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I’ve been nerding out on b&w film over the last two years mostly processing in Xtol and Rodinal and these are my brief thoughts on some of the films out there.
Kentmere 100/400, FP4/HP5 - baseline films. Push and pull just fine. You just get larger apparent grain with the Kentmere film and not quite the insane latitude. TriX behaves exactly as HP5 as far as I can tell.
Ilford Pan 100 - A smidge more contrast than the above. Therefore a little less suitable to push (I still shoot it at EI 200 all the time but wouldn’t go further). Poor man’s FP4.
Pan F 50 - A bit slower than box. A bit more contrast again and just kinda beautiful. Process straight after shooting essential.
Adox HR-50 - High detail. Low lattitude. High contrast. A bit of red sensitivity built-in but looks good with a yellow filter too (requires a bit more care shooting and processing than the films above). Thin negs are best. Clear base. Benefits from a prewash. Easy to scan. Cheap.
Rollei Retro 400 - very similar characteristics to HR-50 (and nothing like other ‘400’ speed films such as HP5 or TriX). Some grain. Moody shot at 400. Benefits from a prewash. Very cheap.
Tmax 100 - very, very fine grain. High detail. Pretty high contrast. Red sensitive (which I really don’t like for portraits but is good for landscapes). Needs lots of fixing and washing. For some reason is like it in 120 but in 35mm I’m not sure maybe I need to hone my times for Xtol for this to get the tonality I see others get. It’s also really expensive in 35mm.
Tmax 3200 and Ilford Delta 3200. I’ve not shot enough to say anything other than … I liked both best @EI 1000 and it didn’t look any better than HP5. Mad grain.
Foma 400 … I have 61 metres of this in my fridge but haven’t shot any yet.
Sorry for the long effortpost.
miro_o-
helpful post, I did most of this and landed on HP5 as my fav, the latitude is crazy can shoot from 100 all the way to 3200.
i do shoot FP4 if its bright.
Always found Tri-X to have slightly worse latitude and more grain than HP5.
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Thanks for sharing your findings!
Can't comment on the Ilford Pan, Adox and Rollei films as I haven't shot them really, but agree with all you said in regards to the T-Max films and FP4/HP5.
Reading all this takes me back and makes me question why I gave away all my b&w developement stuff 🤷♂️
amey
salad
I am by no means a black & white specialist (probably 80% of the film I shot in my life was colour negative - used to do more b&w though, at uni, and in the following years, when I was still tank-developing at home, which I pretty much stopped doing 5+ years ago).
That being said I gotta say I did learn to appreciate the different brands / films - the different looks they had respectively.
I've always found Ilford to be a bit "brutal" / "gritty" ..in a good way 🙂
And Kodak (especially Tri-X) being more "gentle" / a bit more "elegant" in comparison.
Fuji (Neopan & Acros) were also super nice, although they never really suited the stuff I personally shot. In retrospect I regret not shooting them more though, especially Acros.
Regarding cost I honestly don't care nowadays whether it's a few bucks more or less (per roll of film), I kinda always add it all up (film, dev, scans, maybe prints) and divide by 36 - then, at a cost-per-image basis it doesn't make a big difference.
So I pay for the more expensive film if I know I'd really like that particular "look" - it's worth it 👍