 Joel Black-Beatty |
Black and White film and the Lab. I've been shooting a lot of colour slide film, because I don't develop my own film and I've been told that the lab can mess around with the colours if you shoot colour print film. It also helps me learn a lot about exposure. Anyway, I'm now interested in black and white, and I was wondering if there can be similar problems with the lab developing black and whilte. Clearly they can make choices of paper for printing, etc... but can they overexpose or alter my negatives and mess them up? What would be my best option to avoid the lab causing problems with my photos? Would anyone recomend Scala (does it give good prints from slides?)? Are there other ways to get consistancy in developing and processing without using Scala? Thanks,
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Jon Close |
In the broadest sense, developing the negatives for B&W film and color print film is the same as for slides. There is a proscribed chemical process and you'll get them back just as you exposed them without any technician influence. Making prints from the negatives is where subjective judgements are generally made (choice of paper, contrast filters, how dark/light to print, color balance, etc). While the developing chemicals for E-6 (slides) and C-41 (color negatives) is fairly standard, there is a wider choice of developing chemicals with B&W film (eg. Agfa Rodinal, Kodak D-19, D-76, HC-110, T-Max, etc.) that can produce different effects on your negatives so that many B&W photographers prefer to do it themselves. Unless you use a custom lab and specify exactly what you want done, your B&W film will be developed in the most common solution (probably D-76 or T-Max) and will be fine. I don't know enough about Agfa's Scala B&W slide film to comment.
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John A. Lind |
About Agfa Scala 200X: I use Scala, although not nearly as much as color transparency. Your question reminds me I still have two rolls of it in the refrigerator that I've been reserving for a project that's been "on hold" to work on other subjects and I need to use them; i.e. quit delaying the project. Scala 200X It is an excellent, general purpose B&W film. Granularity is very nearly as fine as the ISO 100 E-6 color chromes. Tonal gradation in the mid-tones is excellent and contrast is moderate (not high and not low) . . . it's not "muddy" in the mid-tones. It has a slightly wider latitude (compared to Ektachrome or Kodachrome), however it's not as wide as most B&W negative. Use B&W filters with it as you would any other general purpose B&W negative film. The one downside is developing. It requires a developing chemistry and process unique to Scala 200X and Agfa certifies labs to perform the developing. In the U.S., only three labs are certified for it. Chances are you will have to do the developing by mail . . . unless you just happen to live close to one of these labs. You can get their names, addresses and telephone numbers from Agfa's web site. B&H Photo Video carries pre-paid mailers for the lab in Florida. I buy the film and the mailers at the same time from them. I've been very pleased with the Scala slides. BTW, I've had a couple printed on Ilfochrome by a lab in Texas that did a superb job of keeping the Ifochrome a neutral gray (Ilfochrome is a color reversal print material). They have a very subtle silvery look to them and are quite unique looking. -- John
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