Testing Finer Grain Film: Leica M6 & Ilford Delta 400

I’ve been trying out different types of film lately, looking for the kinds I like to use for street photography, night photography, maybe a finer grain film to use for photo shoots, etc…

Ilford Delta 400 shot at 400

This weekend I was out for a drive, just keeping an eye out for something interesting to shoot. I had my M6 with me, loaded with a roll of Ilford Delta 400. This is a finer grain film and I actually wanted to shoot it at box speed, 400, so daytime would be best for that.

The Trees

I was driving west on Lake Mead blvd when a group of trees, well landscaped caught my eye. This is really pretty far from the kinds of things I usually shoot, but I couldn’t help but see these trees and be reminded me of scenes I remember seeing living in California in my early years (pre 4 years old 🙂 ). I parked and made my way over to the sidewalk that was lined by the palms and other trees.

My Thoughts

I didn’t know if I would really even like the shots or if I was just wasting film, but was happy with what I saw when I developed the images. For a fine grain film I was pretty happy with the life that came from the Delta 400. I shot with T-Max last week, and while it gave a very smooth look, it seemed a bit flat to me. I didn’t find this to be the case with Delta.

Anyway, I do love the detail and tones in these shots. My favorite film so far is HP5+ which to me tends to give more character to the photos, but for times when I’d like to use a fine grain film, I think I’m sold on the Delta 400. Now that being said I do have a couple rolls of Fuji ACROS 100 that I’m looking forward to trying out. 

Doing Something Different

Another thing I did a little differently with these photos – I didn’t push the blacks down quite as much as I usually tend to do. I’m not saying I didn’t push them down at all!! Just kind of backed off it a bit. I was trying to go for more of a classic film look – more silver tones, less crushed blacks.

Here are some of the shots I got on my walk in the trees.