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New Tmax 400

robsteve

Subscriber
Do you know if B&H are shipping the new or the old Tmax 400? I found some at a large Canadian retailer, but all they had were samples from Kodak. They offered to ship me a few rolls of the free samples for just the cost of shipping, so I took them up on it. This retailer didn't expect the new Tmax to be for sale unil sometime next month.

Robert
 

Jack

Sr. Administrator
Staff member
I got 4 sample rolls from my dealer --- I think that is basically what's available at the moment, with the regular supply chain filing up right now. Kodak sent those out so retailers could get experience with it and talk it up... At my retailer, nobody shoots 35mm film any more, so they gave it away.
 

Terry

New member
Do you know if B&H are shipping the new or the old Tmax 400? I found some at a large Canadian retailer, but all they had were samples from Kodak. They offered to ship me a few rolls of the free samples for just the cost of shipping, so I took them up on it. This retailer didn't expect the new Tmax to be for sale unil sometime next month.

Robert
I will be at B&H on Sunday and will have a look and let you know what they say.
 

robsteve

Subscriber
My sample Tmax 400 arrived. It was six rolls shrink wrapped together. The boxes were clearly labled sample and not for resale. It may mean the first batch of this film went out to the dealers as samples and the next batch will go into the retail chain.
 

robsteve

Subscriber
Here is an image from my first roll of the new Tmax 400. I used Xtol 1:1 for the developing. I need a bit more practice with the scanning, but so far this film looks promising. I think it may have a lot less grain than the older Tmax. It also has very smooth tones, but is still quite sharp.

This was shot with the M7 and 50mm Summicron at f2 or f2.8.

 

robsteve

Subscriber
Here is another shot from the same roll. This was inside, but the lady was sitting partially in the sun. This film is sharp, like Kodak says, but also seems to have a great dynamic range.

This is just straight out of the scanner, cropped slightly to straighten it and a resize to web size.



If you have a quick Internet connection, here is the full size scan of this negative, saved as a quality 8 jpeg. It is about 3mb.

http://www.robsteve.com/LUF/AgnesLRG.jpg
 

harmsr

Workshop Member
Kodak stated that they have been shipping the new TMax 400 to distributors for a little while now and that they have no more of the old stock. So now we just need to find the stores with new stock.

I also really like the sample rolls that I had. This is most likely going to become my standard B&W 400 speed film.

Best,

Ray
 

Stuart Richardson

Active member
Any comments on how it handles highlights? The old Tmax 400 had a propensity to blow out the highlights at the slightest provocation...either in exposure or developing. It was a harsh mistress. It's good that they upgraded it though, Tmax 400 was probably the worst kodak black and white film, hopefully the new version will be an improvement.
 

robsteve

Subscriber
Any comments on how it handles highlights? The old Tmax 400 had a propensity to blow out the highlights at the slightest provocation...either in exposure or developing. It was a harsh mistress. It's good that they upgraded it though, Tmax 400 was probably the worst kodak black and white film, hopefully the new version will be an improvement.
Stuart:

Download the full rez scan of the Agnes shot. She had sun hitting her face and the highlights held up well.

http://www.robsteve.com/LUF/AgnesLRG.jpg
 

robsteve

Subscriber
That looks well developed, too. Did you process it the same as the old emulsion?
I just used the numbers Kodak gave in their Tech notes for the new film. It was in Xtol 1:1. I think the new developing time is about 6% longer than the one for the old Tmax 400.

The negatives looked a bit denser than my negatives with the old Tmax 400. I am not sure if it was the film or if I should cut down on the developing time. They looked more like the density of Tri-x or HP5 negatives I used to shoot when I was a teenager.

The full images was straight from the scanner without any curves or level changes in Photshop. I used Silverfast and just adjusted the scan using the silverfast curve controls until it looked good to me. Without the curves adjustment the contrast was a bit too high for my liking.

Robert
 
V

veriwide

Guest
I take it that there is no 120 available ? Any idea if it will show up eventually? I've more or less given up on 35mm since I got the GR but still love to use the Brooks Veriwide 100.
 
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