Gast
Hello
I’m currently exposing Fomapan 200 at 125 ISO and developing it in Rodinal for 8 minutes.
Question: Does anyone have any experience of pushing this film? How high can I go? And how does the development time change?
Thanks for your replies.
Martin
Gast
... Fomapan 200 is not really suitable for pushing, as it barely reaches 160 ISO anyway...
MirkoBoeddecker
Martin,
The question is, what do you mean by ‘pushing’?
If you want to increase the film’s effective speed because you don’t have enough light (e.g. by conducting the development in speed-enhancing developers such as Promicrol or Microphen), then you can just about manage to get the Fomapan up to 250 ISO.
Yes, and then there’s also the kind of pushing that alters the image effect, as practised by Koudelka, for example.
Here, pushing is used even though there is enough light, in order to differentiate the highlights more finely and compress the mid-tones whilst washing out the shadows.
In the second case (i.e. if a change in the image effect doesn’t bother you or is intentional), you can perform an underexposure on any film by several stops, provided you use a developer that boosts the gamma afterwards and adjusts the development time. Promicrol, Microphen, ATM49 and others are particularly suitable for this.
Less extreme equalising developers such as Emofin or highly diluted APH09.
I have, however, heard the opposite claimed here too (a 2-day stand development in APH09 at 1+400 is said to have boosted an Efke 25 to 400 – but I haven’t seen that for myself).
It’s best to try it out and perhaps work at a slightly higher temperature – even at the risk of your emulsion becoming softer (be careful).
Regards,
Mirko
Gast
Hi Mirko,
Thanks for your reply.
I was referring to the first method of pushing. So Fomapan 200 really isn’t suitable for that :-).
What about the Foma 100 and 400? Does anyone have any experience with these?
Have a nice weekend,
Martin
fotohuisrovo
Fomapan 400 has the same issue; with most developers, it remains ‘high’ at ISO 250–320.
In this thread, we’re interested in processing with Diafine (BKA – Vernon Hills). Has anyone tried this developer with the Fomapan range yet?
Best regards,
Robert
rherz
:rolleyes:
Hi,
I keep seeing questions like this and I always find myself wondering: why on earth would I push a 200 if I can just buy a 400? I mean, it’s not like with a GF where I could decide on a shot-by-shot basis. I have to stick with the speed I set at the start right through to the end. So if I suddenly think: ‘I need more speed for this shot’ – that’s not an option. So I might as well just load a film with a higher speed straight away.
As long as we still have Neopan 1600/Delta and T-Max 3200, which you can easily push to around 1200 ASA, I don’t see why I should force one of the lower-speed films to its limits.
Or have I missed something here? ;)
Best regards
Robert
Gast
Robert,
The grain remains finer, but in my opinion, pushing the film isn’t really necessary anymore, unless I happen to realise that I’ve accidentally packed PlusX instead of TriX (or Fomapan 100 instead of 400 – I don’t want to be accused of surreptitious advertising).
Roland
Gast
I always shoot on 400 ISO film and then decide how to perform the exposure based on the light conditions. High-speed films are very expensive, after all… You can push TriX and HP5 up to 3200 with acceptable results. I only use a 3200 film when I need 6400 ISO or higher — in other words, when it’s really, really dark…
SamuliSchielke
I recently pushed some Fomapan 400 to 1600 using ATM49. It worked, but the grey tones were absolutely rubbish. Not recommended. So I bought ADOX CHM 400 (which, as far as I know, is Ilford FP5); it has a lower fine grain than Foma, at least not with my developers, but you can do pretty much anything with it. Fomapan simply isn’t a push film. However, you can get Fomapan 100 and 200 to perform slightly above their stated speed without the image looking much different if you develop them with Fomadon LQN at 30 degrees for 2:30 or 3 minutes each (agitate vigorously). I don’t do this to push the films, though, but to increase the density and steepness of the negatives for alternative printing processes. Fomadon LQN is recommended for Foma films anyway.
