Analogue film imaging

[dannybgoode]

Does anyone still do it? I have a nice copy of an Olympus OM-10 and would fancy a crack at it. 

Any advice on what film to use, exposure times etc or will it be a case of suck it and see?

[jabeoo1]

I do occasionally dabble.  Whilst this nice weather is upon us grab some Ilford Hp4 (ISO 125).  The grain is really fine, its fast film so you probably want to be keeping things quick (1/125).  Grab a cheap digital light meter !

I use a wind up Robot Star 50 camera, an old spy camera.  So much fun. 

 

[Davey-T]

The last thing I imaged with a SLR was  Hale Bopp, I used colour slide film ( do they still sell it ? ) and developed it myself as you couldn't trust shops to do it.

Dave

[MarsG76]

Sounds like asking for expensive trouble.... I'm thinking about all of the throw away subs and the amount of test shots i take before doing the proper imaging...

On the other hand, I'm very curious on your results.

 

[kens]

Back in the olden days I used Ektachrome 400 slide film, push processed to 800. I believe that Kodak is going to (or already is) manufacture Ektachrome again. Not sure if they'll do the 400 though. Typical exposure was about 1 hour. You can''t go much more than that before reciprocity failure kicks in or you hyper the film.

[tomato]

Yes, I used slide film, 400 ASA I think, and developed it myself. Stick to the brighter DSOs, I presume you are staying in the 21st century for the guiding?

I used to do 20 minute exposures, that's about all I could manage with manual guiding before eyepiece fatigue set in.

[Stub Mandrel]

I got my Yashicamat TLR working last winter and I want to  try some wide field, but too few clear nights.

My plan is to take long exposures with it on a scope mount and see what happens. I'd like to do a very deep orion.

I used to process my own Fujichrome velvia, so I have got a couple of rolls  of Provia 120 to play with :-) You can send off the film and get a complete set of prints and hi-res TIFF scans on a disc back.

 

[dannybgoode]

5 hours ago, tomato said:

Yes, I used slide film, 400 ASA I think, and developed it myself. Stick to the brighter DSOs, I presume you are staying in the 21st century for the guiding?

I used to do 20 minute exposures, that's about all I could manage with manual guiding before eyepiece fatigue set in.

Oh absolutely going the modern guiding route! I just think it would be fun to have a play with. 

I like experimenting with stuff - sometimes an idea works, sometimes not but it’s always fun trying. 

[laser_jock99]

Still got my old film cameras would love to dabble again especially with modern guiding. At the end though I was just digitally scanning slides I'd just taken- so thought may as well just shoot in digital anyway......

My Ektachrome 400 Hale Bopp

[coatesg]

16 hours ago, kens said:

Back in the olden days I used Ektachrome 400 slide film, push processed to 800. I believe that Kodak is going to (or already is) manufacture Ektachrome again. Not sure if they'll do the 400 though. Typical exposure was about 1 hour. You can''t go much more than that before reciprocity failure kicks in or you hyper the film.

+1 for Kodak slide - Ektachrome or Panther (pushed twice). Always found Fuji films too green/blue - Kodak film much more neutral.

 

[Stub Mandrel]

3 hours ago, coatesg said:

Always found Fuji films too green/blue - Kodak film much more neutral. 

As I mostly did plant pictures, Fuji was tops, Kodak always gave you ghastly 'Guy Salmon Postcard' red blobs.

[Ibbo!]

I still have a couple of OM10's and an OM1.

 

I used 400 asa slide film and used a lab that was good until they were taken over and that was it as they could not get the idea of astro.

 had a dabble at devlopng my own (  was successful at college) but could not do it consistantly so went back to sketching till the digtal revolution.

[coatesg]

7 hours ago, Stub Mandrel said:

As I mostly did plant pictures, Fuji was tops, Kodak always gave you ghastly 'Guy Salmon Postcard' red blobs.

Oh yes - for daytime/portrait, Fuji was the better film. It just didn't work at night for me!

[laser_jock99]

Scotchrome 400 slide film was another one I liked- good red sensitivity.

Cygnus

[pete_l]

Where do you intend to get this developed, afterwards?
What few labs there are that still have the equipment would probably just tell you its under-exposed.

[coatesg]

I used to use Peak Processing (https://www.peak-imaging.com) - they were always very good and offered services like push processing, or oddities like cross-processing E6 as C41... If you put a note stating that it is astro imaging (please print everything!) then that should work.

Also, I used to get slides uncut, but even then I have had a whole roll auto cut in completely the wrong places (not by Peak though!). A daylight marker frame should help....

[laser_jock99]

On 24/05/2018 at 04:29, pete_l said:

Where do you intend to get this developed, afterwards?
What few labs there are that still have the equipment would probably just tell you its under-exposed.

.....or worse still cut the negatives in half when sleeving them up!

[MarsG76]

On 24/05/2018 at 13:29, pete_l said:

would probably just tell you its under-exposed.

How true...

 

[MarsG76]

On 24/05/2018 at 06:37, laser_jock99 said:

Scotchrome 400 slide film was another one I liked- good red sensitivity.

Cygnus

This image quality/look/feel reminds me of the kind of images I have been admiring as a teenager in my astronomy books.... 

Awesome... Feeling young again...

 

[laser_jock99]

15 hours ago, MarsG76 said:

This image quality/look/feel reminds me of the kind of images I have been admiring as a teenager in my astronomy books.... 

Awesome... Feeling young again...

 

Astronomy magazine in the 1980's.......Jack Newton, David Malin etc. they were my heros.

[Davey-T]

18 minutes ago, laser_jock99 said:

Astronomy magazine in the 1980's.......Jack Newton, David Malin etc. they were my heros.

Still got my copy of "Night Sky Photography" by H.J.P.Arnold, published 1988, that got me started on my efforts at astrophotography.

Dave

[MarsG76]

6 hours ago, laser_jock99 said:

Astronomy magazine in the 1980's.......Jack Newton, David Malin etc. they were my heros.

 

5 hours ago, Davey-T said:

Still got my copy of "Night Sky Photography" by H.J.P.Arnold, published 1988, that got me started on my efforts at astrophotography.

Dave

Looking back at all of those images taken by the pros using billion dollar massive telescopes and comparing to the images produced by amateurs shows you just how far technology has progressed...

Todays amateur images are 10 times better than pro images from the 80s & 90s.

The question is, outside of instruments such as the Hubble, would, potentially, a professional Observatory be able to produce better images than a amateur today? Considering the limitations imposed by the atmosphere.

[pete_l]

2 hours ago, MarsG76 said:

 would, potentially, a professional Observatory be able to produce better images than a amateur today?

Professional astronomy isn't about producing "images". Its job is to provide scientific data for academic research. And most of the pretty pictures that make it into the popular media are there merely for publicity purposes.

Its also true that the highly processed, coloured, stacked and stretched stuff we amateurs produce has no scientific value or merit - it's art, not science!

[MarsG76]

3 hours ago, pete_l said:

Professional astronomy isn't about producing "images". Its job is to provide scientific data for academic research. And most of the pretty pictures that make it into the popular media are there merely for publicity purposes.

Its also true that the highly processed, coloured, stacked and stretched stuff we amateurs produce has no scientific value or merit - it's art, not science!

Good point

[Davey-T]

Some of the images released by NASA aren't particularly well produced.

Dave