Tuesday, May 08, 2007

Agfapan 100


Athough Agfafilm are no longer trading (Chemical and minilab are) there is still a fair few rolls of this and their other films still available.
The batch I have is dated use by 2011 and is probably the last batch made before the Leverkusen factory shut down.
Agfa APX is a 'conventional' grain structure film with a very long tonal range and fine grain and is I believe one of the best (if you can find it) for portraits or any long tonal range subject.



Unfortuanately this film is becoming harder to find especially in 120, so if you want to try it now is probably your last chance.
It has been one of my standard films for many years and once it has gone it will be sadly missed.
The best thing about this film is its ablity to hold on to highlights and the same time retain good shadow detail, combined with Rodinal at higher dilutions it gives tonal values that are beautiful.


I love this film for its ability to keep shadows and highlights and maintain what seems to be a huge range of tones inbetween.
This helps to give an illusion of an almost three dimensional image, and in my opinion APX is one of the most 'underrated' emulsions of all time.

All images and text ©Mark Antony Smith 2007

8 comments:

Charlie Wood said...

Yes I agree totally this film is fantastic! There is lots of it on abay at the moment, I have been stocking up on 35mm APX 100 & 400 in bulk rolls and 36exp cassettes. I have close to 200 rolls of 120 APX 100 and 400 in the freezer. I do have some Apx 25 in 35mm which is dated 01/05. There is 50 rolls of APX 25/ 120 on ebay USA now, but I bet it will go for some serious dollars, althogh the exchange rate is good.
I love the look I get with APX 400 in Aculux 2 ( look at monkey puzzle pic on my blog) APX 100 in Neofin blue is gourgous, in Rodinal I cant get it right. I am working on it.

Photo–Smith said...

Thanks for posting Charlie
The Agfa films dev times in Rodinal as suggested by Agfa are wildly OTT, I dev 400APX for 18 mins 1:50 they say 30 mins!!
Mark

Richard said...

I've read that the new Rollei retro b&w film is old agfa stock that they bought in bulk, or maybe they just bought process from Agfa. In any case I find them to give very similiar results. plus if you buy 10 (or 12 if 120) then you get a nice wooden case. Silverprint in the UK have them.

Photo–Smith said...

Thats right Richard, when Agfa Leverkusen went to the wall Rollei bought up the Bulk rolls of coated stock and had them shipped to Croatia to the EFKE factory to be packaged.
The odd thing is the bulk rolls were coated on stock destined for 35mm so were on the thicker base, just cut to 120 size.
So the emulsions are exactly the same as the last 35mm batch of APX.
I have quite a bit of the stuff, I bought it from Retro Photographic as I don't need the wooden storage, and you can buy singles.
Retro also have the last batch of Fortepan, which I actually quite like, but not as much as APX.
Incidentally Adox are going to re-make APX next year in 100+ 400, it will be interesting to try.

alinCiortea said...

I know it's been a long time since the last comment but I am wondering about AGFAPHOTO APX 100. The box looks almost the same, with agfaphoto written instead of plain agfa and a red circle instead of the red diamond-shaped logo. Is it the same thing or just someone taking advantage of the agfa name?

Photo–Smith said...

I think its the same stuff, when Agfa went bust they coated film right up to the last seconds.
There is a lot of APX (dated 2011 I think) that is from this batch.
Some has found its way to other 're-branding' companies like Rollei Retro and Jessops photo stores here in the UK.
My bet it is from the last batch, if you like I can obtain the batch number of the last Leverkusen coating.
Mark

alinCiortea said...

that would be interesting :)

thanks a lot, Mark!

ggl said...

From what I understand, Adox (Fotoimpex?) bought some equipment from Agfa (Leverkusen factory) and they started to produce this film (both the 100 and 400 ASA variants) under the name Adox PAN. It will be available in formats from 35 mm to 8x10. They are also producing not one but two versions of Rodinal: Adox APH09 (R09) and Adox Adonal (Rodinal). They also sell another developer similar to Agfa Atomal called Atomal 49 (A49) a very good counterpart to Rodinal for use with faster film.

http://www.adox.de/ADOX_Filme/ADOXAP100/ADOXAP100.html