Fp4 + vs Delta100: A Head-to-head Comparison

[@richardsimms251]

This is a very good and educational video. Thank you

[@charliescott5596]

Nice vid Jonathan, really appreciate the lengths you go to give us great content! Looking forward to the next one. :)

[@Kref3]

Nice work. BUT there is one problem. You shoot both at box speed and then make a standard development as described by the manufacturer. I personally took quite some effort in really measuring FP4+. I shot photos of a grey background at different ISO based on the zone system, put the resulting negatives on my enlarger and measured the density above base and fog of the shots to find the film speed that will give me a zone 1 density of 0.11. And I realized that the actual film speed for my process is not ISO125 but ISO80. I then tried different development times until I found the development time to get me a Zone 8 density of 1.30. Since I am considering to use Delta 100 in the future, I was looking for (but have not found yet) is a comparison between FP4 and Delta100 in which the photographer has measured the actual film speed and also adjusted the development for the same gradient. And then do the side by side comparison. Because only then you will be able, to really compare the films. In your results you can clearly see that Delta has considerably less shadow density, so you probably shot it at a too fast speed. Had you shot it at ISO 80 instead of 100, it probably would have looked better. Really important is to keep in mind: With BW film the box speed is more or less a suggestion, but not necessarily accurate.

[@kalenderquantentunnel9411]

Spot on comment! Listen to this guy! 👏👏👏

[@PFW308]

A well thought out comparison, including looking at the grain structure. Thanks.

[@ZachBie]

Great comparison between the two films, I love them both. I’m an avid film shooter and have shot probably 100-150 rolls of FP4+ and I’m at around 100 rolls of Delta 100. All of my recent work has been 35mm. I self-developed and scan using a Nikon D750 and Nikkor 55mm f/2.8. For viewers, just know that how you scan the film will change the look of the film quite a lot. So someone’s examples may or may not match yours. Delta 100 pushed to 200 in D76/ID-11 is my all time favorite combination. Super sharp and with a nice pop to the negatives. Great for landscape shots and generally enough speed for most “Street” photography.

[@metalfingersfilm]

great work Johnathan! love how in-depth these are!! inspiring for us and our videos! :D

[@JonathanNotley]

Thanks, I thought it might be a bit on the long side but I don’t see the point in cutting out the process if it’s relevant to the final image

[@xaviegarcia2657]

Excellent vid! Would love to see more “in the field” tests and comparisons. Thanks for the education!

[@mueslimuncher1950]

I guessed right from the start, and while the Delta shots looked better, I've been using FP4 for decades. I would reckon the difference is about half a grade in multigrade filters! I won't run out of film any time soon, but your efforts are much appreciated, especially in such adverse conditions. Keep it up!

[@JM603]

Nice comparison. Enjoyed this, thanks.

[@Adam-pm1cy]

I noticed your channel today, and have binged watched most of them by now, and I have to say that your channel is by far the best one dealing with analog photography!! Will there be any upcoming videos in the future? I hope so!

[@cowboyyoga]

Thank you Jonathan! A really helpful video ! )))

[@rvbsoundfactory]

Super late to the party, think I'm more interested in the Delta 100. Like you said it as a little bit more (pop contrast) which I personally like. These days good software can do a nice job of reducing contrast. Now, the search is on for a good developer for Delta 100.

[@baptistepayendessinphoto]

Thanks a lot for this comparison, I'm new to film photography and I've just started to develop. And seeing some good comparison will help me to know if my issues are coming from my skills or from the film I use !

[@KAUSTUBH447]

Very informative video. Loved it. Thanks.

[@randallstewart175]

I zeroed my system into FP-4+ years ago, and in recent times I've felt a bit guilty for not running this type of comparison with a view to modernizing my film choices. After running those this comparison, I'' stay with FP-4+ and unload my guilt. I have to say that I rarely print larger than 11x14, and I have no grain issues in any event.

[@emotown1]

I was looking at an old issue of "Practical Photography" magazine, circa 1994 - which did an in depth look at enlargements of very small crops of various b&w 35mm films in different developers. So this would have been in the days before scanners were invented - thus these are all optical enlargements. Looking at the blow-ups of the Delta 100 and the FP4+ negatives, it is obvious right away that Delta 100 is the much finer grained film and is giving much more detail. In fact, it is a just as big a difference as that between the graininess of Tri-X pushed to 1600 and FP4+ at box speed! So, the lacklustre difference in detail you found between Delta 100 and FP4+ has got to be down to scanning acting as some kind of bottleneck. My own experience printing (optically, in the darkroom - yes, even though it;s 2022) from Delta 100 in 35mm was immediately that it takes the fine detail up a whole notch from FP4+. Which is why, when i watched your results I thought "Hm that's odd!" and I got the old issues of PP out. The only real caveat I can think of with Delta 100 is that the highlights/whites tend to run off the print faster with Delta 100 - there is not the gentle shoulder or roll-off into the highlights you get with classic emulsions like FP4+ or TriX. So, Delta 100's whites look unnaturally bright (although they are probably accurate enough) without any burning-in manipulation - once burned in the detail is definitely there though, in the highlights. Ditto for Delta 400.

[@nvrumi]

Oh my, I am late to the game here. What a difficult task you undertook for this video. In reading through the comments I noticed a couple of them that took a fairly hard response to your approach. I think both were a little off the mark given the thesis for your comparison. You compared the results of using two films to capture two instances of the same scene based on exposures calculated from box speeds and developed using standard times in the same developer. The basis of comparison was scans made using a digital camera and a macro lens. This is my understanding of your methods and materials. The results were some relatively minor differences between the scans, with similar sharpness but differences in contrast and grain. Please correct me if my take-aways are incorrect. One commenter then provides a good good synopsis of testing a film (FP4) using a gray card and the Zone System for exposure and adjusting development to obtain his desired density curve. Ah, there is another Ansel Adams fan! I love the Zone System, but it doesn't work well for roll films unless one is shooting an entire roll of one scene under constant lighting conditions. I still use it, but understand that I am not matching my film development (rendered contrast) to the scene contrast. But the approach works well for sheet film and field cameras. (Maybe I'll get there someday!) I considered going to all this work, but decided that it isn't worth it for use with roll films and varied subjects. I can meter the scene (or trust the matrix metering of my camera) so that I get detail in the highlights and shadows and trust the latitude of my film to render a negative that I can work with. Another commenter rightly points out that choice of developer makes a difference in the resulting negative. However, you declared your choice of developer and that you used the same developer and factory development times for your experiments. You were not presenting the results of experiments to determine the optimum choice of developer and development times. Welcome to the joy of analog photography! I thought about this particular problem some 50-years ago when I learned about the d-log E curve and the Zone System. I would have invested a lot more effort in my film and developer choice if I was shooting sheet film with a field camera back then (and now). But I realized that everything is a compromise when shooting roll film and a variety of subjects and finally standardized on Plus-X and Tri-X developed in D-76 (usually 1:1 dilution). I sometimes pushed the Tri-X a stop or two with extended development. I don't see much talk about the Zone System among roll-film shooters anymore. What I do see are photographers who will meter the highlight and shadows and then expose such that they get detail in both (if possible) and then bracket for critical shots. So, they are using a modified Zone System whether they realize it or not. Now that I'm starting to shoot film again, this is what I do (or trust the matrix metering in my camera and bracket if in doubt). I'm sure I'll start developing my film again in the next year. And where that leaves my comment is that I'll pick a film stock and spend some time with it. Plus-X is long gone, so there are a few choices for film at the 100 ISO speed. The primary candidates seem to be FP4, Delta 100, and T-Max 100. I don't know if Fuji is still producing B&W film. (I need to look.) I like your results with FP4 because of the slightly less contrast than Delta 100, which will give a bit more latitude in exposure. I'll look to see if you did a similar comparison with HP5 and Delta 400. All in all, this was a fun and interesting video. It provided another data point for me to review. I'm a little jealous of your Hasselblad. ;) I'll probably wind up with a Bronica for 6x6. Thanks for the hard work.

[@kuraxxkura]

Great in depth comparison between the two films. Do more of these kind of videos with other film stocks. Maybe the new and old fuji acros?

[@JonathanNotley]

I actually planned that when I heard they were bringing it back - I have my last roll of the old stock in my fridge somewhere. Thanks for your support!

[@johnevans7495]

I used to use FP4 back in the 80s as was always easy to get... It very often had a tendency to underexpose when rated at 125 asa, fine grain though . My favourite at the time was kodak plus x ,a great all rounder, was a bit grainier than the FP4. Got a present of a delta film recently , so will do a bit of black and white again!

[@alexander.starbuck]

Bro, WONDERFUL video! Great content but, what do you use to film these videos? And how do you grade? Looks beautiful

[@davidv.kutaliya]

Thanks

[@jllanesphoto]

Thanks for a great video...

[@terrywbreedlove]

I shot my first rolls of FP4 a few weeks ago. For me it makes a great street film. Delta makes a great landscape film. IMHO

[@derekperkins7343]

I spent quite some time looking for comparison videos on this subject. I feel that I wasted most of it watching dreadful life-style/second rate entertainers churning out very poor content. Thank you for your sensible, logical piece of work which did what it said on the tin without additional B----S---.

[@joeltunnah]

Using Ilfosol-3 to develop Delta really enhances its tonality, in my experience. But you really can’t go wrong with either of these films. Nice comparison, thank you.

[@Arclight2020]

Nice comparison, thanks for sharing! =D I had been using HC-110 and Rodinal, but have since settled more on Rodinal due to convenience. Though I shoot a variety of b&w films, Fompan 200's my favorite.

[@MB-or8js]

You barely see any grain in 120 films of FP4+ when using Xtol as developer. I like the wide tonal grey range, therefore FP4+ is my first choice.

[@srfurley]

The Ilford ortho film is not new; they have made it for many years, but until recently only in sheet form. It was originally intended mainly for copy work, which is what I used it for about twenty years ago. It would be interesting to see a comparison between the chromogenic XP2 and the conventional silver HP5.

[@abelsinglavalls9926]

Hi Jonathan. thanks for your computation, i think really interesting. Anyway in my experience you can have the best of your FP4 Film with the HC110 ( I'm really happy with this combination) in the other hand, in my opinion, the Delta 100 gives you the best with the Ilfotech DDX. I think it give less contrast ( like you said is really easy to add in post) and more definition. Anyway, I love both film, specially FP4 with HC110.

[@johnilko2964]

Great comparison. Thanks for all your work. I wonder if the FP4 is brighter and less contrast is because it has a wider latitude? I have never used Delta, but FP4 is my favorite film.

[@JonathanNotley]

I'm not 100% sure on that but remember my developer was weighted in favour of Fp4+. If it does have more latitude it's funny how Ilford waited a few decades and released something 'worse'... I prefer FP4+ too

[@GeirBakkenVestfold]

Nice comparison, I have had good results with both films, but never compared them like this.

[@gabi3744]

Nice comparasion. What tripod head/plate you use for your Hasselblad? Thx!

[@JonathanNotley]

It’s a manfrotto geared head I bought for large format. It weighs a ton and I’m looking at a Gitzo replacement at some point.

[@jacovanlith5082]

To complete this fine comparison I would like to see you make two 100 x100 cm enlargements on a black and white bromide paper. You could use a Durst with the double condensor set or the unit with the graded filter head ( but not changing the grade). I think the FP4 print will have a more "photograpic" look. For a studio test of the two Ilford films, try to borrow a mannequin from a lady's wear shop. Place a bunch of flowers, some shiny glass and metal objects. Some teddy bears and children's toys. I wonder what you will think of the negs.

[@FlosBlog]

The extra bit of light it captures is really the preferable perk to the lower grain in my book 🤔

[@jacovanlith5082]

Why is f/22 a crazy setting ?

[@artistjoh]

I am old enough to remember FP3, which became FP4 in 1968. I think it became plus in 1990-ish, or maybe the late 80's. Tried lots of other films but always returned to FP4 because of the latitude and around 100-ish ISO tabular grains are not the obvious benefit they are over 400 ISO.

[@igaluitchannel6644]

The differences are difficult to see when scanning alone. They really appear during printing. The Delta looks flatter than FP-4. The difference in sharpness is not great.

[@silviopfeifer8094]

ok, you used the HC110 developer , a good alrounder. you can improfe your results with t grain film when you use special developers . Tetenal ultrafine t plus , Spur HRX , Kodak T Max. they work better fpr t grain film.

[@jacovanlith5082]

Your 50 mm Hasselblad lens can be compared to a 32 mm lens of a 24 x 26 mm camera..

[@silviopfeifer8094]

The tp4 and the Delta100 are two completly different emulsions. The fp4 is a classic emulsion and the Delta is a so called flat kristal emulsion. what developer did you use for each film ? a developer that works great for the fp4 is not always good for a delta film.

[@rodrigopfs]

Where are you?

[@jimiwexler1260]

You have some killer noise reduction for that wind over ur voice!

[@ML-rm3vk]

Fp4 works better for me the scale is better longer and more easily printer

[@buyaport]

I think that Delta films are literally "overrated", meaning you should pull them at least one stop. Then they provide you with excellent clear images you won't get with "classical" films. like FP4/HP5. I love using Delta 400 at ISO 200. But for normal use I prefer HP5+. FP4 I have tried but don't like it (perhaps not oldschool enough?). Delta 100 is great at ISO 50, but I don't like tripods, so I rarely use it (but if you are in for superclean result in architecture there is no better film). Delta 3200 is rubbish for normal applications, I guess it was just a marketing gag.

[@westonharby165]

Terrible comparison. A big part of black and white film photography is what developer you use, dilution, and for how long you develop, etc. different developers can make the same film look like two completely different films. For example, HP5 in rodinal is gritty, trainee, and contrasty, while xtol1+3 it's grain-free and sharp. There were no mentions of anything developer side. Additionally in my experience, darkroom prints are much sharper than then even the best flatbed scans (drum scans are the best of them all), And I personally prefer FP4 in the darkroom to Delta 100. However I prefer to scan Delta 100. Waste of my 30 mins

[@JonathanNotley]

Yes there was a specific mention of controlling it for developer - I’d need 40 A12 backs and a pack mule to do the kind of comparison you’re asking for. Furthermore sharpness is absolute, the film that’s sharper in the flatbed is sharper in the darkroom and sharper in the drum scanner

[@westonharby165]

@@JonathanNotley Ok, that's true about the sharpness, my b. kzbin.info/www/bejne/oZvTcqWAhZmDj7c This guy does it. He's done it for panf+, HP5+, Tri-x, FP4+, and others. Watch this vid for the differences the developer makes. There are good and bad developers for all films, so controlling developer could be hurting one and helping the other. For example, panf+ in low dilution rodinal looks great, but that same Dev-delution combo doesn't hold for HP5+. More importantly, you should be developing your own film so you can actually comment on what different developers do to a film stock. I'm saying this to be dick, but rather bc youtube really lacks this content. You'd really set yourself apart if you took the time to experiment and find a great film stock and Dev combo.

[@JonathanNotley]

I develop and scan everything myself. You liked me a developer comparison video not a film comparison video.