kinda grainy black and white prints

[zguy]

i love Trix-400 for its grains so i thought your 1st 2 shots are good and the grain look fine. did you notice yr 3rd and 4th shots have a lot of sky? these kind of shots will appear to be grainy and patchy when printed.

How about trying a roll of fine grain film like the TMAX 100?

 

[heshanj]

yes i did notice that.. the sky and water was especially grainy.. and i was wondering if that is the way with tri-x 400 film.. so i guess if i want a smoother look for water/sky etc, i need to try another type of film? i have a tmax 100 and some fuji neopan acros that im gonna try next.. i actualy dont mind the grain on some shots, like the first two.. but if some shots are gonna look as bad as my 3rd/4th shots, well i need a finer film i'll keep trying n see wat works best for me. thanks

 

[GSiGuy]

This thread has got me thinking why my iso400 film can seem really grainy too... This picture was taken on Fuji Neopan 400 and because of the bright background and multi-segment metering at the time, i fired off the in-camera flash. Now i find the faces very grainy and i don't know why. It seems to happen when there is a high contrast with background. Faces tend to be grainy...

any idea why?

 

[kgston]

This thread has got me thinking why my iso400 film can seem really grainy too... This picture was taken on Fuji Neopan 400 and because of the bright background and multi-segment metering at the time, i fired off the in-camera flash. Now i find the faces very grainy and i don't know why. It seems to happen when there is a high contrast with background. Faces tend to be grainy...
any idea why?

That is not grain. Its a mix of noise and sharpening/JPEG artefacts. Looks like someone save it at compression level 3 or smth.. and Neopan is probably one of the finest iso 400 film on the market..

 

[raytoei]

ehhh.... boh lah...neopan is more grainy than tri-x.

the higher the iso film, the more the grain.

so for example, tri-x at iso 200 and plus-x pushed to 200. which has more grain ?
answer is tri-x pulled to 200. why ? the reason is that the film is more grainy than plus-x.

to confuse everyone further, less light = grain. saturated light = grain. wrong developer = grain.

for developer effect: http://retro.ms11.net/film.jpg

sometimes, a grainy film like neopan + d76 = very sharp grains.

or less sharp = less grain, eg. microdol-x developer, see http://retro.ms11.net/lisaswing.jpg

an example, see http://retro2.ms11.net/self.jpg

less light = grain, example is pushing, concept of pushing is to reduce light but compensate in development.

saturated light, see this example, http://retro2.ms11.net/oversat.jpg the negative was a dense black, ie. image was white,
to salvage it i had to adjust the curves to see anything, the result is very grainy.

raytoei

 

[GSiGuy]

Soooo... if a developer's methods makes a difference, would anyone know a developer who is good at developing and/or scanning film with less noise/grain/artefacts?

 

[kgston]

ehhh.... boh lah...neopan is more grainy than tri-x.

Haha.. which is finer is really debatable. It highly depends on the developer also. Of cos, whatever I say is just my personal experience.

Soooo... if a developer's methods makes a difference, would anyone know a developer who is good at developing and/or scanning film with less noise/grain/artefacts?

Well, if you want fine grain, use a fine grain developer like DD-X, Perceptol, Microdol-X, Microfine, etc etc.. The easiest and cheapest to get and use is DD-X.. But compared to the G.P. developers, it is still more expensive.

 

[JasonB]

I had always know Neopan as a finer grain film than Tri x, if you are getting a grain explosion with Neopan it could mean a few things, poor/underexposure or excessive/unnecessary pushing.

ehhh.... boh lah...neopan is more grainy than tri-x.

the higher the iso film, the more the grain.

so for example, tri-x at iso 200 and plus-x pushed to 200. which has more grain ?
answer is tri-x pulled to 200. why ? the reason is that the film is more grainy than plus-x.

to confuse everyone further, less light = grain. saturated light = grain. wrong developer = grain.

for developer effect: http://retro.ms11.net/film.jpg

sometimes, a grainy film like neopan + d76 = very sharp grains.

or less sharp = less grain, eg. microdol-x developer, see http://retro.ms11.net/lisaswing.jpg

an example, see http://retro2.ms11.net/self.jpg

less light = grain, example is pushing, concept of pushing is to reduce light but compensate in development.

saturated light, see this example, http://retro2.ms11.net/oversat.jpg the negative was a dense black, ie. image was white,
to salvage it i had to adjust the curves to see anything, the result is very grainy.

raytoei

 

[GSiGuy]

Well, if you want fine grain, use a fine grain developer like DD-X, Perceptol, Microdol-X, Microfine, etc etc.. The easiest and cheapest to get and use is DD-X.. But compared to the G.P. developers, it is still more expensive.

Unfortunately i don't develop my own film. I doubt i ever will as i lack the time. Was wondering if someone can recommend a shop which develops film well and therefore minimise this grain

would it also be correct to say that if i print the picture straight from the developed negative it should show less grain?

Sorry about the noob questions. These are my 1st 2 rolls of B&W...

 

[heshanj]

another point i just remembered. the box of my Tri-X looked a bit battered, old.. and i didnt check the expiry date. im wondering if it couldve been from an old batch of tri-x, and maybe long expired.. could this have caused my photos to look like they did?

 

[raytoei]

heshanj:

i think you nailed it. for expired film, i tend to rate it lower than the box speed. perhaps this explains the "underexposed" look ?

raytoei

 

[heshanj]

heshanj:

i think you nailed it. for expired film, i tend to rate it lower than the box speed. perhaps this explains the "underexposed" look ?

raytoei

i see. yes, that would certainly explain it. i just got a couple of new lenses, so i will test em with some c-41, so i can compare the lenses with my old lenses and my last successful prints, with Superia X-Tra 400 after that, im gonna try out some of my neopan acros n hopefully it'll have a much finer result!

 

[losheng]

Well, just came across this thread so I wonder if you have got the problem identified. Honestly, it's going to be hard to debug a film issue over the internet, because there are so many layers between the raw film and the screen - the quality of the print, the quality of the scan, the quality of the compression, and the quality of the display.

On the other hand, it might also be a question of expectation - b/w films tend to be more grainy, well, because it has grains. Colors negs have the silver converted to dyes. So a color neg don't look like a b/w neg in terms of grains - but it has clouds of dyes. Also, unlike digitals, ISO400 is considered a high speed film, and is expected to be grainier. In the film days, a normal speed film is one that's ISO 100, one that might seemed unusable in the days where most people carry zooms that are very slow, which is not a problem with digital sensors; and a fine grain film typically has ISO 25 or 50. So the Acros will definitely show up with finer grains.

Grain size is also affected by the film developer, and temperature at which the development takes place.

So, it will take a while for you to find the ideal combination of film, developer and development time to get the look you like. But that's part of the fun. And if you really want to do know if the film was properly developed, the only way is to show it to people who are experienced with film processing.

Have fun!

 

[heshanj]

thanks for ur reply. im pretty sure that the tri-x i used was expired. and like u said, its a high speed b/w film, and hence the grain is almost normal. however, it wasnt just the grain that i didnt like, it was the way the entire thing looked. like.. it was like black and white, with no tones in between, in some parts. too contrasty? i dont know. anyway, i tried a few rolls of fuji neopan 100, and they came out beautifully. much better. im gonna try out tri-x again, and ive got some t-max as well. i agree 100% about experimenting being a lot of fun. and ive not even started developign my own film yet, which is gonna add to the fun. and im not sure wat developers my lab uses, so i cant say if that played a part in the unsatisfactory results of my tri-x. thanks again for the reply