For today’s Tried and Tested Thursday, I will be talking about shooting a roll of Fuji Acros on my Canon EOS 500n with a yellow filter.
Back in 2018, Fuji announced they were going to discontinue Acros both 35mm and 120. That same year, I had bought ten rolls of them in 35mm and a pack of five in 120 from Parallax in Brixton. Then around a year later, Fuji released Acros II in both formats; a little on the pricey side, yes, but I find it a little baffling on why the original film had discontinued in the first place…
Anyway moving on, I shot a few Acros rolls last year prior to the expiry date, which was October 2019. Including the examples used in today’s post. At the time of writing this entry, I still have some Acros film left: three in 35mm, and three in 120. I shot two rolls in both formats (past expiry) a couple months back for an upcoming series.
Last July I went on a little adventure around Clapton and Finsbury Park, then ending in Islington before going home. I had two different brands of film on me and used a yellow filter that was attached onto my lens. I had mainly used the Acros film around the Stoke Newington area with the journey initially starting from Clapton Pond through to the high street and ending on Church Street.
I was curious to test out the Acros film on the colour filters I have: orange, yellow and red. I wanted to see if there was a comparison from them used; in terms of tone and contrast, and to see if there is any significant difference from the results.
In the past prior to using filters or my Canon SLR, I only shot Acros on my Point and Shoot cameras, such as Canon Z135 and Olympus Mju 1. Results can vary from camera to camera, processing and even post-production like negative scanning or darkroom printing.
The overall outcome was good after processing and scanning the negatives at home with the Epson V550, however I am yet to print these in the darkroom.
On that day, I had focused my attention on street photography around the local area, although I briefly went to Abney Park Cemetery to take a few shots of the grave stones. I returned back to Church Street, mainly shooting store fronts or anything random like street signs. A slow speed film like Acros, which is at 100 ISO is good for bright days, especially sunny days. There are some advantages with low speed film to shoot in low light settings or night photography, something I had done a few times in the past but not with this particular film.
I have to admit, I don’t use the yellow filter as much in my black and white photography. It has been considered as being the ‘popular choice’ for beginners and quite versatile for any genre of photography. I often consider the orange filter for being versatile, which I think it can also be used for almost any style of photography from street to portraits.
The yellow filter on the Acros came out quite good, better than expected; the tones and contrasts are subtle and are on point, although there aren’t many deep blacks in the shadows. If I had set the shutter speed to 125 to 250, it would have possibly made a slight difference with the shadows; not too overexposed or underexposed, but somewhere in between.
It would be great to recreate the same street shots in the same location with the new Acros II film, and probably use the yellow filter again. It would be interesting to see if there is a major comparison between the new film and the original. I might consider that idea in the near future.
For now, I have a few remaining recently expired Acros films that I am hoping to put into great use at some point. Once they’re gone, they’re gone for good.
Take care and stay safe
Photographic Jannine 
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