[frank]

Recently I become interested in shooting films. So, I bought an old film camera and an old lens, from about 60s. The first thing I need to do is to check if the camera and lens work properly. So last week I put a Fujicolor C200 in it and shoot mainly out door.

 

The camera is mechanical without a meter. I downloaded a Pocket Light Meter app from the apple store. The app has a good review record on the internet. So I expect it should work reasonably right.

 

So, I shoot a roll of Fujicolor C200, metered with the Pocket Light Meter app. Then I sent the film roll to a local shop for development, printing, and negative scanning.

 

Yesterday I received the prints and the scanned images. When I look at the prints, I find the exposure is reasonably "correct" for most of them (with only a few maybe slightly overexposed). Based on the print observation, I would say that the camera works properly with reasonable accuracy in shutter speeds. However, when I look at the images scanned from the negative, almost all images look too bright (by 1/2-1 stop, I would say). This impression is confirmed by checking the exposure histogram in Photoshop CS6.

 

My question is: why the scanned image is not consistent with the print (in brightness, I know contrast can be different)? Does it meen the scanning was not done properly? For the purpose of checking exposure of my camera, should I trust the scanned image, or the prints?

 

Comments and suggestions are welcome.

 

[Brightcolours]

Recently I become interested in shooting films. So, I bought an old film camera and an old lens, from about 60s. The first thing I need to do is to check if the camera and lens work properly. So last week I put a Fujicolor C200 in it and shoot mainly out door.

The camera is mechanical without a meter. I downloaded a Pocket Light Meter app from the apple store. The app has a good review record on the internet. So I expect it should work reasonably right.

Which camera and lens did you acquire? I have two SLRs originating from the 1960's (Nikon Nikkormat FTn (from 1967 to 1975), and a Chinon Chinonflex TTL (from 1966 to ?)). Both have a TTL meter. I bought e Chinonflex because of the lenses it came with (M42 55mm f1.4 Autoreflecta, a Tomioka lens) and a Chinonflex 200mm f3.5 (also M42 of course). Both apparently render beautifully (that is why I bought them), but I will have to find a home for that Chinonflex TTL.

So, I shoot a roll of Fujicolor C200, metered with the Pocket Light Meter app. Then I sent the film roll to a local shop for development, printing, and negative scanning.
 
Yesterday I received the prints and the scanned images. When I look at the prints, I find the exposure is reasonably "correct" for most of them (with only a few maybe slightly overexposed). Based on the print observation, I would say that the camera works properly with reasonable accuracy in shutter speeds. However, when I look at the images scanned from the negative, almost all images look too bright (by 1/2-1 stop, I would say). This impression is confirmed by checking the exposure histogram in Photoshop CS6.
 
My question is: why the scanned image is not consistent with the print (in brightness, I know contrast can be different)? Does it meen the scanning was not done properly? For the purpose of checking exposure of my camera, should I trust the scanned image, or the prints?
 
Comments and suggestions are welcome.

I think you probably can't trust either. The prints are done automatically, and the machines do adjust lighting depending on what they think should be correct. Negative scanning the same, most scanners adjust the brightness to what they think it should be. So, hard to say if the negatives are exposed "correctly".

About the metering.... You can meter with your DSLR in spot metering, on a mid tone. Then you can copy its settings to your film SLR, and unless the light changes, all images will be "correctly" exposed.

[frank]

Which camera and lens did you acquire? I have two SLRs originating from the 1960's (Nikon Nikkormat FTn (from 1967 to 1975), and a Chinon Chinonflex TTL (from 1966 to ?)). Both have a TTL meter. I bought e Chinonflex because of the lenses it came with (M42 55mm f1.4 Autoreflecta, a Tomioka lens) and a Chinonflex 200mm f3.5 (also M42 of course). Both apparently render beautifully (that is why I bought them), but I will have to find a home for that Chinonflex TTL.

 

I am tired of DSLRs. So, when I started looking for a film camera, I was focused RFs instead of SLRs. After thinking and searching for several months, I ended in buying a Leica M2 in a mint condition. A Leitz Summaron 35/2.8 was with the camera and seemingly also in a nice condition (though not as mint as the camera). So I bought the lens too.

 

After I received the lens and camera, I found that the aperture blades of the lens have some marks of scratching/scraping, most noticeably the white line in the 6pm position in the attached image. I need still find out if it will affect the image.

 

The camera seems works properly in every apsect, though I need test if the shutter speeds are reasonably accurate. I find that the black painting on the back cover of the camera is quite soft. After using it for about only an hour outdoor, a couple of places on the black painting were scatched off by the plastic buttons on my shirt and the white metal can be seen (about 1mm in diameter of each scratched spot).

 

 

I think you probably can't trust either. The prints are done automatically, and the machines do adjust lighting depending on what they think should be correct. Negative scanning the same, most scanners adjust the brightness to what they think it should be. So, hard to say if the negatives are exposed "correctly".

 

Thank you for your opinions. I just find the scanning was a quite a mess. They cut the film and scanned each piece of the film separately.  Not only the output images are ordered somewhat chaotically, also the brightness and colors of the images vary considerably from piece to piece. Perhaps I should asked them to scan before the film was cut into pieces (but I don't know if this is possible).

 

 

About the metering.... You can meter with your DSLR in spot metering, on a mid tone. Then you can copy its settings to your film SLR, and unless the light changes, all images will be "correctly" exposed.

 

I am not sure if I can use a DSLR or MFT camera to meter, since as far as I know their native ISOs are usually not quite accurate. For a long run with the mechanical RF I think I should start to practice with the sunny  f16 rule.

[Brightcolours]

I am tired of DSLRs. So, when I started looking for a film camera, I was focused RFs instead of SLRs. After thinking and searching for several months, I ended in buying a Leica M2 in a mint condition. A Leitz Summaron 35/2.8 was with the camera and seemingly also in a nice condition (though not as mint as the camera). So I bought the lens too.
 
After I received the lens and camera, I found that the aperture blades of the lens have some marks of scratching/scraping, most noticeably the white line in the 6pm position in the attached image. I need still find out if it will affect the image.
The camera seems works properly in every apsect, though I need test if the shutter speeds are reasonably accurate.

Film is a bit easier on the exposure, a slight deviation never really hurts. Apertures went by the full stop, as did exposure times. I tested my old Agfa Record II by just setting it to 1 and 0.5 seconds and doing the same with my 6D, and see if they ended the exposure at the same time (they did). Of course, I am sure that the Leica has a more advanced shutter timer.

I find that the black painting on the back cover of the camera is quite soft. After using it for about only an hour outdoor, a couple of places on the black painting were scatched off by the plastic buttons on my shirt and the white metal can be seen (about 1mm in diameter of each scratched spot).
 
Thank you for your opinions. I just find the scanning was a quite a mess. They cut the film and scanned each piece of the film separately.  Not only the output images are ordered somewhat chaotically, also the brightness and colors of the images vary considerably from piece to piece. Perhaps I should asked them to scan before the film was cut into pieces (but I don't know if this is possible).

Probably the best way is to get yourself a flatbed scanner which is affordable, and scan then for yourself. Like an Epson V500/550.
 

I am not sure if I can use a DSLR or MFT camera to meter, since as far as I know their native ISOs are usually not quite accurate. For a long run with the mechanical RF I think I should start to practice with the sunny  f16 rule.

Well, film never really is the ISO it says on the package either, it does not have to be THAT precise. A camera with spot meter will get you in the ballpark, and will get you an idea about the shutter duration accuracy. I find using a camera a tad easier than a light meter. But that probably is also due to lack of experience.

[frank]

Is something wrong with PZ? I have tried an hour to attach an image but I am always failed. The jpg size is 1.38M, within the 1.95M limit.

[frank]

Hi BC, thank you for sharing your experience. I carefully checked the prints, scanned images, and the negatives. I found only the following image looks wrong and I don't quite understand the cause. The exposure parameters are f4, 1/1000s. The film is Fujicolor C200. The image looks foggy and smeared, especially the left side looks totally wrong. Does this look like a proplem from the film processing, or the shutter at 1/1000s? Unforturenately there is only one 1/1000s exposure in the roll so I cannot compare.

[frank]

For your reference, here is the exposure with f5.6, 1/500s:

[frank]

The other images shoot at f4 and f2.8 all look OK so the lens seems not to be the cause. The bad one in #6 happens to be at the left end of one of the negative slides (each slide contains about 6 frames) so I don't know if the processer has touched it and damaged it.

[frank]

And here is (f8, 1/250s)

[Guest]

Hi Frank

 

As others said, it's difficult to give an explanation - there are too many variables involved. The EV in the shots may be different (the camera may not have exposed as set), the film may be miss-processed, on top of that the scans may have been done at different settings or processed differently. No surprise the results are inconsistent. Although to be honest the 1/1000 shoot does indeed look like there was something wrong. The dark parts appear washed out - since this is a negative it might mean the scanner did not recover sufficient detail in the bright areas of the film. Or it might just be that the scanner used a wrong black point setting.

 

If you want to eliminate all these variables you need to look at the negatives. With a digital camera, take two digital shots of the two negatives, at _exactly_ the same exposure settings (use manual exposure without metering) and post the results here. The two film frames shot at f/4x1/100 and f/5.6x1/500 should look identical. If they don't then there was a problem either with the camera or the film processing.

 

P.S. Do your cameras have vertical or horizontal shutters?