Best Film for the Canon EOS-1n
The best film to use in your Canon EOS-1n will depend on the lighting conditions, lens, and if you want to use color or black & white.
Getting an ISO 400 35mm or higher speed will allow you to avoid needing to carry around a flash and/or tripod.
Make sure you have a fast lens if you want to shoot photographs in low light, conditions that are often found indoors. Check out my guide on the 5 Best Lenses for the Canon EOS-1n for lens recommendations.
Color Film
Consumer
Kodak UltraMax 400 - An excellent choice for a diverse range of conditions. The film is fast enough so that you should be able to handhold the EOS-1n in the vast majority of circumstances.
Expect pictures to appear slightly warm with beautiful colors.
Fujifilm Superia X-TRA ISO 400 - Depending on where you are in the world, this film can have greater availability. It is an excellent alternative to Kodak emulsions.
Fujifilm photographs appear to have cooler colors with an emphasis on blues and greens, compared to Kodak.
Lomography 800 - If you want a color 35mm film with an ISO of 800, there are not very many offerings. For 35mm film emulsions geared towards consumers, this is the only option.
Additionally, if you own a medium format camera, it’s also for sale in 120 film format.
Kodak Gold 200 - A staple film emulsion that was launched in the mid-1980s. Kodak Gold 200 has the look and feel of home snapshots from the 80s and 1990s. Use an on-camera flash to get the “nostalgic” look.
To bring the ideal look out of this film, you will need to over-expose it by 1 or 2-stops. This will give you the exceptional colors people love Gold 200 for.
Professional
Kodak Portra 400 - By far the most popular color negative film among enthusiasts online. Overexpose the film by 1 or 2-stops to get the color the film is highly regarded for.
Additionally, ISO 160 and 800 versions of Portra. As well as in rolls of 120, 4x5 sheets, and 8x10 sheets.
Black and White Film
Consumer
With low costs and very good very popular to try in the Canon EOS-1n.
The primary appeal for budget minded photographers and photography students is the affordable price. Even if you don’t put yourself in that group, it’s nice to have affordable rolls of film available for evaluating newly purchased camera gear.
Kentmere 400 - Manufactured by Harmon Technology, which is the parent company of Ilford. This is notable because that allows this to be the most commonly sold B&W film out of the three.
Foma Fomapan 400 Action - Might be much easier to acquire in Europe as the film is manufactured by Foma Bohemia in the Czech Republic.
A pretty good film stock to use for your initial few attempts at home developing or analog photography. Also a good choice if you happen to be testing out a camera to ensure that it is operating properly.
Ultrafine eXtreme 400 - You can get the cheapest price on this film by getting it straight from Ultrafine.
If you develop color 35mm film at home, you might have used developer sold by them to develop your film.
Professional
The two most popular black and white films are Kodak Tri-X 400 and Ilford HP-5+ 400. While they both do have different appearances, they have quite a few attributes that are similar that help makes them a favorite.
Both emulsions can be pushed 1 or 2 stops and still create good quality photos. This makes the film versatile as a roll can be shot at ISO 400, 800, or 1600.
Ilford HP5 Plus 400 - Between the two film stocks, HP5 Plus has lower levels of contrast and is more affordable. Low amounts of contrast can be a benefit due to the fact contrast can be increased when making a print in the darkroom or through digital processing.
The film still appears outstanding when pushed 2-stops. It is also known for having subtle grain.
Kodak Tri-X 400 - This film stock provides a more distinctive rendering to it. To create the legendary grain structure, contrast, and look of the film, it should be processed in D-76.
You’re going to definitely see more contrast with Tri-X. That is great if it is the look you need because it requires significantly less work when during digital processing or making a darkroom print.
Reversal Film
Film stocks that make a positive image can be called reversal, slide, or transparency film. That means a projector or lightbox can be used to exhibit the photos.
Colors do not need to be inverted to be seen, contrary to the more often used negative films.
Slide films are believed to be hard to use because slide film has substantially less dynamic range and latitude compared to negative film.
Kodak Ektachrome 100 - This is a film known for appealing skin tones and fine grain. The colors won’t seem oversaturated. The film has a daylight color balance.
Fujifilm Velvia 50 - This is a extraordinarily sharp color balanced for daylight slide film with lots of contrast and saturation, giving images a special rendering. Compared to all the slide films on the market, it has the highest resolving power.
An ISO 100 version is also offered.
Fujichrome Provia 100F - Delivers realistic and vivid colors with moderate color saturation and contrast. It is a ultra fine grain film with a daylight color balance.
Foma Fomapan R100 - This is a black and white reversal film, marketed by Fomapan as having excellent resolving power, higher levels of contrast, and very fine grain. It’s also mentioned as a substitute for the discontinued Agfa Scala film emulsion.
Film Basics
Consumer vs Professional Film
Pro films cost more due to the fact that they are easier to push, have improved dynamic range, and latitude.
There’s a difference in supply. Consumer film emulsions can more often than not still be seen in big-box stores and pharmacies in small quantities. Professional level film will need to be ordered from a online retailer or camera store.
ISO
The ISO represents the film speed, which may also be regarded as the film’s sensitivity to light.
The higher the ISO, the less light is needed to expose a picture. This comes at the tradeoff of noticeably increased film grain.
ISO 100 and slower speed films (ISO 50, ISO 25, etc) is often problematic to shoot handheld with the EOS-1n. The will be longer will most likely be longer than what you can handhold without leading to motion blur unless you are in full sun.
A fast lens, tripod, and/or flash can assist you with longer exposure times. Using a fast ISO 800 or ISO 400 film often makes the additional equipment not needed.
As a quick note, the ISO knob is marked as ASA on the Canon EOS-1n. The change to using ISO from ASA (American Standards Association) happened after the creation of the International Standards Organization (ISO).
Film Latitude
Film latitude is the amount of stops a film can be overexposed while holding onto tolerable results. Professional films have a greater latitude to go along with a slightly increased cost.
Negative film has a larger amount of latitude compared to reversal film. That is one of the reasons why it’s deemed to be harder to shoot.
Dynamic Range
Dynamic range represents the difference between the highlights and shadows details of a photograph that can be recorded. Areas of a picture that don’t fit within this range will be seen as solid black underexposed shadows or white overexposed highlights.
A bigger dynamic range is better because a bigger range tends to make shooting in a variety of lighting conditions easier.
- Digital cameras 14+ stops
- Negative film up to 13 stops
- Slide film 6-8 stops
The constrained dynamic range of transparency film is one more reason why it is thought to be difficult to shoot. An excellent time to try it out would be during the golden hour.
Film Type
35mm film that is sold in canisters is used by the Canon EOS-1n. 35mm film can also be referred to as 135 film, and it is the most commonly used film format.
120 or 220 film, used by medium format cameras, is the only other type of film you are likely to come across}.
One of the best things about film is that you can change the film stock you use and get a unique look to your shots.
DX Coded Film
Virtually all available 35mm film distributed at this point has a DX code. This allows electronically controlled cameras to detect and set the ISO when the canister is loaded into the camera.
The ASA (ISO) on the Canon EOS-1n needs to be manually set. Which means that DX-coding doesn’t matter.
Canon EOS-1n Resources
Where to Get 35mm Film Developed?
You will find only a few possible choices for where to process film. For a more comprehensive discussion of the possible choices check out my guide on Where to Develop Film.
WARNING: Pharmacies and big box stores do not develop film at the store. They ship film off to be developed by a third party. As a consequence, you won’t be given your negatives back.
- Develop Film at Home
- Use a Local Photography Lab
- Use a Mail Order Photo Lab
- Pharmacy or Big Box Store
The easiest solution and the method I would suggest using if you are just beginning to shoot film is to mail your film to a photo lab to be developed and scanned. A disadvantage to this is that it gets very expensive if you frequently shoot film.
There are two actions that you are capable of doing to decrease the expenses involved in using film, assuming that you are shooting a medium to high volume of film.
Bulk Loading Film
Investing in a roll of 100 feet of film and loading in into canisters yourself is among the common options to get a better price.
After you are done, you will have about 18 rolls of 36 frames. Based on the film stock you can expect to save 20%-30%.
Take into account that you’re going to be limited to rolls of black and white film. This is because black & white film is a lot easier and more affordable to process yourself.
Home Developing and Scanning
Any film can be developed by hand. It is a great way to cut costs so that you can shoot more film with your Canon EOS-1n.
Black and white film is by far the least difficult to develop yourself. Developer temperature and time are not as essential to get correct with black & white film as temperatures and time are for color negative or transparency film.