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Background: Because the demise of Kodak B&W Plus-X emulsion (31), shooting B&W outside is challenging. 5222/7222 is the only Kodak B&W camera stock. Outside it is has an exposure index of 250. In the test described below the daylight was metered at 8,000 foot-candles. At 24fps this would require a f stop setting of around f64, or a very dark ND filter. Most lenses are sharpest at about 2 stops from open, this is impossible for 22 outside without using an ND15 or ND18 to get f5.6 or below. The contrast of direct sunlight & shadows is a struggle for any photographic medium.
5222 vs 5234 B&W in Direct Sunlight
Test Information
Film Information
5222 Kodak B&W 35mm DOUBLE-X Negative
Exposure Index: EI 200(Tungsten) 250(Daylight)
5234 Kodak Panchromatic B&W Duplicate Negative
Exposure Index: ? Rated EI 6 for test.
Lighting
Direct mid day sunlight - Metered @ 8000 fc
Camera Setup
Mitchell Super 35mm High Speed 4 perf 75mm prime lens
5222: f11 ND9 @ 24fps 1/48sec
5234: f5.6 @24fps 1/48sec
Processing
Kodak D96 B&W Negative Process
Transfer
Spirit 2K HD 1080P 23.98 1.78 extraction
da vinci 2K+ DVNR2K
Settings constant for all transfers.
Test Results: The grain structure and response of 5234 is clearly finer. It is a very smooth image and out performs the 5222 outside. It is availible from Kodak in both 35mm and 16mm. We will do a test of 16mm soon, I am sure the diffrence will be even more dramatic. While this stock would be hard to shoot indoors, outside it is beautiful. If processed D97 it would have an exposure index of about 18 allowing for less direct sunlight. It is also 5 cents cheaper per foot in 35mm.
The test transfer is available here:
(right click and save link as)
We tried youtube but the compression does not allow for good comparison. This h.264 has compression artifacts but allows a comparison.
