Digital BW, The Print

Anthony,

>Kodak Portra 400BW ... chromogenic black-and-white ... C-41
>color negative film, ... still has the orange mask ...

Have you compared scans with the non-masked version, Kodak's T400CN?  I've
been of the impression that the orange mask, while good for color printing,
is not helpful in B&W scanning.

>... when you scan it, you scan it as color film, ...
>You have to do it this way to drop the orange mask ...

I use T400CN and find, as with all B&W films, I prefer to scan as a
grayscale positive on my Nikon 8000.  The g/s files are smaller, and the
"positive" setting makes it easier to use the histogram and capture the full
information of the film.  Too often the "negative" scans seem to clip or
unduly compress the ends of the curve.

> ...
> 2. It has astonishingly fine grain, comparable to ISO 100 B&W films.

The grain in the shadows can be as bad as a 400 ISO silver film.  The
chromogenic films mask their grain with overlapping dye clouds.  This works
better in the highlights than the shadows, which might not have enough dye
to hide the grain.

I usually have T400CN in my Fuji 6456 Zi, which acts as my "snapshot"
camera.  (Tech Pan is in the Bronica RF 645.)  When I find I want a
finer-grained landscape and only have the Zi, I put it on a tripod and
"multi-sample" the scene.  Just like in scanning, the random grain/noise
averages out and virtually disappears.

>4. The resolution is extraordinarily high for such a fast film.

A hand held T400CN Zi shot printed to 16x20 is considered by some to be one
of my best shots.  MF, 645 T400CN (or Portra, I'm sure) can do very good
16x20 prints, but that is all the further I enlarge that film.


Paul
www.PaulRoark.com 

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