Time to break out the good stuff. I started with some Kodak Portra 800. I wanted Portra 400 or 160, but film scarcity being what it was, I had to get the 800. It rendered the colors pretty well overall. I did have to adjust some of the pictures, as they skewed more towards cyan and green.
The Portra 800 did present quite a bit of grain, maybe a little more than I was hoping for. However, it isn’t distracting from the photos overall.
I also started with a fresh batch of Cinestill developer. I kept the blix (combined bleach and fixer) as that was still good, but the last results from the old developer were not that great. I really wanted a good result, so starting with fresh stock was a must. (FYI: Normally, you can stretch the developer out to about 8 rolls of 35mm according to the instructions, but you must add time with each roll to compensate for the chemical exhaustion.)
I was fighting the back light a little bit in the windows. I had to up my exposure to compensate. However, I had my aperture wide open and I was just on the edge of acceptable shutter speeds. I was down to 1/30 of a second in most of these shots.
Development Details
- Film: Kodak Portra 800
- Camera ISO setting: 800
- Developer: CineStill C41 Developer at 102ºF
- Development Time: 3.5 Minutes
- Development Agitation: Kodak Style (5x inversions every 30 seconds)