Best Film for the Canon EOS Rebel K2
The best film to use in the Canon EOS Rebel K2 will depend on your lens, lighting conditions, and type of film you want to shoot.
To avoid having to lug around a flash and/or tripod, select a film that has an ISO of 400 or faster.
Ensure you have a fast lens if you want to take images in low light, conditions that are commonly encountered indoors. Read my post on the 5 Best Lenses for the Canon EOS Rebel K2 for ideas.
Color Film
Consumer
Kodak UltraMax 400 - This film handles a wide variety of lighting conditions well and is a good selection for a color film. The film is fast enough so that you should be able to handhold the EOS Rebel K2 in the majority of situations.
The photographs will have excellent colors and leans towards the warm side.
Fujifilm Superia X-TRA ISO 400 - Based on where you are in the world, this film could be more widely available. It’s a top quality alternative to Kodak film.
Fuji photos appear to have cooler colors with notable greens and blues, compared to Kodak.
Lomography 800 - You’re limited to a small number of offerings if you want an ISO 800 speed color film. For film geared towards consumers, this is the only option.
The film is also sold in the 120 film format, for use with a medium format camera.
Kodak Gold 200 - A great solution to get that mid-1980s through 90s look. For the genuine shooting experience use an on-camera flash.
Over-expose it by 1 or 2-stops to create the best look the film has to offer. This will provide you with the outstanding colors everyone loves the film for.
Professional
Kodak Portra 400 - Among the photography enthusiasts online, Portra 400 is without a doubt the most widely used color negative 35mm film. Overexpose the film by 1 or 2-stops to get the overall look the film is known for.
Kodak Portra is also for sale in ISO 160 and ISO 800 emulsions. 8x10 sheets, 4x5 sheets, and rolls of 120 are also easily found.
Black and White Film
Consumer
These film stocks have low costs and very good quality, making them very popular for use in the Canon EOS Rebel K2.
The largest attraction for budget minded photographers and photography students is the affordable price. Even if you do not put yourself in those groups, it is great to have low-priced rolls of film on hand for evaluating newly acquired used cameras.
Kentmere 400 - It’s manufactured by the parent company of Ilford, Harmon Technology. This is excellent since that allows this to be the most widely sold 35mm film out of the three.
Foma Fomapan 400 Action - It’s easier to get in Europe as the film is produced in the Czech Republic by Foma Bohemia.
A suitable film emulsion to try for your initial couple of attempts at home developing or analog photography. Also a good selection if you’re trying out a camera to be sure that it’s working properly.
Ultrafine eXtreme 400 - You can get the cheapest price on this film by purchasing it directly from Ultrafine.
They sell chemical developer kits for color 35mm film, so if you process film at home you may have already had interactions with them.
Professional
The two best black & white 35mm film stocks are Ilford HP-5 Plus 400 and Kodak Tri-X 400. They have several traits that are similar that make them so well received, while keeping individual appearances.
Both film emulsions can be pushed 2 stops and provide quality photographs. This makes the film versatile as a roll can be shot at ISO 400, 800, or 1600.
Ilford HP5 Plus 400 - The primary differences are that HP5 Plus is more affordable and has less contrast in comparison to Tri-X. Low amounts of contrast can be a benefit due to the fact contrast can be increased when making a print or editing digitally.
The film emulsion has subdued grain and still looks good when pushed 2-stops.
Kodak Tri-X 400 - This film provides a stronger look. To showcase the traditional grain structure, contrast, and look of the film, it needs to be developed in D-76.
Kodak Tri-X definitely has higher levels of contrast. That is very good if it happens to be the style you would like because it requires considerably less work when editing digitially or printmaking.
Transparency Film
Film stocks that make a positive image are known as transparency, reversal, or slide film. This means the photographs can be shown with a projector or light box.
Colors are not required to be inverted to be viewed, unlike the more common negative film stocks.
Slide films are thought to be hard to work with because slide film has less latitude and dynamic range compared to negative film.
Kodak Ektachrome 100 - This is a film known for attractive skin tones and fine grain. There is no hypersaturation of colors. Ektachrome has been color balanced for daylight.
Fujifilm Velvia 50 - Offers beautiful looking photographs that have greatly increased levels of contrast and saturation. It is sharp and balanced for daylight. Compared to all the slide films on the market, it has the best resolving power.
An ISO 100 speed is also available to buy.
Fujichrome Provia 100F - Creates realistic and vibrant colors with medium contrast and color saturation. It’s a ultrafine grain film with a daylight color balance.
Foma Fomapan R100 - This is a black & white transparency film, marketed by Fomapan as having very fine grain, high resolving power, and elevated contrast. It is also mentioned as a alternative for the discontinued Agfa Scala slide film.
Film Basics
Consumer vs Professional Film
Pro film stock have a greater dynamic range, are easier to push, and larger latitude, this is why they cost more.
There’s a significant difference in supply. Consumer films can quite often be obtained from pharmacies and big-box stores in small amounts. Professional level film emulsions needs to be bought from a online or photography store.
ISO
A film’s sensitivity to light is represented by the ISO.
The less light available to capture an image, the higher the ISO will have to be. This comes at the expense of bigger film grain.
ISO 100 and slower films (ISO 50, ISO 25, etc) is often hard to shoot handheld in the EOS Rebel K2. This is because without full sun, the shutter speeds will probably take longer than what you could handhold without causing motion blur.
A tripod, a fast lens, and/or a flash can assist you with longer shutter speeds. Using a high speed ISO 400 or ISO 800 film will help make the extra gear unnecessary.
As a quick note, the ISO knob is marked as ASA on the Canon EOS Rebel K2. The switch to labeling ISO from ASA (American Standards Association) happened after the creation of the International Standards Organization (ISO).
Latitude
Latitude is the amount of stops film can be overexposed while still retaining adequate images. Pro film emulsions have a larger latitude along with a slightly higher price.
Negative film has more latitude when compared to reversal film. That is a reason why it’s considered harder to shoot.
Dynamic Range
The range between the brightest and darkest details of a photo is referred to as dynamic range. Sections of a photograph that fall out of this range will be seen as solid white overexposed highlights or completely black underexposed shadows.
A bigger dynamic range is ideal given that it makes working in a wide variety of lighting situations easier.
- Digital cameras 14+ stops
- Negative film up to 13 stops
- Slide film 6-8 stops
Transparency film is viewed as tough to shoot due to the constrained dynamic range. Golden hour is the best time to use slide.
Film Type
35mm film that is in canisters is used by the Canon EOS Rebel K2. It’s also the most commonly used type of film and in some instances is described as 135 film.
120 or 220 film, used with medium format cameras, is the only other type of film you are going to encounter}.
Changing the film emulsion you are working with will alter the look of your images. This is one of the excellent things about using film.
DX Coded Film
All available 35mm film distributed these days has DX encoding. This lets cameras to detect and set the ISO of the film canister loaded.
DX-coding won’t matter for the Canon EOS Rebel K2 because ISO has to be manually set.
Canon EOS Rebel K2 Resources
Where to Get 35mm Film Developed?
There are a handful of choices for where to get film processed. For a more in depth explanation of the choices look at my guide on Where to Get Film Developed.
WARNING: Big box stores and pharmacies have stopped processing film at the store. They send the film off to be processed by a separate company. That is why, you will not be given your developed negatives back.
- Develop Film at Home
- Use a Local Photography Lab
- Use a Mail Order Photo Lab
- Pharmacy or Big Box Store
The most straightforward option and the method I suggest using if you’re just starting to use film is to mail your film to a photo lab to be processed and scanned. A downside to this is that it ends up being expensive if you’re regularly shooting film.
As long as you’re using a moderate to high volume of film, there are a couple of actions that can be done to greatly reduce your costs.
Bulk Loading Film
Getting a bulk roll of 100’ of film and manually loading in into canisters yourself is considered one of the most widely used methods to lower expenses.
A 100’ bulk roll of film will fill around 18 rolls of film containing 36 frames. You should expect to save 20-30% depending on the film.
Take into account that you’re limited to 100 foot rolls of black & white film. This is in part because black and white film is a lot easier and less expensive to process yourself.
Home Developing and Scanning
You can process and digitize film at home. It is a great way to reduce costs so you can use more film with your Canon EOS Rebel K2.
Black & white film is much less complicated to process. Temperature and development times are not as crucial to get correct with black & white film as they are for transparency or color negative.