Hi everyone and welcome back to my channel. Thank you for tuning into this video where I will be discussing the Ilfer Delta 100 Black and White Film Stock. I will be giving my impressions from the perspective of a black and white photography newbie. Until now I have only been shooting color film and I have been avoiding black and white like the plague. So this is my first ever attempt at black and white photography and I will be showing you the pictures I took on this role throughout the video. This role was graciously given to me by Anthony from the Focal Matter Channel. Please check him out. I will link his channel down below. If you've watched any of my previous videos, you're already familiar with his amazing work. And he gave this role to me as a way to gently push me out of my color photography comfort zone. Anthony, you have caused me a lot of stress, but you've also caused me a lot of joy when I got my scans back and I thank you so much for this challenge. So half of this role I shot on a very rainy, slightly overcast day and the other one I took out on a different day where it was sunny outside so I could test it in various conditions, some less ideal than others. I won't lie, I was super nervous because not only have I not yet laid hands on black and white film, but this role also has a very low ISO of 100. I usually do street photography and for that I tend to go more towards higher speed films just to be able to capture the moment and then instantly flee the scene. So due to this low ISO and not so optimal, slightly cloudy weather, I ended up often lowering my shutter speed quite a bit so I expected a lot of blur in my scans. To add to this, it took my lab about three weeks to develop this film because they do black and white by hand and so this gave me enough time to overthink everything and imagine the worst possible scenarios. So I don't think that I have to introduce Ilford as a company because they are quite the staple in film photography. I will just say that they were founded in Ilford, UK in 1879 and since then they have been providing amazing film to consumers. They have slightly dabbled in color films over time, however what they're mostly known and appreciated for is their wide selection of black and white film stocks. The Delta Line specifically offers 100, 400 and 3200 ISO film and was released as a competitor to Kodak's TMAX film which came out a couple years earlier. So the Ilford Delta 100 which is the protagonist of today's video is a professional grade medium speed negative film that's been around since 1992 like myself and it has had a couple of tweaks and improvements over time especially when it comes to its shadows and latitude. It's a monochrome film which offers very consistent results and it is super versatile. It can work great for photographing architecture, portraits, travel and street photography sometimes but more on that later. This professional grade film one-ups the consumer grade films for example in the Ilford Plus range namely because of its core shell crystal technology which is slightly similar to Kodak's T-Grain technology. This is what it counts for its super fine and smooth grain and its incredible sharpness and high quality as opposed to the conventional cubic grain films in the consumer range. It is definitely one of the most technologically advanced out there. The core shell crystal technology refers to haylight crystals or haylight salts which are used in the emulsion and are responsible for more light entering. This therefore helps decrease the grain and overall sharpen your images and the photos produced by this film will in fact be extra sharp. Sharp enough even that you can comfortably use it in your pointin shoots or even cheaper reusable cameras and this smooth grain and sharpness is probably one of the main characteristics of the Ilford Delta that really sets it apart. The 100 ISO film offers you the finest possible grain out of the whole range as well as incredible clarity and detail reproduction because the grain won't take over your details. You can also really zoom into your images while retaining grade quality. On the flip side some people do not prefer the Delta range because of this quote unquote to good or to modern look. So if you yourself are more into the vintage look with more prominent grain then the Delta range might not be the one for you and you may want to prioritize the plus range for example. I myself haven't tried the plus range yet but I actually really really enjoyed the clean and crisp look that came with the Delta film. I thought it really accurately reproduced real life. Now the ISO was something that I was actually very nervous about. As I said the lower the speed the better your quality the finer the grain so that is wonderful. So quality wise you can really not do better than the 100 speed but if you don't have ideal conditions like I did not have on one of the days you may have to consider for example a tripod which I do not have. I shot it at box speed which is what Ilford recommends for the Delta stock but apparently you can also push it or pull it by one stop which may in some situations be a little more accommodating and yes the 100 ISO is the reason why this film might not be your choice for street photography. What I found when using it was that when the sun was out my images came out great. But like I said the challenge came when the sun was not so present which forced me to pull my shutter speed lower and that in combination with my shaky hands did cause me to encounter a little bit of blur. Now I won't lie it did disappoint me in a couple photos. However in other ones I was actually kind of obsessed with the fuzziness. So we can say that some beautiful accents occurred and some not so great accents too. So yes the ISO is definitely something you should keep in mind if you will be doing street shots. Maybe the Delta 400 would be a better option for a quick trigger situation or for moving subjects. But I wasn't that mad at the low speed I think on sunny days you could actually whip this out too for your street photography. Now the contrast on this roll is really really impressive. This is another thing that many online have really praised this film for. The blacks are really deep and the shadows are beautiful especially when shot in good light. The highlights also pop and the whites are beautifully bright. The gradation or the transition between the different tones is also really fluid and smooth. Thanks to those deep blacks and bright highlights I found that the pictures came out crisp yet moody and they had a lot of character and personality. The way this roll captures the clouds in the sky is also something. The contrast and tonal range also do wonders for portrait. The film is very easy to edit in your editing software and you can play with it quite a lot without your images coming out too edited or unnatural. And reportedly it is also really good for prints. The Delta film is also very flexible when it comes to the development process. You or your lab can use a bunch of different developers and still have very consistent results. Another great perk with this film is that it is available in literally almost every format. They carry 35mm, 120mm but also 4x5, 8x10mm and it doesn't end there because they also offer ultra-large formats. So I have gone through numerous reviews online and a lot of them actually mention the Delta 100 as one of your best options for black and white photography, especially in the 100's speed category. It is also quite inexpensive compared to other black and white rolls. Again if the super modern super clean look is not for you you may not enjoy it as much but I consider myself very lucky to have been able to dip my toes into black and white photography specifically with this roll. Thanks again Anthony. What a treat this film was. I am still pretty baffled by how some of those photos came out, especially since my expectations were really set low. So I'm going to wrap it up today and I would like to thank you all for watching. Let me know if you have shot the Delta 100 before. I'd like to know your opinions. If I've done something terribly wrong please let me know in the comments. And let me know if you enjoy this modern look. I appreciate your feedback and your consistent support and I'm looking forward to your comments and opinions. The next video I will post was filmed in the UK and will be about another very very exciting film role so I cannot wait to see what you think about that. So in the meantime have an amazing day. I'll see you all soon and take some great pictures. Bye bye.