Kodak’s Portra 800

With regular colour film being a bit difficult to get at times, I was surprised to be able to pick up a roll of Kodak’s Portra 800. At £18:99 for the roll it is perhaps the most expensive roll of film I’ve tried to date! At todays exchange rate it’s just under $21. I thought, when I purchased it, with Christmas coming up, I might get some good festive shots. Well that in the end didn’t really come about, but I did go out and about the town while the tree was still up at least!

I had the roll commercially processed and I think it was slightly under developed. The negs are a tiny bit thin, but the giveaway is that the Kodak imprinted numbering and edge marks are also a bit thin. I do realise that machine processing should be spot on, I know about the mechanics of that having worked in two labs. These days, if one uses a smaller lab with less throughput, it’s quite possible for the replenishment of the chemistry to “drift” and interestingly Kodak films show this before Fuji typically. The typical film processing machine can control time and temperature perfectly, unfortunately I’ve yet to come across one that knows whether its holding bleach, developer or water! Anyway, I digress. Despite this I seemed to get good results from the roll. Much better than I expected. The grain also much less than I was expecting.

I was very pleased with the results, although I’m not a fan of higher speed films generally, but I’d use another roll of this without reservation. There is grain, but to my eye and taste it’s pleasing. These were all taken essentially at night, in available light from shop windows etc. I’ll share a few more images from the roll soon.