5 Frames with Ilford Ortho Plus

I’d been wanting to try some slower films and after a review decided to try some Ilford Ortho Plus. The opportunity to try it out came with a short trip to Somerset, so I put a roll in the Bronica’s 35mm back. I haven’t thought very carefully about what difference it should make to the images, so I just took photos as usual. I developed them in Rodinal 1:50. Part of the reason I used Rodinal was that when I came to take the film out of the camera, I used the catch for opening the back instead of the one to release the back, with the result that there was a light leak. Panicking that I might have fogged the whole film I wanted to develop it quickly, so I could stop any anxiety or self-recrimination about the mistake, and it was quicker to use Rodinal rather than prepare a batch of Caffenol. I scanned using an Epson V700 at 6,400 dpi.

My initial reaction is that there are some that turned out as I hoped they would, and overall the results seem promising. Aside from the three shots that were spoiled by the light leak (lucky there!) they don’t seem any worse than the FP4+ and APX100 I have used recently, and some of them seem a bit better.

One I like more than these is a shot of woodland on the Quantocks. I loved the knarled trees, and thought this shot brought out the shapes in a way I liked: i like the tones, though still work to do on composition. I guess the reduced sensitivity to red compared with “normal” film might have darkened the trees relative to the foliage, though in that case I am not sure why the path did not get darkened too.

The next one reminded me of Nash point on the other side of the Bristol channel, with the pronounced strata in the cliffs, sloping down to a shelf of bare rock and large stones.

However, my favourite after the forest image was another one of the beach.

I am not sure how well this comes out at web resolution, but I liked the tones on this one. At higher resolution there are just about enough really bright tones on the driftwood to provide foreground interest though this is perhaps not so clear on the web resolution one.

Will I try it again? I bought two rolls, so yes. And I will be very tempted to buy some more. Will I have the patience to take shots on Ortho+ and identical shots on Pan F or FP4+ to see what difference the emulsion makes? Probably not. I would be interested to know what experience others have of this film.

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