Portra 160 Pushed
The Value Of Trying Something New
I’ve been shooting film for a long, long time. Blah, blah, blah. Cutting to the chase it never occurred to me far before digital to use slow speed color film pushed to shoot in darker conditions. Why the hell would I want to use ISO 100 or ISO 200 film when I needed ISO 400 film? It would look ”worse”, have less shadow detail, funky color, and more contrast. None of which would produce optimal results. If I had to push film it was going to be the highest speed film I could get. Hell, there was Kodak Ektar 1000, why would one want to push low ISO film?
Fast-forward a few decades, I carried that mentality with me long into the digital age. I never considered pushing slow film. What’s the point, so I thought. I’d rather use a digital camera if my film camera was loaded with slow film.
Two months ago I discovered a long-forgotten bundle of Kodak Portra 160 at the back of the fridge. How out of date was it? Shocker, more than a decade. This was really old stuff. For those not initiated into the wonderful world of expired film, specifically color film, it tends to lose speed, increase grain, lower contrast, and have funky color as it ages.
Given the probable loss of speed, funky color, loss of contrast, a one-stop push couldn’t hurt, right? The results were going to be unpredictable and off in any case, what the heck. So that’s what I did. Taking into account the loss of speed I exposed it at ISO 160, why not, one-stop of speed is a good guess for decade-old film so 160 would be a “one stop push” exposure wise. After I finished a roll, I checked the “push one-stop” box on the instructions and paid my two bucks.
A week later I saw the results. I wasn’t expecting anything usable, I viewed this as a test. I wanted to know if the rest of the film I still had was worth shooting and processing. I was expecting blah, instead, I got wow. I can’t wait to use the rest of the Portra 160. I’ll push it a stop, maybe I’ll even try pushing it two stops. I love it. Why didn’t I try this years ago? Not for the speed increase but for the effects. The color is not crazy, I can still tell it is Portra.
It looks like Portra 160’s evil twin, nastier, more saturated, it takes a bit of liberty in how it renders deeper tones. It’s not a good idea if you’re looking for a lot of shadow detail. If you use it knowing its quirks it can be exquisite.
You may recognize this scene from the OM2S post a while ago. I wanted to see Portra 160 pushed one-stop as compared to 400H pushed one stop. I like the Portra 160 better and in use, it’s about the same speed, 400H doesn’t sing at 400 ISO, never did.
Lesson learned. We all have biases developed over a long time. I’m not exactly conservative when it comes to experimenting with subjects, techniques, cameras, or anything else when it comes to making photographs. That doesn’t mean I don’t have blind spots due to biases. Every once in a while try things you’d never do on purpose. Try something you avoid. This time the catalyst was a box of “useless” film.
Expect failure, that’s usually the result. Who cares? It’s the successes and discoveries that are important. I’ve found a new film, an old film for me but now a brand new film with a very different palette to inspire renditions of projects yet to be done.