Fine Grain 400

[mdenton]

Opinions requested on which film gives the finest grain :

Ilford Delta 400
Ilford XP2
Kodak BW400CN

[Helen Bach]

Dye-image (chromogenic) and silver-image films have different characteristics to their graininess, so it's difficult to draw firm conclusions, especially when the film is scanned and digitally post-processed. The scanning itself affects the appearance of the graininess - as well as the characteristics of the scanner, scanning a silver-image film at higher resolutions (eg 5400 to 8000 spi) can make it look less grainy than when it is scanned at lower resolutions.

My simple answer would be that the BW400CN has a slight edge over the others, if low graininess is the sole criterion.

Using noise reduction software with dye-image films can result in an almost grain-free image - for example I use Portra 800 as my general purpose colour/B&W film, and if you give it plenty of exposure (EI 200 or 400) it has very low graininess even without noise reduction software. That's one of the characteristics of dye-image film: the graininess tends to reduce as the film gets more exposure. Being a colour film, it also enables you to make subtle (or not-so-subtle) changes to the way in which colours are changed to monochrome.

I'd recommend trying a little of each, and finding out how they compare after scanning and printing with your system.

Best,
Helen

[keithwms]

If scanning then the chromogenics win. Xp2 will have significantly better sharpness than bw400CN and similar "grain". I found bw400CN to be smooth.. but I also wasn't impressed with the edge definition.

One thing to bear in mind, the true speed of the xp2 is not 400. I mean, most people are rating it at 320 or slower. So... if this were meant to be a competition between semifast 400 speed films, then it's not really a fair competition. I mean, once you get down to the low 300s then you're only a stop away from finer delta and t-grain territory.

I'll throw one other film into the mix: agfa scala.

I agree with Helen's comments on portra; I recently used a comparable film, ISO 800 fuji pro z rated at 1600 and pushed to 3200 and got a rather smooth image in very low light- the exposure was ~1/15 sec at f/1.9....

http://i25.photobucket.com/albums/c7...ttedcat004.jpg

This is with no noise reduction. But this was 645 format, bear that in mind. Everything I said above is based on medium format observations.

[Greg_E]

Exposed via pinhole, I found Kodak 400BW very similar to XP2, both rated at around 320, and a couple of frames even more exposed. I'm not a fan of either from the grain produced with a pinhole camera. If I ever get myself going I have some Efke 25 and Efke 50 (120 format) that I'll try with both pinhole and lenses, and have it developed at DR5 for a positive image.

Moving my pinhole over to my extension tubes and a body cap for some testing. Need to cut a couple more body caps to make switching diameters easier. Still looking for the right size pinhole for me, tried the math, now I'm down to just trying different holes to see how it affects the image.

[keithwms]

Greg, just a few stray thoughts on pinhole, feel free to disregard ....

I think chromogenics and pan films may not be an optimal choice for pinhole systems, which are extremely non-apochromatic. I think you will find that films with narrower sensitivity region (e.g. ortho films) give better sharpness. You know this already.

Also, on the matter of grain and pinhole: the pinhole shots I've done were contact printed. So the grain was a non-issue, even pushed hp5+ or whatever. But I allege that the boosted, traditional edge contraste helped support the idea of more depth of field. I realize that you may want grain, that is your prerogative, but I would add that c41 films likely will not have the edge contrast plus pleasing grain that you [may] want.

With any film I think there is a balance of detail and grain / dye texture. A person may want more of one than the other. Pinhole is kinda the extreme end of things in which you can vague / not-too-prominent detail but substantial grain relative to the amount of detail. What I am saying, and which you already know, is that one may want a traditional-grained film as opposed to chromogenics or t-/delta- grained films, and for more than one reason.

[sanking]

A couple of other issues that could impact the appearance of grain in these three films.

Grain in the Delta 400 film could be decreased quite a bit if you were to develop the film in a staining type developer. This results in a large percentage of silver density, which is the cause of the grain, being replaced with dye stain.

Also, whether you scan in RGB or B&W might impact grain. Even though these are all B&W films I would recommend scanning in RGB and then looking at grain in the three channels. You may be able to use blur on one of the channels to minimize grain, and there are many controls available in CS3 when you convert to B&W that can be used to reduce grain.

Finally, fluid mounting, other things being equal, can result in considerable improvement in the appearance of grain. This tends to matter a lot more with scanners capable of very high "effective" resolution than with less capable equipment, but as a general rule fluid mounting is useful for reducing grain even with consumer type scanners.

Sandy King

[Greg_E]

I have not tried fluid mount with either of those films yet.

[mdenton]

Thanks for all the responses. I now intend to try all three to see which gives the 'best' results for my taste.

[Don Bryant]

Opinions requested on which film gives the finest grain :

Ilford Delta 400
Ilford XP2
Kodak BW400CN

Since you asked. I like all three but my fav of the three is Ilford Delta 400. However, I would take a strong look at Kodak TMY-2 processed in TMAX-RS at 1:7 or 1:9.

Don Bryant

[Donsta]

Opinions requested on which film gives the finest grain :

Ilford Delta 400
Ilford XP2
Kodak BW400CN

There are a lot of good points made in this thread...

The chromogenic films need to be very overexposed to give decent shadow results - shoot either at EI 400 and the shadows will be very grainy. Shoot them at 200 and they'll look pretty good. For me, the big advantage to chromogenic films is the ability to scan them and utilize Digital ICE dust removal with desktop scanner.

If you want real box speed, I am of the opinion that the new Kodak Tmax 400 (TMY-2) cannot be beaten - extremely fine grain for 400 speed film and very sharp. Drop me an email to donaldhuttonATbellsouthDOTnet and I will be happy to email you some high rez scans of this film developed in TMax developer.