I recently shot an ordination service with Portra 160VC instead of my
normal Portra 400VC/NC. This event was somewhat staged like a graduation
but with the seriousness of a wedding. The facility was a 1500 seat church
auditorium with very well lit (dozen shakespears) stage. Given the
lighting and a $2.50 discount per roll on the 160, I decided to forgo my
usual film selection.
Granted, my results were not head to head comparison between 160 and 400,
but I've shot enough to know what the Portra 400 (either VC or NC) will do.
I did like the "edginess" of the additional sharpness of the 160, but also
found a tendency to saturate and look a little too much like a poster.
Most importantly, though, and this will play in with wedding work, I lost
my background "glow". With the 400 there is a nice warm background glow
that the 160 missed. I somewhat account this to the stop loss in film
speed, but more importantly, I feel that it is an indication of the
differing latitude curves between the films.
This past year I have shot for another wedding photographer company and
used their Canon equipment with Portra 160NC. I noticed the lack of
background warmth that I was used to, but figured it had more to do with
the lenses and exposure systems than the film. Well, shooting this with my
equipment proved that a difference does exist. I am definitely stuck on
using Portra 400NC for weddings. The film is plenty sharp to make
enlargements with ease and the exposure latitude of the film means that a
person with dark hair won't merge into the background.
Usage notes for trying to get a comfortable lighting ratio between flash
and ambient. Mount and turn your flash on and put your OM-2x or OM-4x
camera in auto mode. 1/60 will be your shutter speed, but the meter will
indicate some other shutterspeed for the ambient lighting. Point your
camera at the scene and adjust your F-stop until you get an indicated of
around 1/15. This will put your background down just far enough, without
putting it too dark. OTF flash control will also be less likely to
overexpose too. I absolutely hate "cave-dweller wedding shots" and this
method will prevent them. With Portra 400NC in the average church I can
typically shoot around F5.6 to give me a correct ambient exposure at 1/15.
Ken Norton
< This message was delivered via the Olympus Mailing List >
< For questions, mailto:owner-olympus@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx >
< Web Page: http://Zuiko.sls.bc.ca/swright/olympuslist.html >
|