I have mentioned receipt of the 40 Svema film negatives, purchased from Astrum Ukraine. The online purchase and subsequent message exchange was commendable, these guys are serious and business was done in an honest and straightforward manner, nothing to complain about.
I am about to embark on testing the said films, and the first one I start with is the Photo 400. Loaded in a Nikon F4, lens Nikkor 35-70/2.8. I am shooting this film at per its box numbers, which is 400. Perhaps I will change the ASA setting to 200 and 800 for a few frames, just to get an idea on the latitude.
My first impression is that the film is very thin. Way thinner than my usual films, and I perhaps can find a similarity with the Fuji SHR microfilm, if you know that one. Hopefully, the emulsion will prove to be up to the challenge.
Please do note that, when loading, my Nikon F4 had an issue with getting started with this film, as the leader is longer than an usual one. It measures 12cms, which is by far the longest leader I have ever seen. Of course, no troubles here, but in order to load the film in the F4 I had to shorten it to some 3cms. No biggie, of course.
My main concern, regarding this film, at this point: the film cassette is somehow looking not entirely reliable. The light trap is clearly put there manually, and because the length of it exceeds that of the cassette, the locking upper disk is not flush with the cassette. There is a small space visible between the disk and the cassette itself, and this gives me reason to be worried. Light can get inside through that space. If it does or not, remains to be seen.
It looks like the felt / light trap used is of the self-adhesive type and was put there by hand. It was probably measured and cut without taking into the account that it would have to be folded, so that space created by the fold is somehow worrying me. Also, the top cap is lifted off the can due to the length of the felt piece. You can easily see that it was measured for the right length of the slit, and the 2mm protruding at the top of the slit is because of the 2mm of the bottom of the slit. I hope this does not mean light entering the cassette, otherwise I’m &^%*&(*.
The felt is also on a hard textile (?) base, so the chance for film getting scratched is quite high, I would guess. The way it goes off the cassette’s margin is not looking right, and this may cause some issues when loading the film in the film chamber of the camera (not to mention that the top cap slightly lifted is doing the same). Anyways, I guess we’ll see what we’ll see, don’t we?
Right, so I shot the film with Nikon F4, set per box speed, in Adox Adonal 1+100, 60 mins, stand dev (the first minute invert, then 2 inversions at 30′ past), fixed as usual (1+4 Adofix), and finally some 1+200 diluted Adoflo went into the tank. Results are beyond my expectations, to say the least. Do read on.
First of all, I was expecting light pipping on at least 4-5 frames. Given the top roundel of the cassette was set crooked in the thread, one would (and should) expect film being ruined at least for the first few frames. Well, no light entered the cassette. Given the film sensitivity, any stray bit of light would have been wreaking havoc inside the cassette, but no such thing. The film is clean, with no damage whatsoever. Go figure.
It gave me a bit of trouble when loading the reel, what with the film being so thin, but nothing serious. The film itself looks like Ortho negative, or a Copex one; clear base, with none of that nasty yellowish (amber-ish) tint to it, just clear celluloid. It is perfectly flat, no curling or twisting sideways. And there are indeed 36 exposures, these Astrum guys were honest. This answers other concern of mine.
The developer came out brown-ish, very strong colour, when I poured it out of the tank. First stop bath (just water) came out a bit less coloured, second just fine. The fixer came out white, no tint whatsoever. The film was washed as per my old method (10 inv, 10 swirls, 10 inv – 6 series of such, for each series change water), then washed twice with distilled water, and finally Adoflo. It takes a while to wash it, but it saves me time to not clean the film manually after it dries. And these are 4 frames from the film, chosen to make my point.
To be perfectly honest, I expected more contrast. True, Rodinal (sorry, Adonal) is known to behave strange with some films. Nonetheless, the film came out unexpectedly well, if I may say this myself. Considering the 1+100 dilution, stand development, I feel like I could have been a bit more active on agitation, but the grain would’ve been larger than it is (honestly, I do like the little grain visible in the photographs). Sharpness is all right-ish.
The limitation of the 35-70/2.8 Nikkor lens is visible at this slow aperture and distance, in camera’s P mode.
As this film was a test for both film and processing, I am not bothered too much with the lack of contrast and occasional out of focus on the fringe of the photographs above. A lot of testing needs to be done until I will find the proper combination for this film. All in all, an interesting film.
This brief review was also published on Photo.Net and Film and Darkroom User.
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