Tag: Kodak UltraMax 400

A Portrait in UltraMax 400

This is the other half, taken with UltraMax 400 and the Nikon F3HP and scanned on the Pakon 135. A bit of retouch in LR, but overall, there is little difference. The skin tones were important, because he has a rather ruddy complexion (not as bad as mine), and sometimes toning it down removes a lot of other qualities in an image. Above is the “retouched” and below is the untouched.

UltraMax 400 in the Weeds

Initially, I was not especially thrilled with this film, and I hate to say it is most likely because of the packaging is yellow and blue, not colors I like together too much. Agfa Vista 200 has a decidedly more appealing more cheery packaging for me – love the red!

However, now that I have been using it a lot, I am actually rather pleased with it. I can push it in post, I can leave it be, I can mess up the exposures. It’s not too expensive. Neither the UltraMax nor the Vista have the colors of Ektar 100, but when you are using a new-to-you camera, a good length of inexpensive, reliable film for test purposes is necessary.

I admit, I love bright, impressionistic colors and strong contrast. Subtlety is not a strong suit in my preference range, but here, the delicacy of tonality and shading and contrast works to catch that magical time of day when the color fades away . . .