mframes

Ilford PanF 50 is the slowest black and white film I’ve used. At ASA 50, you either need lots of bright light or a very stable and still camera (and subject) to make an image with it. It never dawned on me to try rating it faster to make it more of a ‘general purpose’ film stock. Then I saw a post on Instagram from a photographer I follow and I thought – wow. His image still had the amazing silky tones that the film is renown for, as well as  it seeming to retain the expected fine detail, too. I’ve always viewed PanF as a niche film. One to save for those special, still occasions where you can take your time and ponder over the shot you’re about to take. I love that slow methodical approach with film, but at a speed of ASA 50, I find that I need to make an effort to shoot all (or most) of the film at one time otherwise it’ll just sit in the camera waiting for me to find the right lighting and conditions to use it….which could take weeks…or months. So I decided to try rating my PanF at 400 therefore giving me much more opportunity to use it day-to-day. It took me ages to decide what to use to develop it when I shot it at its ASA 50 box speed, so for developing it at 400 I had no idea what to do. So I fell back to my current preference that has seemed to work amazingly well with everything I’ve used it for so far – stand development with Kodak HC-110 dilution G. Agitate for one minute and leave it alone for an hour. I had no idea what to expect when I took the developed film out the tank. I’m amazed at how versatile this film is.

BronicaSQA

Ilford PanF Plus 50