Kodak Ektar vs. the Portas

[brian steinberger]

Mike, excellent examples! Thanks so much. I especially enjoy the gas pump. That's the style I like to shoot.

[stavrosk]

Ektar will pump up the reds which does not generally flatter people.
So Portra is the best for Portra-its. (duhh)

[mikecnichols]

Mike, excellent examples! Thanks so much. I especially enjoy the gas pump. That's the style I like to shoot.

I'm glad they helped. The gas pump is my favorite Ektar shot I've done so far...I'm looking forward to the fall colors and doing a family portrait amongst the trees.

[Pupfish]

I've been shooting Ektar and older versions of Portra in MF and would say that the color balance is different. Ektar is really superb for vegetation and scenery... (sort of like Kodachrome 25 of old), and Portra is a wonderful skin tone reproducing film (like Supra or Kodacolor of old). Both now have very fine grain but I got more much more excited about Ektar availability in 120 a couple of years back due to the it's better scanability at high resolutions needed from smaller formats like 35mm and 645.
So long as you're into experimenting with these films you might also want to try adding to the mix some Fujicolor Pro 160S (or whatever it is they're calling it now). I find it has extremely nice neutrals and super fine grain much like Ektar and the long dynamic range of Portra. (Subdued contrast is not always ideal for punchy sunsets, however).

[DREW WILEY]

Right on the Kodak website there are comparison charts between Ektar and the various Portras, both
previous and current. It has about the same contrast as the now discontinued 160VC, but is slightly
more saturated. Due to the level of saturation, it will seemingly exaggerate skin blemishes etc. But
this is only in comparison to traditonal negative films, which are deliberately toned-down for pleasing
skintone effect. It is NOT as contrasty as any transparency film; and it can reproduce a wide range of
hue quite faithfully, IF you expose it at the proper color temperature. I've mentioned this on a variety
of threads. If you don't properly filter for color balance, if things are too far out of whack, no amount
of fussing around in PS is going to give you an ideal negative. All three color layers have to be correctly exposed in relation to one another to begin with. This is also true of Portra and other color
neg films. But as the saturation curve goes up, so does the accentuation of any potential errors.

[brian steinberger]

So long as you're into experimenting with these films you might also want to try adding to the mix some Fujicolor Pro 160S (or whatever it is they're calling it now). I find it has extremely nice neutrals and super fine grain much like Ektar and the long dynamic range of Portra. (Subdued contrast is not always ideal for punchy sunsets, however).

I can't find Fuji 160S anymore. The only color negative films I can currently find are 400H and Reala.

[Athiril]

Ektar will pump up the reds which does not generally flatter people.
So Portra is the best for Portra-its. (duhh)

Learn to colour balance. Skin tones have huge separation from reds on Ektar.

[brucemuir]

^
I hope that pilot aint stoned lol
j/k

[Athiril]

^
I hope that pilot aint stoned lol
j/k

Nah, he was the front passenger. I was in the back in a harness with the door off.

[2F/2F]

Right on the Kodak website there are comparison charts between Ektar and the various Portras, both
previous and current. It has about the same contrast as the now discontinued 160VC, but is slightly
more saturated. Due to the level of saturation, it will seemingly exaggerate skin blemishes etc. But
this is only in comparison to traditonal negative films, which are deliberately toned-down for pleasing
skintone effect. It is NOT as contrasty as any transparency film; and it can reproduce a wide range of
hue quite faithfully, IF you expose it at the proper color temperature. I've mentioned this on a variety
of threads. If you don't properly filter for color balance, if things are too far out of whack, no amount
of fussing around in PS is going to give you an ideal negative. All three color layers have to be correctly exposed in relation to one another to begin with. This is also true of Portra and other color
neg films. But as the saturation curve goes up, so does the accentuation of any potential errors.

Emphasis added because this is very important with any contrasty and saturated material. The same characteristics that give it that special look also give you less room for slop than some other films. Proper exposure of all the color layers is very important with this film. That means you will have the easiest time printing if you filter it:

- any time it is cloudy
- any time it is overcast
- any time your subject is primarily in the shade or in window light
- any time it is more than a few hours either side of noon.
- any time you shoot under artificial light that is not daylight balanced (i.e. most artificial light in our day-to-day lives)

Given what many people tend to shoot, this means that most people should filter this film a good deal of the time. The same is true of any color neg material, but especially important with this film due to the fact that it's contrast lowers it's latitude for imbalanced color.

"Learn[ing] to color balance" only works if there is enough density on all three layers to do the balancing. If not, you can balance brighter areas, but the lower tones will appear "wonky," or vice versa. So if you cannot or will not filter, at least give yourself some extra exposure to allow more workability in color balancing.