Comapring Kodak Elite Chrome to Fujifilm Velvia

To understand more about the difference between film stocks this post investigates the difference between Kodak and Fujifilm by comparing and contrasting Kodak Ektachrome Elite Chrome 200 and Fujifilm Velvia 50. The two 35mm films feature the same colour profiles of the formats for super 8, which makes this study easier to relate to super 8 as Fujfilm have now ceased production of super 8 film.

Kodak Ektachrome Elite Chrome 200 35mm - Shot on the Praktica MTL-3

In shooting this film I encountered a few problems as you may tell from the amount of blank, over exposed frames in the scan of the Velvia negatives. Shooting Velvia is a very tricky process as the ISO setting for the film is 50. This means longer exposure times, which makes it very difficult to judge the correct f/stop and shutter speed to use. On top of this problem, due to the low ISO of the film, the camera I used had shutter difficulties and seemed unable to follow the shutter speeds set. This meant a lot of the images too were over exposed. This is why there are fewer examples of Velvia compared to the Kodak film.

Fujifilm Velvia 50 35mm - Shot on the Olympus OM10

Although more noticeable from going to regularly shooting photography on a DSLR than on 35mm film, a characteristic that both of the film stocks share is the how highly saturated the colours are, which add a sense of surrealism to the photographs. They both, as like with super 8, ooze colour detail.

Although a green colour cast is more associated with Fujifilm Velvia these examples seem to show a more yellowish looking cast, possibly from the bright conditions and low sun when the photographs were taken. Though the green emulsion more commonly found with Velvia is only noticeable on direct comparison of the two different film stocks. Its effect of pushing the greens higher is not over powering.

As discussed in previous posts the Velvia stock really picks up cooler colours well, which is why it is most commonly used and associated with naturalistic photography. As you can see the Fujfilm Velvia appears more saturated in the blue to green spectrum and moreover tends to bring these colours out and emphasise them over all other colours. The film therefore, is ideal for photographing predominantly green scenes, which may include meadows or forest landscapes, or if the stock were to be picked for a certain genre of film it would be more fitting for the cool look you can associate with thriller films.

The Ektachrome film seems more saturated in the yellow to red spectrum, with a warmer palette of colours. However in the darker photographs the film gives off a purple, brown cast in the images, which really doesn’t look that great at all when photographing country landscapes, something the Fujifilm Velvia excels in. As a result, the film is a good choice for photographing warmer scenes. Another item the Ektachrome struggles with is the tone of the sky. Compared to the Velvia stock it renders blue with a yellowish cast, where as the Velvia film has a much more deeper and vivid tone in the blue of the sky.

Both of the films retain shadow detail equally well. Velvia however generally tends to tone darker areas down, though this is known as one of its unique characteristics that is often mistakenly misinterpreted as an incorrect ISO rating and therefore renders shadows in a more solid manner. It also seems Velvia holds highlight detail noticeably better than Ektachrome.

In contrasting the skin tones on each of the negatives it seems apparent that the Ektachrome is much more accurate at determining colours to represent skin colour than Velvia. This could be said as the film is known for its warmer colour palette, which adds the right amount of red and orange to accurately recreate skin tones. In compassion the skin tones in the Velvia film are too pale and really lack in any skin tone colour detail. This observation can be further justified when looking at the tones of the sandstone in both examples. The Kodak film renders the red and oranges much more deeply than the Velvia stock, which lacks the vividness of the Ektachrome footage.

I feel although the negatives that came back from this test were not extensive in the examples shown, this investigation does demonstrate that different films create different looks, and that different films should be used and implemented in different situations in accordance with the environment they are to be used in.

The compassion between these two film stocks shows that Kodak Ektachrome is a stock that renders warmer scenes better than Velvia, and that Velvia renders cooler colours better than Kodak. Therefore I would suggest Kodak is more of a summer film and Fujfilm is a film better suited for the winter. However, although Velvia can capture naturalistic photos better, Ektachrome must be used if you want to photograph realistic portraits with accurate skin tones, but there are no rules in photography to say photos should be accurate representations of what you shoot, which therefore gives artistic license to whoever is behind the camera.