Orwo NC500 35mm test - by Mark Wiggins - YouTube clip

[Stephen Perera]

Hi all, came across this. I hope Mark is around and he can share more interesting facts etc

 

 

Edited April 22 by Stephen Perera

[Stephen Perera]

https://www.orwo.shop/products/orwo-nc500-colour-cine-35mm

 

After 50 years, Orwo has finally returned with a colour cine stock to take your productions to the next realm of adventure.

Proudly still produced in Bitterfeld-Wolfen on the original site where film manufacture has been a tradition since 1910, our new NC500 Colour Cine stock allows for DOPs, Directors and Post-Productionist alike to create a versatile range of looks and provide a clear blank canvas for anyone to build any story upon. 

With a lack of Remjet layer, you can now also rely on any form of processing, whether it be ECN2 or C41 making your productions faster, reliable and greener!

We are not trying to imitate current stocks available on the market, we are creating an alternative, something with different characteristics and a different palette.

Additional Information
Film Type: Colour Negative Film
Development: ECN2 & C41
ASA: 400
Reel Lengths: 100ft & 400ft

Edited April 22 by Stephen Perera

[Joerg Polzfusz]

Great clip!

Funny side note: According to various sources, the final coating of the film isn’t done by Filmotec in Wolfen, but by InovisCoat in Monheim. Hence it’s more an „OrMo“ than an „OrWo“. But of course, this doesn’t such a good selling point… 😉

[Stephen Perera]

8 minutes ago, Joerg Polzfusz said:

Great clip!

Funny side note: According to various sources, the final coating of the film isn’t done by Filmotec in Wolfen, but by InovisCoat in Monheim. Hence it’s more an „OrMo“ than an „OrWo“. But of course, this doesn’t such a good selling point… 😉

interesting! anyway I don't know if Mark Wiggins is in this forum...would be great to have him come on.
As for price (in 16mm) it's ball park Vision3 500T so....but the texture looks great in that clip he posted

[Giray Izcan]

I just checked the price and it says 1321 dollars for 1000ft 35mm.. you could be shooting Kodak 65mm for that price. Otherwise, I like the look of it.

[Jon O'Brien]

I think it looks very nice. Would look fantastic also for 2 perf 35mm. Warm, earthy, with a slight grittiness and edge. Arty.

[Tyler Purcell]

We've done lots of testing with NC500 and so has a few of my friends with the same results. We've had ultra long discussions here about the stock as well. I do know ORWO has done a lot of experimenting with new formulas that may work better, such as a yet to be released NC200. They also had the NC400 which came and went so fast, but the tests of those, were much better than the NC500. The video sample above, is nothing like any of our tests OR our friends tests of the same exact stock. So I'm slightly dubious of what we're seeing. Is it an all new prototype stock they haven't released yet or was it so heavily color graded, that you just can't tell and whoever did that, bravo! 

The main problem outside of the grain, is the yellow ish first layer of the emulsion. This balances the stock somewhere between daylight and tungsten, around 4000k, which makes it pretty much unusable without some sort of filtration or light source which matches the color balance. In most tests (ours included), nobody accounted for this issue, but clearly in the test above, those filmmakers did. 

I personally never did a test with the stock indoors under fixed studio lighting at 4000k. It's one thing I'm interested in doing with the remainder of my test stock we purchased when it was first released. At the time, they did not have 35mm available, so we only got 16mm and with the extremely poor quality, it was silly to invest more since we were buying the stock, unlike the reviewers who got it free. No matter what, we couldn't alter the color balance to get any decent skin tones out of it in broad daylight. 

Considering, we buy Kodak 35mm stock for half the price ORWO is asking for their loads, it's a no brainer what we'd shoot in the future. I also know the company does have some issues creating more stock since the first batch sold out. They haven't had any 16mm stock for sale in 8 months or so. There also hasn't been any word on updates to the stock or even a rebuttal from ORWO corporate from the video's we made, which got a lot of traction. I hear through the grape vine, they weren't happy with our tests and discoveries, which is kinda silly since I'm the target audience and wasn't paid to write a good review (something I would never do). To me, good products are very rare and if you're making a brand new film stock in 2024, it better be comparable to Kodak or it's not worth it.

Edited April 24 by Tyler Purcell

[Jon O'Brien]

I think the size of grain in film images as opposed to digital has to be perfect for a particular project. It has to be just right. Just enough and it adds interesting texture. Too much and it's a distracting noise that does nothing for the story or the subject. For 16mm at the moment I'd go for Kodak film stock but so far, in this test by Mark Wiggins at least, I really like the look of the Orwo for 35mm. The level of grain seems to be good for a gritty, period drama story. It has an almost hand made, artisanal look but still a high quality look if that makes sense. That's my first impressions anyway, fwiw.

Edited April 24 by Jon O'Brien

[Tyler Purcell]

1 hour ago, Jon O'Brien said:

I think the size of grain in film images as opposed to digital has to be perfect for a particular project. It has to be just right. Just enough and it adds interesting texture. Too much and it's a distracting noise that does nothing for the story or the subject. For 16mm at the moment I'd go for Kodak film stock but so far, in this test by Mark Wiggins at least, I really like the look of the Orwo for 35mm. The level of grain seems to be good for a gritty, period drama story. It has an almost hand made, artisanal look but still a high quality look if that makes sense. That's my first impressions anyway, fwiw.

Which FYI does not look like any of the other tests shot on NC500. So that's why I'm a bit dubious. When suddenly something looks too good to be true, generally there is something we don't know. Until we know more answers, I'm skeptical based on my own results and working with the stock myself. 

[Robert Houllahan]

I have recently done some Digital to 16mm recordings on NC500 for people who wanted a dirtier grainier look than 7219.

Pretty happy with it for that, kind of recorded it as if it were 250iso

In my own tests I shot it outdoors golden hour in a Bolex at f5.6-f8 24fps and felt more light really helped it.

[Mark Wiggins]

Hi Folks!

I am the very Mark Wiggins who uploaded that Youtube video.

Sorry its only a brief clip.  I shot the tests for ORWO last year and they have only just published that clip on their socials. I hope they publish the rest.  I tested 35mm versions of NC500, NC400 and the black and white UN54. I have to say the UN54 looked gorgeous!

All my test footage was processed and scanned (4K) by Cinelab in the UK.

As you will see on the slate right at the start of the clip.  This was a 27mm lens at T2.8 (Panaflex Millennium XL2 and Primo lenses).  No filter.  This particular clip I rated the stock at 400 ASA but I did shoot the scene at a whole rage of ASAs (personally, I thought the 320 ASA looks better than the published clip).  This particular clip has mixed lighting.  There is a soft box with Gemini panels above.  Nanlux 1200 evokes bouncing off Ultrabounce throiugh some windows to the right of frame.  A 650W tungstan fresnel through a a frame of 216 to left of frame and a gemball (also tungstan) to the right of frame.  The room is a set on a stage.

I'd say the colour balance of the stock is somewhere between tungstan and daylight; say 4000K.  I'd say don't use it with an 85.

The NC500 (the clip) actually has warmer skin tones than the NC400.  Hopefully ORWO will publish some of my shots I did with the NC400.  ORWO say I can talk about the stock.

There is no grading.  This clip looks just like it did when it came back from the lab.

Mark

[Stephen Perera]

5 minutes ago, Mark Wiggins said:

Hi Folks! I am the very Mark Wiggins who uploaded that Youtube video.

hey Mark great you're not pissed off I posted this for you in here haha thanks man. Also glad Cinelab is your lab with Sonji, Aarti and the gang doing their thing for you.

Edited April 24 by Stephen Perera

[Mark Wiggins]

4 minutes ago, Stephen Perera said:

hey Mark great you're not pissed off I posted this for you in here haha thanks man

Not at all, that's why I put it on youtube. If anyone wants to see some behind the scenes photos of the tests, they are on my instagram (wigginsdop) you just have to scroll through all the rubbish I post on there! ha ha

Edited April 24 by Mark Wiggins

[Mark Wiggins]

15 hours ago, Tyler Purcell said:

e've done lots of testing with NC500 and so has a few of my friends with the same results.

Yes. I read you postings about the tests at the time.  Everything you say about colour balance and film speed concur with what I discovered.  At the time I read your posts I was actually doing the tests for ORWO so couldn't really say anything.

 

[Mark Wiggins]

I forgot to say, the wall at the back varied between 4 to 5 stops under.

Edited April 24 by Mark Wiggins

[Tyler Purcell]

28 minutes ago, Mark Wiggins said:

Yes. I read you postings about the tests at the time.  Everything you say about colour balance and film speed concur with what I discovered.  At the time I read your posts I was actually doing the tests for ORWO so couldn't really say anything.

 

What color balanced light did you use for the shoot? 

[Tyler Purcell]

52 minutes ago, Mark Wiggins said:

There is no grading.  This clip looks just like it did when it came back from the lab.

Cinelab musta graded it during the scan then. 

The nice thing about having your own scanner, is that you can see exactly what the film looks like, not what a colorist rendition is. 

We thread up Kodak or Fuji and it takes a few seconds to make it look perfect. 

The NC500 didn't work that way at all. 

But then again, we never tested indoors, so I appreciate the feedback and I'll have to do a test in 3200k lighting to see how it does. We tried this in the test above, but I felt the results were mixed due to us under lighting where I wanted it to be. 

[Mark Wiggins]

29 minutes ago, Tyler Purcell said:

58 minutes ago, Mark Wiggins said:

 

What color balanced light did you use for the shoot? 

Daylight from outside the windows and a soft box above and smaller tungsten units inside.

[Mark Wiggins]

20 minutes ago, Tyler Purcell said:

Cinelab musta graded it during the scan then. 

Maybe. I don’t know if it was or not. But then it’s the results that count.

[Tyler Purcell]

9 minutes ago, Mark Wiggins said:

Daylight from outside the windows and a soft box above and smaller tungsten units inside.

Interesting. Yea in our initial tests, I was so completely frightened by the results, I basically gave up testing. Literally the worst looking stock I've ever put on the film scanner in my entire career, which is saying a lot as I've tested everything you can imagine. But if it works in the situation you're describing, maybe it's worth another go, I have so much left! 

[Tyler Purcell]

9 minutes ago, Mark Wiggins said:

Maybe. I don’t know if it was or not. But then it’s the results that count.

True! But if it can't be scanned properly on OTHER scanners, then that's also an issue. I'm pretty sure CineLab London would have used an Arriscan, which is an entirely different beast than most scanners on the market. What it can achieve color wise, is a miracle honestly. We actually were part of a test which scanned on a Scanity and it had nearly identical results to my tests. So I know the Scanity has the same issues our scanner has. 

[Mark Wiggins]

1 hour ago, Tyler Purcell said:

I have so much left! 

The stock may have improved. When I did the tests they were definitely treating it as a work in progress. Hence hiring me to shoot some tests.

[Mark Wiggins]

1 hour ago, Tyler Purcell said:

1 hour ago, Tyler Purcell said:

m pretty sure CineLab London would have used an Arriscan,

I just shot the tests and went away again and a couple of days later got sent the 4K scans of the rushes by OWRO. Every shot had a greyscale and Macbeth chart at the beginning so I assume Cinelab used them.

[Stephen Perera]

Cinelab have an Arriscan yes.....

[Mark Wiggins]

On 4/24/2024 at 6:11 AM, Robert Houllahan said:

recorded it as if it were 250iso

Yes.  I deffinately say NC400 is 250 iso. NC500 is a bit faster I think so 320 iso.  Also, NC500 has warmer skin tones than NC500.