A handful of film photography practitioners tend to try out every kind of films available on the market to discover the best fit and I am no exception. After experimenting with various 135 color films from different brands including Fujifilm, Kodak, Agfa, Lomography, Tudorcolor, etc., Kodak Pro Image 100 is one of the rare types that I use frequently. Below are some outstanding characteristics of this type of film and why I love it.
1. ‘Classical’ palette.
The color inclining to burnt orange, pretty low contrast, realistic skin tone and fine grain are typical characteristics that make up the “classical” palette of this film type. Also highlight and shadow details are captured well.
2. Versatility.
Although Kodak Pro Image 100 is highly advisable for portraits as written on the container, from my actual experience, this type of film works perfectly with other genres such as street and landscape photography. Not only does it offer smooth production of skin tones, the color green also appears as moderate as Portra, rather than washed-out like other common Kodak films like Colorplus, Gold or Ultramax; blue and red appear bright but not as saturated as in Ektar.
3. The tagline “Kodak Professional”.
The tagline is self-descriptive; Kodak is perhaps the only brand that distinguishes high-end and common products by adding “Kodak Professional” on the containers of high-end films. At the moment there are only three types on the market that have this tagline: Pro Image, Ektar and Portra. The appearance of this tagline brings in a sense of ‘professional’ to me.
4. Reasonable price.
Pro Image is the cheapest among the series “Kodak Professional” at the price of 105,000 VND (purchased at Croplab Hà Nội), which is half of Portra or Ektar’s price. This number is also not much higher than other common options such as Fuji C200, Fujicolor 100 or Agfa Vista 200. Of course, the picture quality depends on various factors such as the lens you use or the quality of the scanner, but anyhow Kodak Pro Image 100 proves to be a proper improvement for frequent film practitioners who want to enhance their image quality.
“Professional quality with reasonable price” is my final conclusion after a long time using Kodak Pro Image 100. I usually recommend my friends to try it out at least once.
Long Nguyen is currently majoring in Broadcast Journalism at Academy of Journalism and Communication. He pursues street-life and landscape photography.
