Re: "Best" color slide film/color neg (skies, gaussian blur)

[Russell Williams <williams@Adobe.COM>]

>Jerry Olson writes:
>What is the current winner in the finest grain, sharpest color negative
>film on the market? Which one is the CLOSEST to the 25 ISO Ektar?

I'm not sure I believe it, but the "film characteristics table" at:
http://www.dsp.net/tut/films.htm

sez the following. These numbers are mostly taken from the mfrs, and the
Reala numbers may be out of date, because I didn't notice a change when
Fuji came out with "New Reala" a year or more ago that was supposed to have
significantly finer grain and higher resolution.


                        resolution lp/mm        under     characteristic
                 grain  at contrast  sharpness  over   curve max density
                   RMS  1.6:1 1000:1  <100%  latitude  blue   green  red

Agfa XPS 160       3.5    60    150     11      ?      2.7    2.3    1.8
Royal Gold 25      4.0    80    200     18    -1/+1    2.8    2.3    1.8
Konica Impresa 50  4.0    63    160     20    -1/+1    2.7    2.2    1.6
Fuji Reala 100     4.0    63    125     20    -1/+2    2.7 +c 2.3    2.1
Fuji NPS 160       4.0    63    125     20    -1/+2    2.6 +c 2.2    1.7
Fuji NuSuperia 100 4.0    63    125     20    -2/+2    3.1 +c 2.7    2.4
Fuji Superia 100   4.0    63    125     15    -2/+2    3.1    2.7    2.3
Agfa Optima 100    4.0    50    140     18      ?      3.2    2.7    2.3
Agfa HDC 100+      4.0    50    130     15    -2/+3    3.1    2.5    2.2
Fuji NuSuperia 200 4.0    50    125     20    -2/+2    3.0 +c 2.7    2.3
Fuji NuSuperia 400 4.0    50    125     15    -2/+2    3.0 +c 2.7    2.3

(list truncated for space)

They list the other Kodak films separately because Kodak has switched to
using a "print grain index" instead of traditional RMS and resolution
numbers. The cynical would say this is to avoid unflattering competitive
comparisons. A more charitable view would note that the traditional
measurements in the table above are not very useful because they say that
almost all these films have the same amount of grain -- even RG25 and Fuji
400. Yet the prints I get tell me it's not so.

Summary answer: according to these numbers, Konica Impressa 50 or Agfa XPS 160.

Russell Williams
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