Recommendations for film during wedding shoot?


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alvin

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Hi!
I have been using Press 800 or Fuji 800 Xtra for quite a few wedding dinners, and was thinking about trying another kind of film. Do you guys have any suggestions what other types of film that may be suitable?

Thanks!

Alvin
 

Fuji NPH400 is often used for weddings, but depending on your lens and whether you are using flash it may not be fast enough to shoot indoors with. It looks good pushed one stop, but be prepared for a slight yellow shift if pushed (correctable to an extent in printing).

Its much less contrasty than Press 800, which some people like, and has a somewhat desaturated look. The low contrast means it can hold texture detail in both white and black in the same shot (this is the real strength of this film), but one must be careful when printing it. Increasing density when printing NPH400 will make it look more saturated but also wipe out all that extra detail in the shadows and highlights.

I find Press 800 can have problems with very saturated reds (deep red becomes really intense, almost blood red).
 

Hi all!
Well I got the hint to use press800 from CS, but it won't hurt to experiment. Scarly there is a kind of film that has qualities I would like even more!

espn: Heheh thanks but I personally prefer another brand for b&w ;P tmax a bit too smooth for my tastes. But you did give me an idea, perhaps I'll try it at another wedding.

LKSC: Thanks! I will try it out. I have a 28-70/2.8 and 70-210/4 and flash, hopefully this combo will work out with NPH 400. I have no issues with press 800, I really enjoy the color saturation =)

Thanks alot! Looking forward to hearing other recommendations!

Alvin
 

If Tmax's too smooth, try Tri-X or HP-5. Both have the sort of gritty reportage feel. :D
 

Alvin

If you are going to shoot indoors with flash, then unless you need great depth of field, there's no reason not to use ISO100 films like Reala - incredibly fine grained and beautiful saturation.

NPH400 will work great with flash indoors.

I find wedding banquet halls are usually very brightly lit, especially on stage. You might want to try shooting some available light w/o flash - much more natural. Press800 should be fast enough for this.
 

justarius said:
If Tmax's too smooth, try Tri-X or HP-5. Both have the sort of gritty reportage feel. :D

Hmmm never tried either :( I like the grain from ilford's iso 400 film, but I'm not sure of the exact name though... just see label 400 buy =)

Alvin
 

LKSC said:
Alvin

If you are going to shoot indoors with flash, then unless you need great depth of field, there's no reason not to use ISO100 films like Reala - incredibly fine grained and beautiful saturation.

NPH400 will work great with flash indoors.

I find wedding banquet halls are usually very brightly lit, especially on stage. You might want to try shooting some available light w/o flash - much more natural. Press800 should be fast enough for this.

Thanks for your recommendations. I will try both reala 100 and nph at this upcoming event!

Slightly off topic, I recently took photos, portrait shots and group shots with both NPS160 and Reala 100, but I am not seeing the difference between them. 4R prints. What should I look out for?

Thanks!

Alvin
 

alvin said:
espn: Heheh thanks but I personally prefer another brand for b&w ;P tmax a bit too smooth for my tastes. But you did give me an idea, perhaps I'll try it at another wedding.

Tri-x? Maybe I should give it a go ;) Can I tag along with you on your next wedding shoot? :)
 

justarius said:
If Tmax's too smooth, try Tri-X or HP-5. Both have the sort of gritty reportage feel. :D

I would go for Tri-X rather than Tmax. Tri-X has much better latitude (+/- 2 stops) than Tmax. If you use Tmax your exposure needs to be spot on, and that may be difficult at a wedding where you don't have luxury to meter all the time.
 

Alvin

Reala and NPS160 are very similar, but NPS has less contrast and is slightly less saturated. The lower contrast of NPS means it will have less chance of blowing out highlights in extreme lighting conditions. If you shoot a white dress in bright sunlight, or a black shirt in bright sunlight, NPS will hold texture details of the fabric a little better.

You may not be seeing the difference between them because of the way the lab is printing - for a meaningful comparison, ask the lab to print both with no corrections/adjustment. When printed on a Fuji Frontier the back of the photo should read "NNN".

Often labs dont know how to handle low contrast films like NPS and NPH400. Unless you instruct them, their oprators will tend to "normalise" the image by increasing density and boosting colours because they think everything should look very saturated, like Superia. Nothing wrong with that, if thats the look you want, but thats not how NPS and NPH were meant to be used.
 

melvinfoo said:
how about NPZ 800? i saw a lot of wedding photog use NPH and NPZ.. result pretty impressive too. but the printer really need to know how to bring out the colours..

NPZ800 is also a low-contrast film, a sort of high speed version of NPH400. Unfortunately Fuji does not sell it here. :(
 

pipefish said:
I would go for Tri-X rather than Tmax. Tri-X has much better latitude (+/- 2 stops) than Tmax. If you use Tmax your exposure needs to be spot on, and that may be difficult at a wedding where you don't have luxury to meter all the time.
Never had that problem on a F80 ;) but thanks for the point out, didn't realise that :)
 

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