Fujicolor Pro 400H Review

Although it’s more known for its performance as a wedding film, I’ve found that Fujicolor Pro 400H makes a wonderful street photography color film on those rare occasions when I want to do something different then my normal B&W. Why does it make such a good street film? In large part, it’s due to the things that have made it a lagend as a wedding photography film.

• It’s a true 400-speed film with excellent sharpness and grain.
• Especially good performance under indoor, especially fluorescent, lighting.
• Neutral, realistic colors and very good skin tone rendition.
• It’s ability to handle extremes of color contrast (such as…say…a white wedding dress and black tux).

Besides these attributes, there are a few more characteristics about Fuji H that make me love it as a street film:

• Amazing exposure latitude. Daytime street photography is often a mix of direct sunlight and heavy shade. Nighttime street photography is a combination of bright, high-key lights and black shadows. The broad exposure range of Fuji 400H will get you workable detail in both extremes.
• Finally, one of the most wonderful aspects of Fujifilm 400H, likely due to a combination of it’s contrast and color palette characteristics, is it’s ability to reign in and “restrain” dominant colors. Here’s what I mean. Say you have a night scene with a strong, bright neon green sign in it. With many films, especially the more saturated flavors, the entire frame would take a greenish tinge as the green emultion layer “overreacts” to the overpowering green element in the scene. God forbid there is someone with pale skin in the same scene. One word: sickly. Fuji H doesn’t do this. Strong primary colors stay contained and don’t “leak” into the rest of the image. A green plant will stay green even with a red neon halo surrounding it.

Brilliant.

Some more samples of Fujicolor Pro 400H (Fuji 400H) pictures. Click on a thumb to enlarge.

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