Best Film for the Canon EOS ELAN 7N
The best film to use in your Canon EOS ELAN 7N should depend on the lighting, your lens, and if you want to shoot color or black & white.
To prevent having to carry around a flash and/or tripod, pick a 35mm film that has an ISO of 400 or higher.
Make sure that you have a fast lens if you want to shoot photographs in low light, conditions that are often found indoors. Go read my article on the 5 Best Lenses for the Canon EOS ELAN 7N for suggestions.
Color Film
Consumer
Kodak UltraMax 400 - This film handles a multitude of lighting conditions well and is a terrific selection for a 35mm color film. Using this film you should have the ability to handhold the EOS ELAN 7N in just about all situations.
Expect photos to look a little warm with beautiful skin tones.
Fujifilm Superia X-TRA ISO 400 - Based on your location, this film could have greater availability. It’s a great alternative to Kodak emulsions.
Fuji images appear to have cooler tones with stronger greens and blues, when compared to Kodak.
Lomography 800 - If you want an ISO 800 color 35mm film, there aren’t very many offerings. For 35mm film focused on consumers, this is the single choice.
In addition, if you own a medium format camera, Lomography 800 is also for sale in 120 film format.
Kodak Gold 200 - A staple film emulsion that started production in the mid-1980s. Gold 200 provides the look and feel of snapshots from the 1980s and 1990s. Use a flash to get the “classic” look the film is known for.
To bring the best look out of this film, make sure to over-expose it by 1 or 2-stops. This will provide the outstanding colors everyone loves Kodak Gold for.
Professional
Kodak Portra 400 - By far the most popular color negative film among photography enthusiasts online. Overexpose it by 1 or 2-stops to get the appearance the film is highly regarded for.
Plus, ISO 160 and 800 versions of Portra. It is also offered in rolls of 120, 4x5 sheets, and 8x10 sheets.
Black and White Film
Consumer
These film stocks have affordable costs and good quality, making them quite popular to try in the Canon EOS ELAN 7N.
The main appeal for budget minded photographers and photography students is the very low price. Even if you would not put yourself in that group, it’s good to have comparatively cheap rolls of film readily available for testing newly purchased used gear.
Kentmere 400 - It’s manufactured by the parent company of Ilford, Harmon Technology. This is notable considering that allows this to be the most commonly sold film out of the 3.
Foma Fomapan 400 Action - It’s less difficult to acquire in Europe as the film is manufactured in the Czech Republic by Foma Bohemia.
A decent 35mm film to try for your initial few attempts at analog photography or developing film at home. Also a good selection if you’re trying out a camera to confirm that it is operating correctly.
Ultrafine eXtreme 400 - You can get the cheapest price on this film by ordering it straight from Ultrafine.
If you develop 35mm color film yourself, you could have used developer sold by them.
Professional
The two most popular black & white 35mm film stocks are Kodak Tri-X 400 and Ilford HP-5 Plus 400. They possess several attributes that are equivalent that help make them so well liked, while maintaining distinctive looks.
You can achieve professional photographs after pushing both films 2-stops. A roll of film can be used at ISO 400, 800, or 1600, making them quite versatile.
Ilford HP5 Plus 400 - Between the two film emulsions, HP5 Plus has lower levels of contrast and is cheaper. Less contrast can be a benefit because contrast can be changed when making a print or during digital processing.
The film still looks very good when pushed 2-stops. It is also recognized as having subtle grain.
Kodak Tri-X 400 - This film stock features a more distinctive style to it. To create the classic grain structure, contrast, and look of the film, it will need to be developed in D-76.
You’ll undeniably notice a higher level of contrast with this film. That is very good if it’s the style you want to have because it means a smaller amount of work when during digital post processing or making a print in the darkroom.
Reversal Film
Film emulsions that create a positive image are commonly referred to as slide, transparency, or reversal film. That means a lightbox or projector can be used to show the pictures.
Colors are not required to be inverted to be viewable, contrary to the more commonplace negative film stocks.
Slide films are regarded as very difficult to work with because slide film has a smaller amount of dynamic range and latitude compared to negative film.
Kodak Ektachrome 100 - This is a fine grain film known for beautiful skin tones. The colors do not seem oversaturated. Ektachrome is daylight color balanced.
Fujifilm Velvia 50 - Provides unique looking photos that have highly elevated levels of contrast and saturation. It is remarkably sharp and balanced for daylight. When compared with all the slide films available to buy, it has the greatest resolving power.
You can also get it in an ISO 100 speed.
Fujichrome Provia 100F - Offers vivid and realistic colors with moderate color saturation and contrast. It’s a daylight color balanced film with ultra fine grain.
Foma Fomapan R100 - This is a black & white reversal film, claimed by Fomapan as having fine grain, elevated levels of contrast, and high resolving power. It’s also billed as a substitute for the long discontinued Agfa Scala Film Stock.
Film Basics
Consumer vs Professional Film
Pro film stock are easier to push, have better latitude, and dynamic range, which is the reason pro-film costs more.
You should expect to see a difference in where it can be purchased. Consumer films can frequently be found in pharmacies and big-box stores in anemic quantities. Professional film stocks should be bought from a online or camera store.
ISO
The filml speed is displayed by ISO, that can also be thought of as the film’s sensitivity to light.
The higher the ISO, the less light will be required to properly expose an image. This comes at the cost of bigger film grain.
ISO 100 and slower films (ISO 25, ISO 50, etc) may be frustrating to use handheld in the EOS ELAN 7N. This is due to the fact that if you don’t have full sun, the exposure times are going to take longer than what you can handhold without causing motion blur.
To avoid this you will need to use a flash, tripod, and/or fast lens. Using a high speed ISO 400 or ISO 800 film will likely make the extra equipment not needed.
The ISO selection knob is marked as ASA on the Canon EOS ELAN 7N. The switch to using ISO from ASA (American Standards Association) happened after the creation of the International Standards Organization (ISO).
Latitude
Latitude is the amount of stops a film can be overexposed while still maintaining satisfactory quality. Professional film emulsions have a larger latitude paired with a slightly increased price.
Negative film has a greater amount of latitude when compared to transparency film. That is a reason why it’s deemed to be harder to shoot.
Dynamic Range
The difference between the shadows and highlights parts of a picture is described as dynamic range. Parts of an image that don’t fit in this range will appear as totally white overexposed highlights or black underexposed shadows.
When shooting in a variety or quickly changing lighting situations, film stocks with a bigger dynamic range is preferable.
- Digital cameras 14+ stops
- Negative film up to 13 stops
- Slide film 6-8 stops
Slide film is viewed as tough to shoot as a consequence of the limited dynamic range. A great time to give it a try would be during the golden hour.
Film Type
The Canon EOS ELAN 7N takes 35mm film that comes in metal canisters. In addition, it is the most commonly used type of film and occasionally described as 135 film.
The only other film format you are probably going to notice is 120 or 220 film that is used in medium format cameras}.
One of the wonderful properties of film is that you can switch the film stock you work with and get a new look to your shots.
DX Coded Film
Almost all available 35mm film for sale at this time has a DX code. This makes it possible for electronically controlled cameras to auto detect and set the ISO when the film is put in the camera.
DX-coding won’t make a difference for the Canon EOS ELAN 7N because ISO needs to be set manually with the ASA knob.
Canon EOS ELAN 7N Resources
Where to Get 35mm Film Developed?
There are a handful of possible choices for where to process film. For a more extensive explanation of the possible choices have a look at my guide on Where to Get Film Developed.
WARNING: Film does not get processed on site at big box stores and pharmacies. They mail film off-site to be processed by a separate company. 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 simplest choice and what I would suggest using if you are just getting started using film is to send off your film to a lab to be processed and scanned. If you frequently shoot film, this might be a downside due to the fact that it can get expensive.
So long as you’re going through a moderate to high volume of film, there are two activities that you are capable of doing to help reduce your expenses.
Bulk Loading Film
Purchasing a bulk roll of 100 feet of film and manually loading in into canisters by hand is certainly one of the leading methods to reduce costs.
Once you are done, you will find yourself with approximately 18 canisters of 36 exposures each. Count on cost savings of 20-30% based on the film.
Bear in mind that you’re going to be limited to bulk rolls of black and white film. This is in part because black and white film is quite a bit easier and more cost-effective to process yourself.
Home Developing and Scanning
You can develop and digitize film yourself. It is an intelligence method to reduce costs so you can use more film with your Canon EOS ELAN 7N.
Black and white film is by far the least complicated to develop. Chemical temperature and development times are both not as vital to do correctly with black & white films as they are for color negative or transparency film.