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I need to start learning that when it comes to black and white developers, all of this has happened before, all of this will happen again. Take, for example, Rollei Low-Speed, RLS is a modern rebranding of LP-CUBE XS. There’s very little information about both developers online outside of official documentation. But it also has some interesting notes and is the first time using a film described as a deep layer developer. But the one thing I am familiar with is a developer that works best at speed less than the box. In fact, the amount of reduction in film speed is what I sawRead More →

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When it comes to colour films, I’m picky about which ones I shoot. I’m the first to admit I wouldn’t say I like working with colour film as I have a digital camera that gives me consistent colour images with little work on my part. The biggest problem is getting the colours right from my scans as I don’t use specialised software like Negative Lab Pro. When it comes to medium format, I am reliant on my Epson V700; the Nikon Coolscan V ED makes life easier. So it comes as no surprise that when I learned of the discontinuation of Fujicolor Pro 400H thatRead More →

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When it comes to the name Velvia, most photographers will often latch onto the cult classic Fuji Velvia or its modern form, Velvia 50. But Fuji also released a one-stop faster version, Velvia 100 or 100F, which offers everything you like about Velvia 50 but in a slightly faster form. While I’ve shot plenty of slide films, Velvia 100 is one that I have far less experience with; again, I’m more likely to shoot Provia, Ektachrome, or Astia (RIP) when shooting a 100-Speed slide film. But Velvia 100 is an interesting animal and one that I’m not likely to shoot again. So I wasn’t tooRead More →

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I’ll admit, I have a soft spot for manual focus Minolta cameras. And the Minolta lineup is a unique cross-section of camera technology through the post-war 20th Century. All my early experience with photography came in various Minolta cameras, from my family’s Riva Zoom to my first personal camera, the Hi-Matic 7s and the first SLRs in the SR-T 102 X-7a. More recently, the XE-7 has been my Minolta SR-Mount of choice. But the XE-7 lead me down the rabbit hole of the 1970s of Minolta’s technology-sharing agreement with Ernst Leitz because, of course, there was something better. And that something better is the MinoltaRead More →

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When I first decided to review Rollei Low Contrast developer (RLC), I doubted my choice. The list of available films remained short and some I could not find to purchase for the review. And most of the films on the list were technical films, which don’t always suit my photography. But I went ahead anyway after coming up with a decent list and getting my hands on a roll of Kodak Technical Pan and seeing the results from my good friend John Meadows. RLC is a strong developer if you have a contrasty film, fine-grained, and super sharp because the developer will make sure youRead More →

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When it comes to slide film, Fuji Sensia introduced me to the medium, but it was Astia that made me love slide film. Sitting neatly in the worlds of Velvia 100 and Provia 100, Astia is often an overlooked member of the Fujichrome family, with more people going towards Velvia for rich saturated colours or Provia for a more natural tonality. But Astia was a happy medium between the two; you get a stronger contrast than Provia and more natural colours than Velvia. Astia quickly became my go-to slide film for trips and events where I wanted the magic of slide film with a bitRead More →

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While Fuji Velvia was not my first experience with slide film, it is certainly is the one that made me like slide film. First released in 1990, the film became an immediate threat to Kodachrome, especially Kodachrome 25. And unlike Kodachrome, Velvia used the standard E-6 process that could be done in any lab that covered the process. No need to send it to speciality labs, and you could have your slides back the same day from the right lab. The name itself comes from combining Velvet and Media to describe the smooth images produced by the stock. While the original version was discontinued inRead More →

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I always seem to want to come back for more. One of my first experiences with a Soviet camera was a Smena 8m, this was a gift from my good friend Michael Raso, and the camera was interesting, to say the least. There wasn’t anything bad with it; it was pretty unique and produced excellent images. It was hard to work with, too much to do, too fickle, and I wasn’t getting to know the camera well enough. So I passed it onto another photographer who went on to use the camera to produce awesome results. There wasn’t anything wrong with the 8m; I thinkRead More →

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When you read the datasheet for Adox Silvermax Developer, you almost can think that this is the secret cypher key to unlock the best possible results when using Adox Silvermax film as the developer is used to unlock a secret silver reserve in Silvermax films and use it to the best photographic potential. Now I’m no language expert, especially German, but I feel that something got lost in translation. (Checks translation), okay, dormant reserves. Either way, this developer is best used with Silvermax films, as it couples with the specialised sensitiser used in that film’s production. But don’t let that stop you as the developerRead More →

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I have known about Adox HR-50 for some time but have purposefully avoided including it in past years. Originally released in 2018, HR-50 was one of the new film emulsions to come out of Adox shortly after releasing CHS 100 II (reviewed last month). The reason being that HR-50 is a semi-closed imaging system and I never had good luck with those, as seen by my Adox CMS20 II review. I caught a lot of flack for that one. There is also the trouble with getting the stuff here in Canada. But when I saw that both the film and the dedicated developer, Adox HR-DEVRead More →