First Impressions: Velvety Velvia 100F

On a trip to twin crater lakes in Laguna, I decided to try Fuji Velvia slide film for the first time. Imagine my delight when I got the roll back from the lab and saw how rich the colours in my photos were! From plush purples to rad reds, the images boast of strong contrasts as well as smooth tones.

I only started experimenting with cross-processing slide films last year because I generally prefer expired color negatives for my photos. After trying x-pro for the first time, I soon realized that x-pro is a great look for travel photos.

Since I’ve been wanting to try more brands to see which will eventually become my ultimate choice, I bought about 12 different kinds of color reversal films as a Christmas present to myself and they were mostly rolls I’d never tried before. So on a daytrip to twin lakes in Laguna, I was excited to try Fuji Velvia 100F.

Based on reviews I’ve read, Velvia tones fall into the warmer side of its wild spectrum which I thought would be nice contrast since there would be a lot of greenery and water at Lakes Pandin & Yambo.

I loaded the roll into my trusty travel camera, the Canon Autoboy D5, and fired away. It was a mostly cloudy/partly rainy December day and I worried that most of my shots were just gonna be dark and overcast, but boy was I wrong!

To my surprise, the colors shifted between every other photo! Just check out the first three shots: from mellow yellow to vivid violet to pretty pink, it was an explosion of rich and lush colors!

As I expected, the blues and greens of nature took on a different look. The colors are a little skewed but I love the soft cast of red in them. The gloomy weather was actually a bit depressing but when I look back at these photos, I just remember how beautiful it was to be out in the “wild.”

I didn’t quite like how some of them were too crimson, almost like intense redscaled film.

But in some cases, I think it made the photos more well-defined—like you could see how each leaf pops out of the trees that pop out of the forest, as well as the horse’s and people’s forms.

I now also know of the legendary contrast produced by Velvia films. The silhouettes turned out awesome and I think it would be great for multiple exposures next time.

The unpredictability of color shifts is a double-edged sword. I like how some of them were exactly the opposite of how I expected them to turn out: purple with indigo tones, similar to Tungsten film, and even a tinge of green, and I wish there were more of those.

But of course, Velvia 100F is still predominantly warm and red, as seen in the above photos. These are shots of the scenery when it was raining, just cloudy, and a bit sunny.

I thought I wouldn’t like this film because, while I expected extreme color shifts, I thought they would be too out-of-this-world for my taste. Surprisingly, the warm coloring grew on me and I find that some of the softer tinted photos are actually quite delightful.

I think it was a lucky choice for the rainy excursion because, even if it was a gray day and the 140 ft. deep lake was freezing cold when we swam, I hardly remember the unpleasantness because the Velvia’s warmth just changed the mood of the images from that day. Fortunately, I have one more roll of Velvia 100F in my stash and I think I’m gonna save it for a multiple exposure set or a LomoKino movie next time!

See more photos from this Fuji Velvia 100F roll in the album Laguna Lakers.

You might also like:

• Vivid Velvia Visions
• Dreamy Beach Photos from 14-Years-Expired Ektachrome Slide Film
• The Panoramic and Subaquatic Canon Autoboy D5
• Around Town with the Canon Autoboy D5
• SA-WIDE-EKA! Bangkok with the LC-Wide

Fuji Velvia is world-famous as the most saturated slide film that you can buy. Shoot this on a bright day and develop it normally, and the results will knock you head over arse. When crossed-processed, it gives you that wild Fuji green-blue colour shift that we absolutely love. See the whole range of colour slides in our Shop.

written by denisesanjose on 2013-03-13 #gear #travel #lake #philippines #slide #review #analogue-photography #films #laguna #fuji-velvia-100f #cross-processing #staff-review #film-reviews #35mm-films #color-slides #canon-autoboy-d5 #pandin #yambo #first-impressions-dsj