised that I was able to at all. Highlights recover beautifully, better than Foma 100 I am thinking, which has a propensity for those highlights to burn a little.

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These were also the first couple rolls which I hand-loaded, which took an embarrassing amount of times to figure out which way the film needed to face and be wound... so the scratches were expected.
 
Shot another roll (on a rather beat-up Olympus XA with some light leaks due to completely disintegrated light seals), this one at ISO 400, developed in Rodinal 1:25 for 8 minutes. Same agitation pattern as the above post. This film pushes one stop without breaking a sweat, I think it could go another stop, and also 1:25 is an excellent recipe.

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Just put a roll of Foma 200 through my new-to-me K1000 with the 50mm f2. Shot at 400 and developed in Rodinal 1:25 for 7.5 minutes with the same agitation as the last roll. Again, I'm satisfied with the deeper contrast and tonal separation when using this method than the previous dilution. The soft contrast can work but I don't usually compose with the idea of soft contrast in mind. Maybe something to explore later on.

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A very unique bus that showed up in town...

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With a couple of dogs who did not take kindly to me stopping in front of their vehicle for photos...

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I drive by the following derelict buildings sometimes when I take a back road, so I decided to take some shots on the inaugural roll through this camera:

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And, lastly, the continuing joys of the building going on next door:

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A few more, this time through the Olympus XA. It doesn't always pick the shutter speeds I would like. These were shot around 200 speed, though I did bump the ISO rating up when inside dim interiors. I might nearly always push film through this camera when I want faster shutter speeds.

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Last one is cross-posted in the street thread, but let me say again, this little girl made me shiver!

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I broke out the Fomapan again for a weekend trip to Portland. This time shooting in the MX with the fantastic 1.7/50. Shot at 160, developed in Rodinal 1:25 for 5 min. It was a sunny day, which contributed to the high contrast. I think I like the looks of Foma 200 best when the light is less harsh. This is the fourth of four rolls I shot that day, 3 if which were this film, one of FP4. Others are waiting to be developed.

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I am fairly happy with how these turned out. Some of my issue with Fomapan has always been scanning it with Silverfast, which has some useful NegaFix profiles for some common films but not for Foma - it applies a tone curve which suits the film, or at least it tries to. If you scan with an improper tone curve, you will get blacks that are too high (grainy, muddy) or highlights that are too low (again appearing grainy). I have come to realize it's best left at default, then I click the autoexposure button and make slight adjustments to the histogram tool, most often consisting of moving the highlights and shadows a little to the right (it also often works to select a black point with the dropper tool using the outside of the film frame, but sometimes this makes things just a bit too black), and moving the midpoint to a visually pleasing balance. I like where it's at now. I scan in TIFF and make some slight adjustments, and apply sharpening, in LR.
 
Nice thread with some nice photos, Andrew.

I still have all my old darkroom equipment, including enlargers and developing trays, but I just can't be bothered with it.

Is Ultrafin still available? I preferred it to Rodinal, back in the day.
I just checked, and yes, Ultrafin is still available.

I found a succinct description that resonates with my remembered experience from about 60 years ago in this post:

Ultrafin results

"first rolls (neopan 400) developed in ULTRAFIN. first impression from seeing the negatives on lighttable (no prints yet) is that this developer is fantastic. the texture of the negatives looks great (the grain appearance, fine, tight), crisp with sharpness and acutance, very good tonality, though now i have a reference how to fine-tune my developing time/agitation/dilution."

Here:

Post in thread 'TETENAL ULTRAFIN questions.' TETENAL ULTRAFIN questions.
 
What filters have you tried using with your lenses and this film?
None, yet. I bought a pack of 10 rolls for €49.99 and shot and developed two.

I have filters coming. Yellow-Green, Skylight Filter (slight magenta cast I suppose?), Orange, Red R25A, Warming filter (slight yellow), and a blue 80B filter.
 
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