This time we will test the photographic film of all times -– the legendary Kodak Gold 200. This is a fresh film with an expiration date of 07/2019, which was not imported to Russia for a long time, but since the fall of 2017 its supply has been restarted.
Based on flashbacks from the 90s, many people think that Kodak Gold is cheap consumer photographic film. In fact, this is not quite true. Actually, in the lineup, Gold occupies an intermediate position between the cheapest Color Plus and professional Portra, both in quality and price. But in the 90's the difference in cost was so insignificant that many distributors and stores preferred to buy and sell higher quality and more reliable and Kodak Gold.
This film was proven not only by its trademark, much-loved golden tones, but also by its good tolerance to exposure errors. In other words, average users (not only professional photographers) could shoot this film with almost any camera, even the simplest ones with inaccurate exposure metering, and it was difficult to ruin the film or get a completely unacceptable result.
Let's put it to the test. For this purpose we will shoot Kodak Gold film in the exposure range from -6 EV to +10 EV and observe how the image will behave with such significant metering errors. We will evaluate the detail in highlights/shadows and of course the overall color balance of the photo. For this test we took an Olympus OM-1 camera with a 50 f/1.2 lens, shooting in manual M mode.
For normal exposure we considered spot metering with an external spotmeter of the faces in such a way that their tone corresponded to the Adams VI zone. The aperture on all shots was set to f/2.8. The shutter speeds for the above sequence of photos (from left to right) were: 1/1000 (-6EV), 1/500 (-5EV), 1/250 (-4EV), 1/125 (-3EV), 1/60 (-2EV), 1/30 (-1EV), 1/15 (Normal Exposure), 1/8 (+1EV), 1/4 (+2EV), 1/2 sec (+3EV), 1 sec (+4EV), 2 sec (+5EV), 3 sec (+6EV), 4 sec (+7EV), 8 sec (+8EV), 16 sec (+9EV), 32 sec (+10EV). Shooting was carried out with a tripod, and at slow shutter speeds the models tried not to move during the exposure.
As lighting we used ADOX Adolight fluorescent lamps with high color rendering quality CRI > 95 and temperature 5400K. The film was scanned on a Nikon Coolscan 5000 scanner with automatic white balance and the same settings for all frames.
The test results can be observed in the title picture of this article.
Visual Observations
1. The film withstands underexposure quite well (slightly better than professional films). Even at -6 EV the image is quite readable, although it loses information in shadows considerably.
2. Kodak Gold 200 does not tolerate overexposure very well (worse than professional films). Despite the fact that even at +9 EV exposure the image is present, an acceptable picture is achieved at lower values. The film finally ‘gives up’ at +10 EV.
3. Underexposed Kodak Gold tends toward violet hues, while overexposed film tends toward pink-yellow hues.
Scan processing
Now we will try to process some scans following the same methods that can be performed in the darkroom when printing negatives, if necessary. Such processing is possible with acceptable color reproduction results for those shots made within the range of exposures from -2 EV to +3 EV.
-2 EV with scan correction (can be reproduced when printing from a negative)
Normal Exposure
+3 EV with scan correction (can be reproduced when printing from a negative)
Significant color correction is also possible for shots with greater exposure errors. However, in this case the color balance is affected significantly. Grain and contrast also start to grow (details in highlights/shadows are lost).
-4 EV with scan correction (can be reproduced when printing from a negative)
+6 EV with scan correction (can be reproduced when printing from a negative)
Conclusions
Kodak Gold film gives the best color reproduction at exposures from -1 EV to +1 EV. The range from -2 EV to +3 EV can be considered acceptable for normal color reproduction as designed by the manufacturer. It should be taken into account that with significant under- and overexposure the color starts to become noticeably unbalanced, contrast increases and visible grain texture increases. With significant color shifts, the film can be exposed in the range of -4 EV to +6 EV.
In other words, Kodak Gold 200 film can be exposed:
- with little or no color shift as ISO 100-400
- with slight color shift as ISO 25-800
- in extreme situations (with significant color shift, loss of detail in highlights/shadows and increased grain) as ISO 3-3200.