So, I have recently discovered slide transparancy film, and I like it! My photog teacher had us all go out to a nearby mining town and shoot up a roll of transparancy film. I also found out that, at the lab I went to, transparancy film actually cost a few bucks less to process than regular color film (because there were no prints made). Plus, unlike negatives, I could just look at the slides if I wanted to look at the picture.
So, what transparancy films do you PhotoDopers favor? Cost is an issue, but not a huge issue. At some point, I’m planning to invest in a scanner for scanning film and slides.
I like Kodak Ektacrome back in the day. Looking at the Kodak website they don’t list it anymore, they list Professional Elite Crome.
Overall my favorite speed was 200 which gave me a good balance of speed vs grain.
Kodacrome was always to redish orangeish for my tastes.
One camera shop owner I knew suggested that the first roll of film through a new camera should be slide film. His reasoning was that if the meter in the camera was a bit off, the poor exposure could not be corrected in the printing process. With slides what you see is what you got. So if your slides came out muddy or washed out, it was a meter issue.
I haven’t shot all that many rolls of slide/transparency film, and it’s been a few years at that, but Fuji Velvia has been a popular choice for landscape and nature photography. It’s a warm and very saturated looking film, but it isn’t very accurate–many colors come out very different than you expect. If you’re taking pictures of people I’d stay away from Velvia, but if you have yellow flowers on a green field it can be stunning. I’ve had decent results with it, but it’s a quirky film, and the best results come through experience (that I don’t have) working with those quirks instead of against them.
I’ve only shot a few of rolls of both Fuji Provia and Sensia, and I don’t have the slides handy to remind me of why, but I liked the Provia but not the Sensia. You can probably do some googling for more detailed reviews of both.
Here is an interesting article on the difference between the old Velvia 50 (which is what I have experience with) and the new Velvia 100. He seems to like the new 100 (not 100F) as well or better than the old 50.
I don’t have any experience with Kodak chrome film but I’ve heard people swear by it. Hopefully a few of them will chime in.
I’ve recently been shooting Kodak 100G on the advice of a pro photographer friend. I like it a little better than the Fuji Velvia that I had previously been using as I believe it to be a little more neutral and also a little easier to scan as the dark areas seem to be a little less dense. I’ve been shooting at rated speed but my friend has suggested that it looks ‘better’ shot at 80 ISO and push-processed one stop. I haven’t tried this yet as I only shoot film in large format (the Crown Graphic rules!) and because of the cost, I wait to shoot until I actually have some good ideas.