Grainy prints with ISO 800 (Page 3): It has been a long time so my memory be at fault, but was not film speed proportional to grain size. That is, the larger the grain size the less...

John_F Loc: Minneapolis, MN

It has been a long time so my memory be at fault, but was not film speed proportional to grain size. That is, the larger the grain size the less light was needed to give the desired density.

Blenheim Orange wrote:

Welcome aboard. Don't be a stranger.

It has been a long time since I worked with film, but my experience was that 800 ISO film is just going to be grainy.

Mike

htbrown Loc: San Francisco Bay Area

Burgee wrote:

Hi! This is first attempt at asking a question. I just bought a Nikon f5 and I love everything about it except my first roll of ISO 800 is very grainy. What did I do wrong. Need substance critique please.

The higher the ISO, the bigger the grains of silver in the emulsion. That's physics.

rmalarz Loc: Tempe, Arizona

Congratulations on getting a great camera. ISO 800 is going to be grainy. It’s part of the wonderful beauty of hi ISO film.
—Bob

Burgee wrote:

Hi! This is first attempt at asking a question. I just bought a Nikon f5 and I love everything about it except my first roll of ISO 800 is very grainy. What did I do wrong. Need substance critique please.

burkphoto Loc: High Point, NC

via the lens wrote:

FYI, per the "experts" on the saying above, "Expose for... ." Not "experts" on this site. For digital, which is more similar to slides, the saying should be, "Expose for the highlights, develop for the shadows." So, for digital it is opposite of film and the same as slides.

JPEGs and transparencies are as you say.

Raw files and color negatives benefit from a different approach.

selmslie Loc: Fernandina Beach, FL, USA

Burgee wrote:

Hi! This is first attempt at asking a question. I just bought a Nikon f5 and I love everything about it except my first roll of ISO 800 is very grainy. What did I do wrong. Need substance critique please.

Ilford and Kodak still offer ISO 3200 B&W film in 135 size. Delta also offers theirs in 120 rolls.

Take a look at Delta 3200 medium format where I exposed at ISO 1600 and developed in Xtol.

I then filtered the image using Neat Image. You can get similar results with the smaller format and with grainy color film.

rehess Loc: South Bend, Indiana, USA

selmslie wrote:

Ilford and Kodak still offer ISO 3200 B&W film in 135 size. Delta also offers theirs in 120 rolls.

Take a look at Delta 3200 medium format where I exposed at ISO 1600 and developed in Xtol.

I then filtered the image using Neat Image. You can get similar results with the smaller format and with grainy color film.

I used FujiColor 1600 at a wedding once in my second camera.That turned out to be very grainy.

Ken Owen Loc: mid-Michigan

Ralf, I believe the slow speed black and white you are referring to was ADOX KB-14 which had an ISO speed of 25. It is still available in the USA from Freestyle Photo, along with a host of other BW films in their stock.