German film lab Optik Oldschool has announced a brand new color film called OptiColour 200 that will be available in 35mm and medium format.
It’s Optik Oldschool’s first-ever film release and it is made entirely in Germany. Not only that, but it’s a fresh emulsion that is not yet available to consumers. That’s because the shop has taken the emulsion from ORWO’s NC200 which has not yet been released.
“This new film features natural colors, good contrast, great greens and reds and awesome skin tones, setting itself apart significantly from the other films of the NC series (NC400/500),” Optik Oldschool writes on its blog. “Bonus: The film has an orange base, which makes it easier to handle when scanning in the Lab.”
The film lab, which is based in Düsseldorf, a city on the River Rhine in Germany’s west, released a series of photos shot on the film. “The film looks great! … Don’t take our words for it, see for yourself!”
Optik Oldschool says that initially the film had a “green-ish” base and the shop was unsure about the outcome. “But very pleasantly surprised when we ran the developed rolls through the scanners,” it adds. “We provided feedback on colors and scanning performance and kept questioning why the film could not have an orange base. Additional hours of work and weeks of preparation later and voilà, the orange base was born yielding even better results when scanned in the lab.”
The film lab says it has never been so involved in a film’s production. “Months ago we teamed up with InovisCoat to run lab tests with this film. It all started with a full factory tour followed by several meetings at InovisCoat’s facilities,” Optik Oldschool writes on its blog.
“Shortly after we started to get hands on rolls with test-coatings which we were to provide feedback on. We shot these with different cameras under several lighting conditions, scanned them with Frontiers, Noritsus, and even did camera scanning sessions.”
Not everything was smooth sailing, the initial run of the 120 OptiColour film ran into problems when the anti-halation layer was not applied correctly.
“We experienced a setback during production in April. Something went wrong with the coating and the anti-halation layer got affected. The error has been identified and will be corrected during the next production,” explains Optik.
“The anti-halation-error turns out to be really evil on a PET base while it’s ‘controllable’ with a triacetate base as used for 35mm film. This means the first rolls of OptiColour 200 in 120 will have to be cut from 35mm material, with the known side-effect: fat rolls. The halation effect isn’t as pronounced as known from CineStill films, though still visible. You may also spot some red/green dots here and there.”
The 120 film will cost €9,90 a roll ($11,30) and will be avaialbe this month (June). Kosmo Foto notes that no release details for the 35mm version has been given yet.
For more, head to Optik Oldschool’s website and Instagram page.
