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From: marcus@pyuxt.UUCP (M. G. Hand)
Newsgroups: net.rec.photo
Subject: Re: Questions on films
Message-ID: <169@pyuxt.UUCP>
Date: Sun, 19-Aug-84 15:58:27 EDT
Article-I.D.: pyuxt.169
Posted: Sun Aug 19 15:58:27 1984
Date-Received: Mon, 20-Aug-84 02:10:16 EDT
References: <1607@ucbvax.UUCP>
Organization: Bell Communications Research, Piscataway N.J.
Lines: 25

I, admittedly, don't use a huge amount of B&W stock, but I ocasionally
use it when I want to take fast action shots (soccer, hockey etc).  I
now ALWAYS use Ilford XP1, and wouldn't now be without a roll in my
gadget bag.  It is a chromogenic B&W film, which basically means that it
uses colour technology to get a B&W image - i.e. the image is formed
from black dye, not from silver oxide (or so I understand).  Ilford have
their own special chemistry, but you can save a little by processing it
in a normal C41 process (ie as colour print film) with very little loss
of quality.  It is very tollerant to exposure at other than its nominal
rating of 400 ASA,  and it also doesn't seem to be worthwhile to push process
(shoot it at 1000 and develop it as if it were 400 - you just get thinnish
negs - no other problems as far as I can see).  I have always found the
image quality to be superb (better than Tri-X in my book, certainly the
grain is all but invisible, and the contrast is excellant).  My local
photographic shop man once told me that the results at 200 ASA are breathtaking.
So, what are the dissadvantages?  Price is a little higher, processing in
special chemistry is more expensive (but can still be done in a home
dev tank), and developing is more temperature critical.   They sell a starter
kit that consistes of a roll of film plus enough chemicals to process half
a dozen or so rolls - its a good way to find out whether you like it wihout
spending a fortune on new chemicals  (or shoot a roll and tell your local
lab to process it as if it were colour neg stock.)

			Marcus Hand (pyuxt!marcus)