Anais Shooting a Game of Checkers

This morning I went for another walk in the Cho Lon area of Saigon, this time with my new buddy Anais.  Anais just recently got herself a new Canon 500d with a 50mm f/1.8 lens attached to it, and wanted to play around with her new toy.  I set a goal for myself as we set out, which was quite simple:  shoot through a roll of Fuji Provia 100F film to test it for colors and skin tones.

Checkers and Newspapers - Part Of Saigon Daily Life

Anais is super fun to hang out with, mostly because she’s a bit crazy, and she’s fun to shoot with, mostly because she reminds me of myself when I started taking photos.  By that I mean that she’ll snap a shot of pretty much any object she stumbles upon.  She’s 18, which makes her half my age, and walking around with her alternately makes me feel really young and really old.  While we don’t seem to share the same tastes in music, we do have a few things in common, one of which is that we both love taking pictures, and another being that we both dig old, torn up blue jeans and English workman style shoes.

Don't Leave Home Without 'Em

I like quirky people.  My girlfriend is fond of saying “Jake – all your friends are crazy, but in different ways.  And you too, you’re cuckoo too!”.  Yes, it’s true, most of my friends are twisted in one way or another, and Anais seems to fit the bill.  She likes making weird faces.  If you see her in a bar she’ll be the one bouncing up and down and running back and forth.  To top it off she’s got a filthy mouth that’s she’s not afraid to use in public, and a dirty sense of humor.  All in all, a winner in my book.

Nudge Nudge, Wink Wink, Say No More...

Well, this post was supposed to be about film, now wasn’t it?  Maybe I should veer back on course…

Since I wanted to test out Fuji Provia for skin tones and colors, it seemed pretty obvious to me what I should be shooting – portraits and fruit in some nice morning light.  The results, I must say, were very, very impressive.  I’ve sort of been moving up the chain, starting with color negative films and moving up into professional slide films, so it shouldn’t really surprise me that Provia is my favorite film that I’ve checked out so far, but I’m blown away by how fantastic the skin tone replication is.

Beautiful Skin Tones and Rich Pastely Colors

Color representation is gorgeous with Provia film, the only problem that I found being that the yellows are far too strong, with the highlight details being burnt out long before they are in other colors.

Banana Peddler

You can see on the portrait above that the skin tones came out perfectly – but on the bananas nearest his face some problems are showing with the highlight details starting to be lost.  I shot this with my 60mm macro lens, not my old school 50mm, and plus I wasn’t shooting wide open, so it shouldn’t be the lens causing contrast issues.  I was bracketing my shots all morning, and the shot I took that was one stop down showed great color on the bananas, but his skin was looking too dark, not to mention the light I lost in his eyes and under his cap.

Strawberry Red

Reds, however, were a completely different story!  After shooting digital for many years, I’m used to having to worry about reds burning out every chance they get.  Not with Provia.  In almost every situation, reds I shot today stood out bolder and brighter than they did in real life, however never over-saturated and never blowing out highlights when I suspected they might.  On Fuji Provia these strawberries turned out looking much more luscious and delicious than they actually did to me this morning in the market.

Color Conundrum

In this shot, the greens and oranges came out rich and bright, the reds are a deep crimson hue, but still looking natural – but take a peek at the yellow apples in the upper left hand corner.  The white styrofoam protective wrapping on them seems okay, but those bright yellows seem to be the only spot in the photo that turned out too hot.

Yellows, Hotter Than Hell

And finally, this last one is just a wreck.  My exposure seems great on everything in the shot except the yellows, which are just hot as hell and lacking any semblance of detail.  So – my conclusion for the day is that Fuji Provia is absolutely stunning for portraiture, does a really great job reproducing pastels, creates eye-catching reds that pop out of the frame and yet still look realistic, and is impressive with other colors in the spectrum…  until you get to yellows that is.  Watch your ass with the yellows.

After I ran through my roll of Provia today I popped in a spool of Agfa APX 100 black & white.  I fired off 25 of the 36 frames this morning and doubt it will take me long to get through the other 11, but with lag time on b&w processing here, and the New Year’s holiday coming up, it might be a week or so before we can look at them.  I’m hoping that the charming shot I got of Anais spitting in the marketplace came out well.  The big test for me with the Agfa will be whether or not it can stand up to the Ilford PAN 100, so it’s going to have a run for it’s money.

And for those of you who like to read my blog more for the stories than for the techie photog geek crap – keep your pants on, we’ll get back to that stuff in just a short while…