Kentmere Pan 400 Black & White film : Old short review

-
I've recently been having fun looking up old film photos stored on my old hard drive. 
Over the years, I've been taking film pictures from time to time, and I've looked at what films I've used the most. Since I'm not rich, I thought it wouldn't be Kodak or Ilford's relatively expensive films.
One of the films I've used noticeably a lot is Kentmere Pan 400 Film, The film I'm going to review briefly today.


The Kentmere 400 film comes in beautiful box packaging. Certainly, I think the beginner film should be packed with impressive design to appeal to beginners.


Kentmere Pan 400 is a black-and-white negative film produced by Harman Technology, the same company behind the iconic Ilford films. Designed as an affordable alternative, this film provides a solid balance of grain, contrast, and sharpness while maintaining a budget-friendly price.
Maybe the most I've used this film is easy to get for the first reason, the second reason is that it's being sold at an affordable price.

This is probably the easiest black and white film to find it.
I'm sure any film store is selling this film!
And the price of this film is relatively cheap. In Canada, they're selling this film for 8-10 dollars. Kodak or Ilford's black and white film is about 18-20 dollars,sometimes even more expensive. it's almost half the price.

The birth date of this film is not exact, but I remember that it was around 2012. At that time, I was studying photography in South Korea. I remember my friends who were studying photography together said that this film looked like an 'affordable version of HP5'.
I thought he was right to some extent and wrong to some extent. Actually, this film I used had a little lower contrast than HP5, and it felt a little more grainy.



It's time to look at the pictures taken at that time.
All developments were developed using Ilford's Ilfosol 3 developer, and scanned using Epson's V700.



Nikon FM2, Kentmere Pan400 




Nikon FM2, Kentmere Pan400




Nikon FM2, Kentmere Pan400




Nikon FM2, Kentmere Pan400




Leica M6, Kentmere Pan400




Leica M6, Kentmere Pan400




Leica M6, Kentmere Pan400




Leica M6, Kentmere Pan400




Leica M6, Kentmere Pan400




Leica M6, Kentmere Pan400




Leica M6, Kentmere Pan400




Leica M6, Kentmere Pan400




Leica M6, Kentmere Pan400




Leica M6, Kentmere Pan400

Final Thoughts

Kentmere Pan 400 delivers fine grain that is slightly more pronounced than Ilford HP5+ but still retains good detail. The contrast is moderate, making it a great option for those who prefer a classic black-and-white look without overly harsh tones. It captures shadow and highlight details well, though it can lose some detail in very high-contrast scenes.

Kentmere Pan 400 is a great choice for photographers looking for an affordable black-and-white film with solid performance. While it may not have the refined grain structure of premium films, it still delivers pleasing tones, good contrast, and decent sharpness. Whether you're a beginner experimenting with film photography or an experienced shooter looking for a cost-effective option, this film is definitely worth trying.


Thank you for reading the review, I hope you have a great day today :)


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Lucky SHD 400 Black & White film Review

-
Image
Lucky black-and-white film series was a film used for practice when I first learned film photography. As it was used for practice, it was very cheap for students to buy, and although it did not have the same quality as Kodak or Ilford, it was a good film to understand the characteristics of the film. When I first purchased Lucky film in 2010, there was only a film called Lucky SHD 100, and the ISO was also only 100. Recently, when I was looking around the Internet, there was a film with the ISO of 400 of the same name, so I bought it and used it. That film name is  Lucky SHD 400 This is a picture of the packaging and film of this film. The Package of Lucky SHD 400   It has a normal design of packaging. It's quite different from the ISO 100 design I used before. The Canister of this film. This film is contained in a canister made of plastic with the style of bulk film that sell from local film market. a t least it looks better than the well-crushed aluminum canister used in Luc...
Read more