Today is a good day for color film photography lovers everywhere. Kodak announced that one of its most popular color films, Kodak Gold 200, will soon be available in 120 format. And CineStill unveiled a crowdfunding campaign to produce an entirely new color film called CineStill 400Dynamic.
Introducing CineStill 400Dynamic
According to the campaign, CineStill 400Dynamic, or “400D” is a daylight-balanced color film intended for “everyday use.” CineStill says it will be available in both 35mm and 120 formats. And assuming the campaign goes well, there’s even the possibility of 400D being produced in 4×5 Large Format sheets.
In terms of image quality, the film should deliver “a soft color palette with natural saturated color and rich, warm skin tones.” And like the brand’s other film offerings, this one comes from “motion picture film emulsion.”
You can expect good push/pull versatility from this 400D—though it’s rated at ISO 400, CineStill says it can be pulled to ISO 200 or pushed all the way up to ISO 3200. We’ve yet to view examples of it pushed that far, but we’re super curious to see how it holds up.
The new film is developed using standard C-41 chemicals. It’s also treated with an “anti-static lubricant coating” to ensure the film moves with ease through older cameras, whether they’re manual wind or automatic.
Where does 400D fit in the CineStill lineup?
400D falls right smack in the middle of CineStill’s color film lineup. Presently, the brand offers an ISO 50 daylight-balanced film and an ISO 800 tungsten-balanced film, so this adds some nice versatility to the range.
Early bird gets the film
As is the case with most crowd-funding campaigns, there are a number of different ‘tiers’ to back, each with different rewards. For those hungry to try this new film ASAP, CineStill offers several “early bird” packages, that ship as soon as April 2022. For $15, you can reserve a single 35mm roll of the film; there’s also an early bird option to secure 10 rolls of 35mm for $150. For 120 shooters, you can secure 5 rolls of the good stuff for $75.
In addition, you’ll find quite a few other non-early bird packages to choose from. Those rewards all ship in July and presumably come from a second production batch.
Plenty of campaign support
As of writing, the crowd-funding campaign has only been live for a few hours, and already it’s 44% backed—you can count two of PopPhoto’s resident film nerds among those backers. And we have no doubt the project will receive full backing before its deadline in 21 days.
Ultimately, whether you like the look of the 400D or not, tossing $15 to help launch something new in the analog space is money well-spent in our book. Not to mention, $15 is a fairly standard price for a specialty roll of film.
Of course, if you’re feeling super generous, you can always drop $1,350 on the 100-roll carton.