Rolling with Kodak Ektar 100+2

As I mentioned in my last post, I don’t think I’ll be using Kodak Ektar as my daily driver in my film camera; the saturated colours and high contrast doesn’t really go with the way I want my images to look, however seeing as I bought a pack of two I thought I’d experiment a bit with this one and shoot beyond box speed.

For anyone that doesn’t know what pushing and pulling film is, you’re essentially telling your light meter that the film is either rated at a higher ISO or a lower ISO so you over or under expose the image when taking the picture. This is then made up for in the developing stage by soaking the film in chemicals for longer or shorter to compensate for the exposure. For example, Kodak Ektar is rated at 100 ISO, this is called the box speed. But if I’m shooting in an environment where 100 ISO will mean that my shutter speed will be too slow or my aperture too wide, which will let in more light but mean that the image might have motion blur or an out of focus area that I want to be in focus, then I can tell the camera to push it 2 stops to 400 ISO and fix the exposure by developing it for longer.

Which is what I did with this roll. I exposed this roll at 400 ISO in two very different environments. The first half I shot while down in Dorset visiting my grandparents on the Jurassic coast, and the second half I filled while snowboarding in the alps at The 3 Valleys Ski Resort.

We can see that by pushing this roll of Ektar there is a substantial increase in grain, which isn’t saying a lot considering there was virtually none in the box speed roll. This is especially visible in the shadows in the bottom right corner of this photo of the bay.

There is also an increase in contrast by pushing this film. These photos were taken on bright sunny days yet the tops of the cliffs look incredibly dark and the people look like shadowy figures in the distance. Interestingly I actually prefer this look over the box speed shots of Ektar as it gives it a harsher look which I think comes across as more artistic and less editorial.

Another interesting note is that pushing this film causes a more stark separation of highlights and shadows, due to the increased contrast.

For some reason I find myself really drawn to this image taken from my chalet balcony. It’s out of focus, poorly lit and there isn’t really any element of composition. To be honest I was just testing the film to make sure it was still rolling after travelling for a couple of days. But if it’s a game of finding beauty in the imperfections then this photo should be absolutely stunning.

This was the last image in the roll, I went on a bit of a hike during a cloudy day to try and hunt down an image when I came across this vegetation trying to make itself know amongst the evergreen forest. It’s another one where we can really see a lot of detail disappearing in the shadows of the trees on the right hand side but there’s still enough sharpness to pick out the ski lifts in the background. Other than that, I do just enjoy it as a composition.

For the full unedited album, dust and all, check out my Flickr here.