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Exposure profile for vision3 500t developed ECN-2.


Seth Baldwin

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How many stops below middle gray would appear black and how many stops above middle gray would appear white for vision3 500t stock developed ECN-2 and scanned professionally.

As it's film, of course dynamic range is also influenced by your labs work and scanning capabilities. For this reason, I expect rough estimates. But if someone who actually has good experience shooting this stock could let me know what the exposure profile appears to be, i'd really appreciate it. I'm not interested in knowing the dynamic range, I already know it's around 16 stops according to Kodak. I'm interested in knowing how many stops below middle gray I can determine as "basically black" and how many stops above middle gray I can determine as "basically white" for this specific stock.

Edited by Seth Baldwin
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I have just conducted that very same test on a roll 7219. Waiting for film to be processed and scanned. Will share results when it comes back. 

I fear however that the scanned image will be the limiting factor and not the film itself. And scans can be infinitely variable, depending on the shop and settings. 

Ultimately, I would like to get my hands on a densitometer and take measurements on the film itself. Blacks are unexposed base and whites are at full density. 

I would expect 5 stops each way. Or maybe 6 stops on the highlight side. We'll see. 

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I like to treat everything under -3 or 3.5 stops on film "potentially unusable so considered black even if there is information" . all Vision stocks including the 19. but that is a matter of personal taste based on experienced grain and flattening contrast on darkest tones so it is not scientific in any way. On the highlight side, it depends on the scanner you use and how much time you have to tweak it in scanning to get the best possible results. It has much more dynamic on the highlight side than 6 stops though. With a pretty good average scanner it should be more than 10 stops in any case (of available highlight response above middle gray without using dual pass or hdr or very high end scanner) . 

You should look on how large density difference the scanner can approximately handle with the settings you are using and then comparing this to the characteristic curve on the datasheet. It is only a matter of where the "clipping" on the scanner fall on that curve when you are scanning the film: both on the dark tones and on the highlights. Grain and sensor noise are another matter and are subjective.

all in all, the question is very subjective and mostly a matter of taste and depends on the exact scanner you are using and the exact settings of it as well. But every modern scanner should be able to handle at least -3 under and at least +8 over on that stock in any case, subjective or not

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7 hours ago, Raymond Zananiri said:

I have just conducted that very same test on a roll 7219. Waiting for film to be processed and scanned. Will share results when it comes back. 

I fear however that the scanned image will be the limiting factor and not the film itself. And scans can be infinitely variable, depending on the shop and settings. 

Ultimately, I would like to get my hands on a densitometer and take measurements on the film itself. Blacks are unexposed base and whites are at full density. 

I would expect 5 stops each way. Or maybe 6 stops on the highlight side. We'll see. 

Would be really interested to see those results. Do you know what scanner your lab is using? A densitometer would certainly help determine the negatives full potential but if your lab can share info on the scanner they're using or even specific settings, that would probably be fine for a rough estimate.

Edited by Seth Baldwin
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There should be about 14- to 15-stops of information on the negative but of course, the stock was designed to be printed onto a stock with a higher gamma so that about 10- to 11-stops appear.  And the stops of info at the bottom are too grainy to be useful and the last stop in the highlights can be pretty subtle.

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13 hours ago, Seth Baldwin said:

Would be really interested to see those results. Do you know what scanner your lab is using? A densitometer would certainly help determine the negatives full potential but if your lab can share info on the scanner they're using or even specific settings, that would probably be fine for a rough estimate.

My understanding is that it will be a Xena 6.5k hdr Scanner (at Cinelab). But since this is an important test for me, I will send the processed roll to Gamma Ray as well to compare the Xena to the Scanstation 6.5k. 

Edited by Raymond Zananiri
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