I'm still awaiting my last rolls to be developed but in the mean time this is probably one of my more acceptable shots taken on my road trip using only film.

Last month I bought a few rolls of expired Fujichrome Sensia 200 slide film from a Craigslister at about a dollar discount from retail price (and of course no taxes) so I haven't been really saving it. So on this trip I brought along a handful of rolls intending to see just how good they would be as general purpose film (I shot a lot more print film, though).

Slide film in general is supposed to be harder to meter. As I wrote earlier, I did bring along a hand-held meter and used it on occasion to back up my guesswork. For landscapes, however, you can't run up to the horizon to meter it; you need a spot meter and my Sekonic isn't one. The Fujica ST705 that I used for my wide-angle shots has through-the-lens metering. You line up the center point and try to get the floating needle to the ideal point, just like my Dad's cameras worked. Using the in-camera metering you can check the horizon, sky, shadows and try and average out your exposure. Since I was being a tourist (Sarah was very understanding whenever I wanted to stop on the side of the road), I didn't spend a lot of time making sure, instead I would bracket the exposure and hop back in.

Sensia wonderful for clouds

First the good. Sensia really surprised me on how well it picked up the clouds. I mean, better than I've ever seen clouds. If I had known how much depth in shading Sensia reveals in the clouds before I would have shot clouds extensively with this film. Look above the horizon. It's just lovely. In my print film shots, there is hardly any depth at all. And also note that it has excellent detail and sharpness.

Oh hai, 1970s snapshot calling

Let me digress a moment here by relating how I got this shot by complaining about 21st century technology a bit. I would never have known this dam existed if my GPS hadn't told me the 'fastest' way to go from Trail to Keremeos was to ... go to the United States. Here I am less than a mile from the U.S. border because, according to my GPS, the fastest way from one town to another was through a different country. After this shot I talked to some local people camping nearby and got turned back the right way. "Don't trust them things!" I was warned.

Anyway, I actually like this shot because it resembles something our fathers might have taken on a roadtrip very much like the one I was on. Look, son, it's a dam. Symbol of industry. Let's stop and take a picture of it using faded blue slide film.

Yes, Sensia 200 has a decidedly blue tone to it. You can, of course, change the white balance after you scan it so that it looks a bit more natural but I kept it here because of the water.

Very grainy

By now I've gotten used to the grain characteristics of medium format professional films such as Kodak 400VC and 400NC and really it isn't all that of an issue on 120. However, I was quite displeased with the amount of grain in Sensia 200. Look at the darks. Eek. It's really more grain than I would possibly want in a landscape film and certainly not something I want usually in a portrait film. I am surprised any ISO 200 would have that much grain actually. Obviously, a lot of it has to do with proper exposure and I will take my licks on that.

This is one of the better shots again with Fujichrome. It is certainly possible to get good shadows with it but for me there was a bit too much hit and miss.

The very first shot I posted (the post card shot) was with Sensia and you can see some struggles with exposure. Darks are too dark and had to be rescued in Lightroom; lights are okay.

More to come

As you can see there are some mixed results here and I am going to wait for my last roll to come back before rendering judgment. Still, fun fun in the film world. More to come.

Links

- Karen Nakamura's ST605 page (the ST705 is nearly identical)
- Fujifilm's Sensia 200 page
- Another user's Sensia 200 Flickr gallery
- Teck Cominco Waneta Dam