These two shots are from the same roll of Velvia 100F.
The image below has a little colour correction after scanning.


This second scan is soft on the head detail but any sharpening shows up a very grainy image. It has had 1 "Sharpen" between reducing from 150 to 72 dpi. and cropped



I have compared these Velvia 100F shots with the Kodak EBX 100 shots that I took of the same Jawfish 15 minutes previous and I can not see any difference between them! I also scanned both sides of the grainy shot just to check.

So, any ideas why I should have so much grain on a single frame?

More Velvia 100 shots in a previous post:
http://wetpixel.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=3843

PaUp

I think they put the blue emulsion (cyan) behind the red, and what you are actually seeing is blue noise generated during the scan, and not grain.

This can be adjusted on your scanner software prior to the secondary scan

and so on...

Very nice Paul.

Where were the shots taken?

The grain I refer to is what appears in the 2nd shot. Look below the pectoral fins. The texture looks grubby, like a dirty slide.
The bottom third has had USM applied to enhance the grain. It does look blue though.

The first shot I don't have a problem with. Although the slides lose quite a bit of depth due to scanning.


Thanks Todd. The Jawfish was about 10m away from the steps at Buddy's Dive resort in Bonaire, taken a couple of weeks ago.

A fantastic place for photography.

PauP

That looks like a thumb print!

If only if were that simple.....

That's not grain. It's noise. The best approach is to run it through a noise removal tool, then selectively sharpen the jawfish.

The problem looks worse if you are severely cropping and/or trying to use your scanner software to increase your exposure. What scanner and software are you using?

Oh, by the way, I have the same noisy, soft focused head shots of jawfish shot on Velvia50 and EVS100. I think it's the fish's fault

I just called Fuji - My initial assumption was right - Not developed for UW!

Hi George,
I am using a Minolta Dimage scan dual (1st model) with Minolta's scanning software, DS Dual 2.0.1.E into PS7.
Set on Auto exposure, I did not have to adjust it for scanning. It is cropped afterwards in PS by about 15%.

I will have a look at removing the noise.

Thanks
Paul P

Bob,
Did Fuji say which films were?

Did Fuji not know of the market of UWphotographers using Velvia 50. Makes you wonder why they bothered to bring out a new 100 asa version?

Thanks for calling anyway Bob.

PaUP

Thanks Bob & George
You are right it is noise.

If anyone wants to see for themselves just run the PS "Despeckle" filter over my posted Grain close-up. The noise is pretty much removed and evens out the sharpened area too.

Paul P

The new 100ASA film was developed for a faster variation of 50 for wildlife etc. I noticed the difference a lot when looking through new and old shots I took in Indo' The reds are more evenly balanced and don't overpower the rest of the spectrum.

Not many films are developed for UW (only 1 I can think of), it's just whether or not the build up of emulsive layers are going to offer good coloUr saturation amidst a prominantly blue environment under artificial daylight conditions.

IMHO: The New Kodak G100VS is far better UW, and well worth the extra money over EBX and is around 25% cheaper than Velvia 100.

There is some good software around for 'Grain/noise' reduction - Must get some!

There is actually more than one type of Velvia 100

Last time I was in Tokyo I noticed that there were two types of
Velvia 100 on the shelf "Velvia 100F" and Velvia 100. I asked the shop
staff what was the difference?

I was shown a comparison sheet with 4
identical images, one each of velvia 50,100f,100 and Provia 100. The
images tended to confirm that Velvia 100F produces a less saturated
images than Velvia 50 that are very similar to Provia 100. The new
Velvia 100 is very similar to Velvia 50 in saturation levels. Maybe
even more so.

Of course, for now Velvia 100 (like many epson printer models) is only available in Japan and it costs
about 100 Yen ($1) more than the international Velvia 100F.

Chris

Thanks Chris.
Something else I noticed too was the adverse effects when using a circular polarizer - Almost blackened out areas of deeper blue in sky shots that looked ok through the finder.