Ludwig Hagelstein

I think pushing is best approached from 2 angles: Pushing adds something to the look. That is undeniable. But that means also that it is best and most effectively used on purpose. Pushed footage looks different, and that in itself is probably the best case for pushing: If you shoot an ad, for example, and the delivery format is mostly geared towards smartphones, pushing might add just a pinch more "life" to the image, as it accentuates granularity in a specific way that helps sell the message on the small display, while it might look too muddy on a large cinema screen. Pushing is a great visual tool if you know what to expect and work towards it. As a means to correct underexposure it is a double edged sword: If a bit more information matters, better push than not, but it will only bring out density where there is already a latent image present. At the time of exposure the film had a set sensitivity. You can't change that afterwards. When no latent image was formed, no dyes will form. It's a bit easier to pull detail out of pushed neg under some circumstances. No, certainly not. Pushing changes the look. But it shouldnt be seen as just ramping up the speed without anything else happening. Here's a great summary from EKC regarding the subject: "Contrast build up from pushed processing is generally most dramatic in the bottom (cyan and magenta) layers of negative film and least dramatic in the top (yellow) layer. This is because development is a diffusion limited process. Contrast mismatch problems are introduced with pushed processing resulting in high red to blue and high green to blue contrast. The relatively high red to blue and high green to blue contrast of the negative produces yellow highlights and blue shadows in the print when mid-scale neutrals are balanced. In many cases the yellow highlights may have a red bias because the mismatch tends to be higher in the cyan layer compared to the magenta layer. It should also be noted that contrast mismatch varies with exposure; stronger effects with over exposure, weaker effects with underexposure. Under exposure, combined with pushed processing, tends to lessen the effects of increased contrast from pushed processing alone. Differences in exposure and scene content may have a significant effect on the perception of color in the resultant print, when pushed processing is used. ER speed increases with Push processing may be significantly less than needed to offset speed loss from under exposure. With the given conditions above, Push 1 processing produces ER speed increases of less than a 1/3 of a stop and Push 2 produces ER speed increases of around 1/2 of a stop. Push 2 taken in combination with two stops of under exposure represents a stop and a half loss in real speed. Push processing is not recommended as a means to increase photographic speed. Push processing produces contrast mismatches notably in the red and green sensitive layers ( red most) compared to the blue. This produces reddish- yellow highlights, and cyan- blue shadows. Push processing also produces significant increases in film granularity. Push processing combined with under exposure produces a net loss in photographic speed, higher contrast, smoky shadows, yellow highlights and grainy images, with possible slight losses in sharpness."

Pushing 2 Stops won't yield an actual effective increase in sensitivity of two stops. At best you get 1/3 of a stop of perceived speed increase per full stop of push processing. So if you take 5219 and push it two stops, arithmetically you'd arrive at EI.2000, but the very maximum effective speed increase in practice would be around 800. So you still have underexposure. Pushing is not a very effective tool to increase film speed. It increases contrast and is much more of an artistic tool than anything else.

it's officially back, and in use, too. Gold Lion Winner "Poor Things", by Giorgios Lanthimos and DP Robby Ryan was shot partly on Ektachrome.

This is a fantastic resource for info (and samples) about many historic color process, curated by Prof. Flueckinger from Zurich Uni. I highly recommend browsing through the site. It will leave you in awe. Also there were many combinations of tinting and toning together, to create multi color images. https://filmcolors.org

Great test. How did you perceive perf stability?

Silbersalz in Stuttgart. 35MM only right now, but by far best service / price ratio.

Lots of interesting answers here, but all are unneccessarily complicated. Actually there is a very easy trick, courtesy of your local lab consultant: Expose a photo on bw paper, process it, fix it, then use a rehalogenizing bleach to reconvert the silver into soluble halides, and you'll have a white piece of paper. Now, in broad daylight, you can process the photo again, and oh boy it's not magic but only smoke, mirrors and some chemistry, the image will reappear, and only the image atop that. You can repeat that cycle as well a few times. So then light your scene as you want and carry on shooting. cheerio

"For critical applications make tests under your conditions". There is no way around proper testing. I have EXR 100T from god knows when. It needs about 2 stops.

it's not Agfa XT 320. I would say it's not even close. That was an 80s emulsion. Judging from the grain and how the dye image looks, NC 500 is more in line with how a - here it gets tricky as these are two incompatible systems - lipophilic coupler Version of Agfacolor Neu might have looked given another 20 years of improvement. The 320 XT comparison is not baseless, but I think the film needs its own category in the end.

even after ten minutes I cant stop shaking my head. There i was telling you all "go ahead try the film, have fun - maybe all the doubters were wrong after all- a few days ago. I stand by what I said about the technical achievement of the emulsion team. But the distribution is beyond verbal description.

I think they have some insanely stupid dynamic pricing mechanism based on stock quantity running amok in their webshop. This can't be rational. Or maybe it is because as my dad once said: "Every day three idiots are born. You just have to find them." The starting price of 187 € net / 122m / 400ft was cheap. Paying ridiculously much for a technically sub-par novelty emulsion is madness, however. As much as I respect the technical achievement of rolling out this emulsion, this will massively hurt them. And it's a punch into the faces of the folks actually making the emulsion.

It's insane. At the time I wrote the text above, a 400ft Roll NC 500 was available for 187.00 € net excl. shipping on their site. Now its more expensive than Vision3.

I just saw. When I wrote my post a 400ft roll was 187.00 € net. Their marketing / sales / distribution really is erratic.

Uli, you might want to have a look at my thread in FILM STOCKS AND PROCESSING ?

That`s the base color. No mask, but dye filter.