All in Film

Using Kodak PhotoCD Files in 2019

I recently moved house, and doing my best attempt to Marie Kondo my office during the move, I ended up finding some things that I thought were long gone. One of which was a collection of PhotoCDs from 1996. The PhotoCD format is long since dead, so I wondered if I would have any chance at finding a way to use the files. After a little digging, I was able to get them to open! Here’s the full story…

Video: Scanning film on a 20 Year Old Film Scanner

I recently came across a set of negatives that I took about a year ago, and I realised that I had never properly scanned them. This gave me the opportunity to record the process, something I had wanted to do for a while, but had never gotten around to it. So, in this video I show you the process of scanning film using a dedicated, if somewhat old, film scanner.

T-Pan vs Real Film: Round 2

I wrote a post yesterday where I compared my new T-Pan for Lightroom Presets , applied to some Fuji X-Pro 2 images, against some real film. It wasn’t meant to be taken too seriously, and wasn’t meant as a scientific comparison. I wanted to show, that I could mix images from both together in a single story and they would work together well. However, someone suggested that It wasn’t a fair comparison, because the film I was using Ilford XP2 wasn’t “real” black and white film.

Fuji X-Pro 2 + T-Pan for Lightroom vs Real Film

I’m really proud of how well my T-Pan set of Lightroom presets turned out. I’m not just saying that as a shameless plug. I set about creating something that would work well to emulate black and white film, and I think the results work really well. I’m sure it’s not perfect. It’s not a full simulation as such, but rather an artistic interpretation, but I think it comes close. To see just how close I decided to do a little experiment

More Adventures in Film

I’ve been shooting some film again recently. I really do like shooting film, and I would shoot more were it not for the down sides, of cost, and scanning and so on. Being a perfectionist when it comes to image quality, it frustrates me that I can’t get film scanned properly without doing it myself, and being a busy professional, it frustrates me to have to take the hours it takes to properly scan film. 

Ektachrome is Back !

The has been several photography related announcements at CES this year, but I think the one I am most excited about is the news that Kodak is going bring back Ektachrome. Ektachrome is a slide (positive) film made by Kodak since the 60s and is generally considered to be one of the best slide films that you could buy at the time. It was discontinued by Kodak in 2012. If you’ve seen any issue of National Geographic during that time frame you’ve probably seen Ektachrome, as it was the film of choice for many National Geographic photographers.

Shooting Kodak Ektar

In my recent rediscovery of film shooting, I decided to try out a roll of Kodak Ektar 100. I've never shot with this film before, but it gets a lot of good reviews online, and having used and scanned a roll, I can say that they're not unfounded. I headed out on a sunny(ish) autumn day in Dublin and took some shots around the city using my trusty Eos 5 with a 17-40 f4/l lens.

Recent Adventures in Film: Part 1

As I mentioned in a recent post, I’ve recently been shooting more film. It’s been somewhat of a therapeutic exercise, although, the length of time it’s taken me to scan the film has been somewhat frustrating, but more on that in a minute. It’s also been a bit of a learning experience, both shooting and post-processing the film. For this part, I’m going to look at some of my recent attempts at shooting colour negative. I have some black and films white left in with the lab for processing, and I’ll talk about that in part 2.

Street Photo Diary: Issue 17 - Vintage Edition

As I mentioned on my main blog recently, I've been scanning in lots of my old negatives and slide film recently. One of the patterns that's emerged from looking at my old shots is that I had an interest in Street Photography even from the early days of my photographic interests. Of course I didn't know it was a genre called "Street Photograhy" at the time. I just like taking pictures around the city. Most of these were taken between 15-20 years ago, on my trusty Canon Eos 5.

The Real Velvia, Provia and Acros

One of the things that people love about their Fuji X-Series cameras is the film simulation modes and the rich colour that they give out of the camera. Many of these film simulation modes are based on actual films that Fuji makes, or used to make. Provia, Velvia and Astia are slide films, while the new (in the X-Pro 2) Acros is based on the Neopan Acros film. Lately I’ve been scanning some of my old film in and I realised that I have photos taken with some of these films, so I thought I’d share what the real thing looks like.

Dusting off my old Film Scanner

After being without it for a while, I finally managed to get my trusty old film scanner back out of storage recently. I had been thinking about shooting more film lately, but I had been kind of disappointed with the results that I was getting. I had put my film scanner in storage some years ago when I had moved house, so I was relying on scans from the Lab. Lab scans done at the time of processing are very poor, especially compared to a dedicated film scanner. So, before I gave up on the project, I wanted to remind myself of what a good quality scan could be like, so I retrieved my old film scanner and I think the results will speak for themselves.

Kodak brings Super 8 Back from the (Almost) Dead

While Nikon may have had the big photographic announcements at CES this year, in my opinion, the more exciting news came from Kodak. Yes, Kodak, remember them? Kodak announced that they’re creating a new super 8 film camera. The new camera and service will blend digital and film technologies, and seeks to capitalise on the analogue resurgence. As someone’s who’s shot Super 8 in the past, I for one am very excited about this.