Highlights are compressed at 200 but that's a small price to pay for clean shadows. Originally I was shooting XP2 at 400 ASA as the recommended optimum sensitivity. Darker shadows than 2 EVs then comes out with blotchy, irregular grain. And it's grain all right not just noise introduced by the tone expansion, as it is obvious on the optical prints as well. Servus, Alin
Godfrey wrote: GD> My experience with XP2 says that you were overexposing it too GD> much at ASA 200, compressing tonal scale quite a lot. I found it GD> best in the range ASA 320 to 640. Going down to 200-250 produces GD> very flat negative: all the highlights are compressed. GD> Yes, underexposing it creates grainier images. GD> Compensation for the compressed histogram by scanning to 16bit GD> and then adjusting the gamma curve. It's amazing how much data GD> can be pulled out of a thin negative if you work at it.
