Hi, I plan to take some rolls of Kodak 3600 B&W (Plus X, i think it is) with me to paris to get some night shoots. I have an M3, and use a simple little gosen scout meter. Should I just meter at 3600, or should I set the meter to say, 800, and expect to "push" the film? I'm pretty new to high speed films and "pushing", so any advice is helpful. Phillip

-- Phillip Silitschanu (speedin_saab@hotmail.com), May 14, 2002

Answers

Hi Phillip,

I asked a lot of questions few weeks ago about this subject. I received very informative answers and I suggest you to look at them - Thanks

Arie

-- Arie (nhaziza@northrock.bm), May 14, 2002.

You're plannning on pushing Plus-X to 3600!!?? Unless I'm mistaken, that's an ASA 125 fine-grained film and not the best choice for that much pushing.

BTW, pushing is the technique where you intentionally underexpose the film and then compensate by overdevelopment or an alternate development methodology from typical. If you're planning to push Tri- X to 1600, you load the Tri-X, set the meter to 1600, and shoot away. Then you develop the film according to the film/development charts for exposure at EI 1600.

Skip

-- Skip Williams (skipwilliams@pobox.com), May 14, 2002.

I would suggest using Kodak TMZ Tmax 3200 film, and setting your meter at 1600. I would also suggest processing the film over there. Traveling through airports with 3200 speed film is dicey. Doing it twice, especially in Europe, with exposed film, is a risk I would not take. Either process it there or Fedex it back home.

-- Kent Phelan (kent@phelan.org), May 14, 2002.

Kent has given a good answer, Tmax 3200 is actually set for 1000Asa but it is much better and easier to use at 1600Asa.

Don't forget to tag a 1600 box on the cartridge when it is developped.

Pushing a film is okay when you cannot do otherwise. Beside, pushed films are expensive (in Paris, my home) to develop. If you like to push the matter further, Ilford HP5 can support 800 or 1600 (Yikes for the results..)

Ilford 3200 is pretty good too, you should try one.

Cheers. X.

-- Xavier d'Alfort (hot_billexf@hotmail.com), May 14, 2002.

I use the Kodak Tmax 3200 while travelling around Europe (i'm from Spain), but always metering and processing at 1600. I think that's it's optimal performance, and i think it's the best for B&W. I shot indoors AND outdoors with it (it gives me an extraordinary depth of field) just because i find amazing it's latitude (you could nearly forget metering) and i love both the quality and quantity of it's grain. Take the film with you at the airports and show it to the guards avoiding x-ray. They usually know the film.

-- Jaime Font (jaifo@airtel.net), May 16, 2002.

If you only have a few rolls, stick them in your pocket when going through the metal detector - they do not set it off, thus you avoid the x-ray issue

-- Anam Alpenia (aalpenia@dasar.com), May 20, 2002.