Bill Smith's Photography

 I've been shooting black and white for almost 24 years and processing black white for 18 years, I have a hard time getting a handle on Ferrrania P30 outside their Alpha production. Rollei Supergrain 1+12 was an option I haven't tried. To deal with exposure, I shot my roll with a Nikon F100 with Matrix metering to get the exposure right, even then, I had to do some finessing during the scanning process. I wonder when you're not using D96 the true speed might be a bit slower as Nico of Nico's Film Photography News attests. I might try that in the spring.  Camera: Nikon F100, Nikon AF-D 50 F1.8, and 29 F2.8 lenses.  Film: Ferrania P30, Rollei Supergrain 1+12. 

  P30 is an 80 ISO black and white motion picture stock made famous by the Italian filmmaker Fredirico Fellini and was revived by Film Ferrania a few years ago. Joining Eastman XX and ORWO UN 54 and N74 on the market P30 was marketed towards savvy film photographers looking for a black and white stock to shoot with.  Unlike the American and German options, P30 can be a tricky film to shoot with its narrower latitude, while I love the results, it's not my favourite medium speed film to shoot with. It took me a while to dial things in with the regular production P30, you want to use D96 ideally for processing, failing that,  D76/ID-11 does the trick as well. I found HC110 B was great for the Alpha rolls of P30 but not regular production, things got way too contrasty. The other thing you have to be mindful of is the agitation, as in be gentle, I went with three gentle inversions per minute with D76 1+1.  The other thing, use a camera with an accurate meter and shutter, ...

 Ferrania P30 is a tricky film to shoot with as in you have to careful with metering and processing. I had good luck processing with HC110 B with the Alpha run but with two production rolls, I found the negatives really thin and the scans were crap. Now, D76 or ID-11 1+1 that's a different story I found the negatives much denser which is great for scanning and printing. I used a 13.5 minute time at 20 degrees cesius and I got nice results.  Now I also have a new lens to play with, the Nikkor NC 28 F2, a really fast piece of glass with floating elements like the 24 F2.8. My brother Alex hates this lens, he had a bad example that was probably worked on by a hack repair tech who re-assembled it wrong. My example performs well and I'm pleased with the results. Now the H 28 F3.5 is a super sharp lens but I also found my version vignettes while the faster lens does not.  Camera: Nikon F2S, Nikkor NC 28 F2, Pre Ai K 40 f1.4 lens.  Film: Ferrania P30, D76 1+1.  ...