Pushing Tri-X
theartofphotography.tv
Last week I did a little experiment that I wanted to show you in this video.
Kodak Tri-X is an excellent film - probably one of the most popular b+w film types of all time. What I like about Tri-X is the versatility and the different looks you can get depending on how you shoot with it.
A few episodes back we talked about pushing and pulling film. If you missed it, here is the link:
• Pushing and Pulling Film
Today we're going to push Tri-X to an extreme. Tri-X is rated at 400 iso, but I metered the whole roll at 6400. This is a 4 stop push and I wasn't sure this would work or not.
I processed the film as a stand development in Rodinal 1:100 for 2 hours. I agitated for the first minute and then let it stand. Every 30 minutes I would give it 15 seconds of VERY light agitation.
I'm pretty impressed with the results. If you want to see the images I used in the video - I made a set on Flickr.
www.flickr.com/photos/tedforbe...
So far I'm loving the results. These images are negative scans. In the next few weeks we'll try printing these on an enlarger and see how they behave.
Пікірлер: 179
Back when I was shooting concerts, I pushed the crap out of Tri-X. Never failed me. Nice to see this video. Love the kitty pics. Never tire of those. And thanks for sharing. Digital folk have no idea what it takes to make a great picture. Darkroom was my drug. Miss them days.
I agree that the white cat grainy picture looks great.
These tutorials are the most informative and complete of any on the internet! Thank you so much!
My first "assignment film roll" - for Middle School annual staff in 1977 - was Tri-X Pan. Teacher gave me as many rolls as I wanted and told me, "Take pictures of whatever catches your eye." I still live by that, and I still shoot Tri-X 400 film in 2021!
they are so beautiful and emotionally strong photos. I love your work very much, and the fantastic analysis on pushing Tri-X. I feel your soul. Wishing you best luck.
Thank you for doing these videos! By far one of the most informative and entertaining sources for aspiring film shooters.
I've learned more from these videos than I did in college, thanks man.
Love your vids Ted! Always super helpfully and interesting!
Thanks for your work Ted. Working my way through your channel. Really enjoying it.
Your channel and your tutorials are really fantastic. The one about pushing and pulling film has been particularly useful to me. Plus, thank you for showing us your pictures in this video, technics apart, they gave me a strong emotive feeling. Thank you and greetings from Italy! Chiara
What time length would you recommend for pushing film from 400 to 800? I've been hearing 30% more time per stop for developing times. So 3:30 would equate to around 4:40 using developer. Would that 30% more time include the blix and stabalizer as well or just using the developer? Thanks.
Thanks....another good one. Now I'm off to see if Tri-X is available in 4x5 sheet so I can play.
beautiful shots ted, and of course, another great video!
You can take the lens out flip the mirror and stick a patch to the film. This was when you're loading the film into a reel, you can feel for the patches in the dark and cut the film there
Just discovered your channel. It's brilliant! You explain things very clearly and your enthusiasm shines through :) Nicely done!
Thank you Ted. Interesting speech, looking forward for the next episode.
Glad you're back!
I really liked your shots. The pushed tri-x adds a mood that seems appropriate, especially considering the subject. I buy tri-x in bulk but never tried pushing that far, I think that I will give it a try.
I haven't, but I bet it looks great!
@richardsimms251
3 жыл бұрын
Ted, you are an excellent teacher, with a great knowledge of the history of photography, and of the previous work of the original masters RS
I'm loving this, thanks! Although I no longer DO film, back in the day my father and I would push to 1600 and although Rodinal is good, we always made our own which now I don't remember the formula for. We made all our own developers and fixers and only ever used D-76 or Dektol when we'd run out of raw ingredients.
Great photos of the cats - its like you can hear what they are thinking in each shot. Just developed my first ever roll of B W film at home yesterday in my dad's old Paterson tank. Lots of notes and lessons learnt (argh purple monster Tri X = more fixing time required?) and your vlogs are helping alot. Cheers!
Awesome episode, loving the analog attention!
That photo of Judy is awesome!
Great images! loved the first one! how much post processing did you do?
Excellent Ted............Thanx
I dig this. Can't wait to try it out. Thanks for sharing, Ted.
8:48 - Judy - I can see where the sprockets have affected the developing. There are darker patches by each sprocket hole. (It isn't apparent in any of the others, so I guess it is because this is close to maximum range). Is there any way to avoid those sprocket issues?
I've pushed one stop and intermixed with normal shot, using regular development with no problems. it's a great way to shoot in lower light.
Just watched this. Interesting discussion. I wonder how HP5 Plus would push this way? I have seen it pushed to 1600 and I really like the results.
‘This is all gonna be cats.’ I usually say the same thing when I unspool a freshly developed roll out of the tank 😂
I'm still working on it. I'll do Tom Snyder later today ;-)
I really like the ghostly, mysterious look in your shot at 12:14
Might have been a situation for incident metering. Very glad you did this. One of the things I was thinking of was experimenting with the DuoFlex indoors without flash using pushed Tri-X. It is f16@ about 1/50s. Glad that the results were so good. I would be interested in how it would come out using a commercial lab.
Great Tip Ted!, i love the feel of those pictures, why we should avoid grain?
Thank you very much for sharing! Kudos!
Films coming back, maybe I'm behind the times, but walked into my local shop and they said film sales are up 3x since last year.
Hello Ted! how are you? months ago i saw one of you posts in which you dyed some fiber photos with tea and coffee. Ive tried to find the video but i couldnt, would you tell me in which episode is it? I love your channel! keep it up! :D
Hi Ted just quick question what type of scanner are you using Great work I love the mood it gives a mysterious look.
sorry if this is a silly question but do you meter for the shadows like I've heard is best for film?..and is metering for the shadows still useful if you're in the end scanning negs and not in dark room? will that info still be in the highlights with a scan? thanks
Great video man. Thanks
Hello Ted. great vídeo!! im learning a lot about analog photography from your channel. you said something about the nikon F4 (you dont like it as you like the F3?)... i wonder if you could do a vídeo about the F4. im thinking on bying the F4 as my first analog camera... thanks
Also, how do you feel with pushing Tri-X with microphen? I just mixed up a bottle to push some delta 400 to 1600, but I got to thinking about using it for Tri-X since its supposed to be a very fine grain developer. However, since its my first go round with microphen, I'm only going off what I've been reading.
Great video. Did you get to print these photos on paper? would love to see the results
very nice video al always. plus the second photo (the one of the white cat) is in my opinion the mot beautifull picture you've taken i've seen so far. i really like that your pictures are so peacefull but this one really exceeds.
Is this grainer than ilford 3200? I might have to experiment, I love the grain in these shots :D
Amazing, even underexposed, they look great.
This video is now seven years old and I just found it. Thanks for the video. What scanner are you using - particularly for medium format? Thanks.
Very helpful. (I really like the first two results and the silhouette by the way.) You helped me correct an impression I had from another website that maintains mixing normal, push 1-stop, push 2-stop, etc., on the same roll was no problem as long as you use a dilute developer and let it stand for exactly one hour. Yeah, I know, too good to be true, right? Thanks again!
that second picture is amazing!
Ted, first of all thanks for making this video. I haven't pushed tri-x yet but I intend to do so quite soon. From what I see the images are much more pleasing than what I'd get with Delta3200. I stand-develop quite a lot as it's my favourite technique and while I agree that it's more straight forward to stick to a single speed throughout the roll, I find that stand developing allows me to change the iso on the fly. When I shoot HP5 I will often go back and forth between 400 and 1600 (while metering accordingly). This flexibility comes in handy especially in the evening on overcast days. I wonder if T-max 400 would yield similar results ... P.S. In terms of development time, from what I've read, Rodinal - at a 1:100 dilution - is usually exhausted at about the 2h mark. I use a full stand method where I agitate at the beginning then let the tank sit undisturbed for the remainder of the process so your mileage may vary. I use the exact same time of 70-80 minutes @ 20ºC for all film speeds. So far I've had good results with PanF, HP5, Rollei 400s, Rollei 80s, and a few expired colour films found in the attic that I developed in B&W chemistry.
Brilliant!! I have some ilford PanF plus 50 in the fridge. I have one roll in my Halina I'm pushing to 200. I was wondering weather I was going to develop it using the stand method or normally. I think 'stand' now!! What dilution would you recommend? 100:1?
You don't need to avoid it - you just might not want it - or you might ;-) I'm just showing you what makes it more prominent so you can control it.
I like your information and I'm getting ready to dust off my OM-1 and I'm gonna order some film from a film supplier in San Diego. Thank you for the refresher.
Thanks! Yeah - its one of the greatest films ever.
can u give an idea of what speed u shot at when u pushed the film to 4 stops
Hi! Just want to ask. If I pushed it to 1600 and use stand development. Do I need to develop it for 1 hour? I'm kind of a beginner and right now I'm using rodinal too as my first developer. :)
Rodinal is back, Freestyle photo, Glass Key Photo, Looking Glass Photo.
@billkaroly
5 жыл бұрын
I saw that on the Freestyle website. I always used HC110 with HP5 and never pushed. I really want to shoot some film pushed to 1600.
I don’t want acutance, I want the finest grain. What is the best developer for this. Xtol?
If I wanted to push tri-x to 1600 and stand develop the roll how long would I need to develop for?
You can send me an email thru youtube and link it. Should work there…
Hi Ted! Right about the last episode of the vlog where you talked about stand developing, I tried it too, using a 1:100 dilution and 3.5 ml per roll, with Adonal. I can't seem to leave the link to the photos here :( Great vids! Keep'em coming! :)
if these are your regular `not great' pictures, i`ve got a lot to learn i`m way behind that
@richardsimms251
3 жыл бұрын
Wonderful and very useful video, as usual. RS. Canada
sometimes i have to watch your videos twice. once to listen to your words of wisdom, and once to find the kitties in the background.
Very, very interesting episode, I immensely enjoyed it. I love pushing film (same cannot be said about pulling, no idea why) and I must admit I've always preferred pushing T-Max 400 than Tri-X. I would easily push the T-Max up to 6400 as you did here with the Tri-X and love the results. I almost exclusively use the Tri-X for portrait work, so I never really find reasons to push it. But the T-Max is my choice no. 1 for street, and I'll just go happy pushing depending on what I need. I also try to use as much as I can the HP5 400 (this one, too for street only) and to me this film works perfect at ISO 1250. Here some shots I took 'pushing around.' I know I'm writing a lot, and that's your channel; I am not trying to show my work through "The Art of Photography" but in case that's how it sounds, please do erase this comment :) 1) T-Max 400 pushed at 3200: www.flickr.com/photos/matteoprezioso/15027077823/in/dateposted-public/ 2) T-Max 400 pushed at 6400: www.flickr.com/photos/matteoprezioso/14740543351/in/dateposted-public/ 3) This one was taken pushing the HP5 400 at 1050: www.flickr.com/photos/matteoprezioso/13927301084/in/dateposted-public/ Finally, your work is so good, that's one of my favourite channels. Keep up with the good work! p.s. Sorry to hear about your cat that passed away.
I thought that TMax was the next step for Kodak, then I discovered HP-5 watching Flickr pictures and then I went for Tri-X which became my favorite. However, my early black and white shots were with Plus-X-Pan and the results were awesome!
Hello, new subscriber here. When I started photography Jimmy Carter was halfway through his term as President. What I can remember of push processing is that there should be a similar time adjustment in the fixer bath proportionate to the development bath. As I recall my photography teacher at the time had a logarithmic chart she consulted. I know I used a similar chart for timed exposures.
Developed my first two rolls of film today (tri-x), I've fallen in love with film, got four shots I'm really happy with.
Did you ever get the results of your experiments? Was the f3 in bad shape or was it the time you had with development of the film? Please let me know. I'd like to try this out
Great video
I shot a roll of Tri-X through my holga and, as you may know, there are no setting controls on this camera. Can I develop as if I shot it at 800 or 1600? Would that be considered pushing?
@nathanjohansen7169
4 жыл бұрын
You've probably already developed your film by now, but I'm replying anyway. If you shot in the daylight pushing Tri-x would probably over expose your images by a stop or two. Shooting fast or pushed film in a Holga would probably work best indoors, or outside on a cloudy day or evening hours. This isn't a hard rule exactly as there are a variety of conditions out there I can't account for, but the lack of adjustments on a Holga make it most usable for certain films speeds for certain lighting situations. Feel free to experiment though. Black and white film has a pretty big latitude to play with.
Have you ever pushed Tmax at 800 it's amazing it's what to use if you don't want a lot of grain.
WOAH WHAT I DIDN'T REALIZE THIS VIDEO WAS UPLOADED ALL THE WAY BACK IN 2012 IT LOOKS SO RECENT
Tri-X is my favorite film!
Ted do you think this could work with HP5+ as well? I got 10 Rolls for cheap an really would like to try to shoot some bar scenes with ISO 6400.
Can you do this with aperture priority mode?
what dilution did you use?
silly question but I've got some Potra 400 and I want to over expose it by two stops. So should I shoot it at 100 or 1600 (with normal processing)? Thanks for your help.
@jmathews4765
7 жыл бұрын
If you're overexposing, that would be at 100. It would underexpose to 1600. You can normal process with 100 (or pull process if you want), but you will need to push process for 1600.
Fantastic grain for pushing to 6400, but not a huge fan of the extreme contrast. Thanks for the examples!
The old Levar Burton sign off... awesome
Can anyone tell me if pushing a slower film like 100 going to give similar results ??
@BorisS
9 жыл бұрын
Jeffrey Srnec Ya it has about the same results.I have pushed 100 to 400 and it gives me almost better results than shooting 400 at 400. The thing to remember is 400 you can push to 1600 and that's two stops. But 100 two stops up is 400 not 1600, so you wont be able to push it to the same iso as 400uun,h
Sorry to hear about your cat Ted. Our last one developed kidney disease and we had to put her down. I feel your pain. Our pets are family. Sometimes we love them more than our family :). On a lighter note, what developer will give me super tight fine grain and good contrast? Will be developing 12+ rolls for first time since college (which is over 20yrs ago). Or is it a matter of developer choice combined with agitation method and time of development?
there are many arguments on the net on whether or not agitation effects grain, the one argument i find most logical is that the agiation effects grain because it effects the development time. If you develope say 8 mins with continous agitation, the amount of grain would be equal to a stand development in say 10 minutes but i didn't proof it myself
Hi Ted what scanner do you use?
Ted man This is a practical lesson ! Can you please start doing some more hands on videos so we can see the process on what you are talking about? That would be just brilliant!
Exact exposure really doesn’t mean much when stand developing. As long as it’s long enough. In low light take it all the way. If there is anything on the film it will get developed. It’s hard to overexposed Tri-X. Preflashing would really help with the crushed blacks. Why aren’t you doing film again Ted? These where really good.
Wauw he is beautiful and also very beautiful photo I really love this first one of your cat 🙀
Files are no longer available .. bummer.
The Judy photo is incredible. 8:50
If Im setting the ASA to 1600 though the film is 400, does that mean I have to use faster shutter speeds and different Apertures? Or would I shoot with the settings I usually use?
@mikeortega6072
8 жыл бұрын
if your aperture is wide open and you are hand holding your canera and you are still to dark under... its an option to "increase the light" in your photos, plural and in the whole roll as he state because you are processing the entire roll... and as stated previously add 33% for every stop you gave.
@jmathews4765
7 жыл бұрын
if you shoot ISO 400 settings with the ISO dial set at 1600, changing the ISO dial will not affect the picture.
For what you said about using one ISO for the entire roll, there is an exception; Ilford, apparently, has a film that you can shoot at any ISO throughout and develop entirely in one way. I don't know why or how this is a thing, but it exists. - And I don't know if there are any trade-offs to this or if there are other films that have this ability. But yea, there's at least one that can do different ISO-values on the same strip without issues.
@mfbfreak
Жыл бұрын
Many films can do this, as long as they're good quality film. You can shoot Tri-X at 100, 200 and 400, while developing as 400 taking care to not agitate too much. You will end up with very dense negatives at 100 iso, but the film will have captured a lot of information. It's up to your printing abilities or your scanner whether you can get the detail out of the film. Another thing i remember: i once shot a roll of Fuji Natura 1600. It just so happened to be in my camera on a bright sunny day. Meter was pegged to overexposure even at f/16 and 1/1000s. Shot anyway. Dense negatives, but fully scannable. As long as you err on the side of overexposure, you can get away with a lot if you develop for low contrast. But keep in mind there is no benefit to switching around the ISO on your camera. If you want to adjust what the shadows look like, point your meter at them or overexpose to get better shadow detail. Reverse for highlights.
Nothing fancy - I'm using an Epson 4870
Do you have a video where you show how to scan grainy film? I have trouble getting it to look right with my flatbed.
@Itaxok
8 жыл бұрын
scan in tiff and not jpeg if you arnt already.
Which lens were you shooting with?
I'm sorry about your cat.
Honestly, I think your F3 works fine. Love the siamese cat picture
you said you used Rodinal, stand developed. Did you greatly dilute the developer, especially for 2 hours? Did you use 1:100, 1:50, etc? Most stand development I have experienced is for 1 hour.
@alun2007
8 жыл бұрын
+Steve H It's in the description. 1:100.
With the orthodox stand I often get brighter areas around dark objects in the picture. So now I usually give it a twist every 20 minutes.
Thanks for the inspiration, I'll try 6400 soon for some street shots at night :)
+33% per stop...is that calculated progressively? By that I mean that if the original time is "x", one stop would obviously be 1.33x, but would two stops be 1.33 * 1.33 * x = 1.77x, or 1.66x?
i think it's actually called 'semi-stand' in that case, if one wants to be overly precise! ;) i am really looking forward on seeing some prints by the way! i only pushed it to 6400 two times and ended up with horrible results (probably mostly due to bad metering though!), so i never really cared to print them! so if they turn out good for you i guess i ll give it a try again! ;) thanks for this awesome channel by the way! very informative! and i am sorry to hear about your loss! all the best!