Shanghai GP3 Mini Review

[iangreenhalgh1]

I bought 3 rolls of Shanghai GP3 in 120 to try out. My previous experience of Chinese film had been Lucky SHD100 which is not good at all so I didn't have high expectations of this Shanghai stuff. Well, I was right to be wary because it's really awful.

The problem with it is how cheap and nasty it is, the paper backing feels cheap and rough, but it's when you develop it the nastiness becomes apparent.

The film base is the worst thing I have ever encountered, it insists on rolling up into a tight spiral constantly, making it almost impossible to work with, it took me an hour to scan one frame because the film refuses to lie flat, never encountered another film like it, unless they change this base to something better, this film is next to useless imho. I couldn't scan it, even in the holder, it would bow so much that a scan without ghosting was impossible.

It's not just this extreme curliness, it's the base itself, it's not clear like it should be, instead is has a grayish covering of tiny spots a bit like film grain, I held a piece of fomapan 100 and a piece of this shanghai side by side, unexposed pieces from the end of the roll, and the difference is huge, the Fomapan feels twice as thick and feels shiny and smooth, the Shanghai feels more like paper than plastic, the surface is not smooth, and holding both pieces of film upto the light, the Shanghai is much more opaque and the covering of gray stuff in a craquelure pattern is obvious.

All in all, this film is garbage, I can't say much about the emulsion because the other aspects are so bad they obfuscate any further examination. Maybe the emulsion is good, but unless they change the plastic backing material completely, this product is garbage.

Overall, out of 10, I'd give it a 1, more a nasty Chinese joke than a useful product.

[rawhead]

You likely got a bad batch.

GP3 apparently has some quality control issues. HOWEVER, when you have a proper batch, they're quite marvelous. I don't know how rare or frequent they are. I've really only shot their 4x5 film (same emulsion) and never had any huge problems. Au contraire, I'm quite in love with the grain, the tones, etc. I currently have a couple hundred sheets of 4x5 and would definitely purchase more as that number decreases.

http://www.flickr.com/search/?q=GP3&w=88929764%40N00&s=int

You can check the Flickr GP3 group to read about some of the horror stories with bad QA. But it's more a QA issue than an emulsion issue:

http://www.flickr.com/groups/shanghai_film/

[iangreenhalgh1]

Aah, that makes sense. From the scans I made, the grain looked very good, tonality not sure about as they were snow scenes in very gray dull light.

I really can't say much about the emulsion, it's the damn backing that was the problem, never encountered anything so curly and it wouldn't straighten out, I left it between some heavy books overnight and it was still springy as hell, just went straight into a tightly coiled tube, couldn't get a scan of a single frame that was without flatness issues because even when you managed to get it into the holder, it refused to take on any flatness.

It's hard to explain the issue with the opacity of the base, it looks like film grain, I wish I'd kept the pieces of Shanghai and Fomapan so I could take a picture of them side by side on my light box so you could see the difference.

One thing I take from this is it's time to get one of those ANR glass things, that would probably have helped a lot with the flatness issues.

This is the only shot that wasn't too bad, the others were fine in terms of sharpness, grain etc but I just couldn't get decent scans of them, you can see vertical lines on the left and right sides, that's ghosting from the negative refusing to stay flat in the holder, on the other scans, it was far worse:



So I think I'll make the provisional conclusion that the batch my films came from had something wrong with the base material. Thanks for the tip rawhead, good to know.

BTW, I was just testing out a new lens for my Century Graphic, I mounted a Componon-S 5.6/100 in a Prontor, seems to work rather well as a taking lens but not sure how it compares to my Xenar 3.5/105 that came with the camera, that was the point of the Shanghai test rolls, to compare the two lenses.

[iangreenhalgh1]

Hmm, I get an error when I try to upload the scan, I'll post the error code here for Attilla to look at:

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[iangreenhalgh1]

Here's the scan, linked from my FB account:



It was with the Schneider Xenar 3.5/105, 1/10sec at f18, focus set to 100ft. I exposed the GP3 at 50 then developed in Microdol-X diluted 1:3 for 20mins at 23C.

[Katastrofo]

I like that scan, looks decent to me. Agree with rawhead, you got a bad batch. This is from the Bessa 6x9 Skopar, GP3 100>400, Rodinal stand 1+100 for 2 hours, started at 18C.



I've only used the 120 stuff, but it reminds me of Acros, pushes well, too.

[iangreenhalgh1]

That's nice Bill. I thought the grain and tonality was good, just the inability of the damn stuff to staff flat killed it.

Today I had the same problem with a roll of Maco po100c, it's incredibly curly, impossible to get it flat in the holder for the scanner. I really must get an ANR glass insert.

The Maco film came out grainy and with ugly tonality, I did my usual method - expose at 50 instead of 100 then develop in Microdol-X 1:3 for 20mins at 24C. I had the same problem with Fuji Neopan so it seems some films don't work so well with my favoured method of development.

I've had rolls of Agfa APX 100 and Fomapan 100 in the last few days as well and they dried nice and flat and didn't give me any problems so I don't think it's something I'm doing.

Maco po100c, not inpressed:



Agfa APX100, which I am impressed with:



These are just test shots to evaluate some lenses for my Century Graphic, Maco shot is with a Schnedier Componon-S 5.6/100, Agfa shot is with a Mamiya-Sekor 2.8/80 rescued from a Mamiyaflex.

[Katastrofo]

Yes, that doesn't resemble the Maco/Rollei pix I've seen. This is another GP3 100>400 using CCM, but used it as a semi-stand for 75
minutes, a mistake (recipe is for Caffenol without the Vit C). Mamiya C2 using the old chrome Sekor 80/camera I sent you:

[iangreenhalgh1]

I do like the 80mm, it performs very well on 6x9 with only the very slightest bit of vignette so I'm very grateful and will be using her quite often I expect. It's just a shame the Seikosha shutter lacks a cable release socket, makes focusing on the ground glass rather tricky.

[Katastrofo]

Trying to remember what thread hood it takes, thinking it was 46mm, but may be confusing it with the
blue dot 80.

[iangreenhalgh1]

It's either 40.5mm or 42mm, I forget myself now.