Film Friday - January 5th, 2024. Cinestill 400D

After writing Film Friday reviews for Cinestill 800T, 50D and then BWXX we thought we were all wrapped up with Cinestill films, but then in March 2022 Cinestill announced they had been working on secret plans to bring a new film to market - 400D. Cinestill launched a Kickstarter campaign that was massively successful and in late 2022 the first rolls of 400D started hitting cameras around the world. And so here we are again, with new images from a new Cinestill film to share.

Cinestill 400D is a color negative, ISO 400, daylight-balanced film. Its native 400 ISO is a versatile, high film speed akin to Portra 400 or Kodak Ultramax. ISO 400 films are great films to reach for when the weather turns cloudy, or you are going to be splitting time outdoors and indoors. Or even when you don’t know what to expect. Having that extra speed in your film emulsion can help you be ready for a lot of different circumstances. Additionally, this film is daylight-balanced. This usually goes without saying as most films are daylight-balanced (designed to produce accurate colors under direct sunlight). But Cinestill brought the concept of a a tungsten-balanced film back into popularity when they brought out 800T. Motion picture film photographers are familiar with these distinctions but still photographers haven’t had to think about the difference for a couple decades now since almost all color negative films left have been daylight-balanced.

While we are talking the film’s background, it is important to mention that 400D is a departure for Cinestill. Previously the company had been adapting Kodak Vision3 motion picture film for still photography by removing the remjet layer that motion picture films possess. 400D on the other hand was specifically manufactured without the remjet layer. While the end result amounts to about the same thing (being able to develop the film in standard C-41 chemistry) the upshot is that by eliminating the remjet removal step Cinestill has also eliminated some of the quality control issues that photographers had experienced with 800T and 50D films. While 400D does not have a remjet layer, Cinestill states the film does have an anti-static layer which also helps prevent the “red lightning bolt” effect that could sometimes show up with those other Cinestill color films. Above and beyond all of this, Cinestill has emphasized that the emulsion itself is something new, not something repurposed or repackaged.

So that covers the lion’s share of 400D’s backstory. Let’s get into what qualities this film has and how it may appeal to you.

The TLDR on Cinestill 400D would read something like this: soft contrast, great latitude, softer-but-not-flat color saturation, very fine grain.

Cinestill 400D shares a lot in common with Kodak’s other Vision3 motion picture films, and Cinestill 800T and 50D. It has a softer contrast with wide latitude. It is meant to handle a wide range of lighting conditions, particularly tricky light. The “D” in 400D stands for Dynamic and this is exactly what it is referring to. This is a highly forgiving film - of both lighting and photographer decisions. It can be shot anywhere from ISO 200-800 without adjusting its development. Furthermore it has great push capabilities all the way up to +3 (ISO 3200)!

The color palette is a bit on the muted side of the spectrum but it never feels flat or desaturated. In this regard Cinestill 400D is in the same space as Kodak Portra 400 (which itself is heavily influenced by Vision3 technology). It is an everyday kind of color film. If you give it saturated colors then it will produce saturated images, but it will never take colors and run away with them on you, something that Kodak Ektar or Fuji Velvia with their heightened saturations can do at times. Heading into using 400D we expected to get low saturation but found ourselves pleasantly surprised by the color palette of the film. Its colors may not be highly saturated but they do have a nice rich feel to them.

400D’s colors are not overstated, but nor are they flat and they have a decent richness to them.

Give 400D vibrant colors and it will return vibrant results.

And of course skin tones come across well on this film stock, making it a great choice for portraiture.

It is worth noting that when it comes to color reproduction your mileage will vary with Cinestill 400D and this is largely due to processing and scanning variables. In browsing sample images and reviews of 400D online we noted a wide variety of color shifts with this film. Whether you are lab-processing or at-home processing can have a distinct impact on the colors of your 400D. Moreover, this film does tend to scan a bit on the warm side. Most of the color variance seems to originate in scanning. We have noted this just in our own work, where Cinestill 400D tends to scan a bit on the warm side, with a slight yellow/green cast. For what it is worth, Cinestill 50D has the same tendency. This could be attributed to a base of a slightly different tone than what films scanners are typically calibrated for. So depending on how/where you scan your 400D keep this factor in mind. When properly balanced your 400D can have a very neutral and natural look.

One last note on Cinestill 400D and color. This film is produced without that aforementioned remjet layer, which serves as an anti-halation layer. This causes 400D, just like its 800T and 50D counterparts, to produce a red, halation effect around highlights. Most dramatically this is seen as a red glow or halo around bright highlights. But this halation can show up in more subtle ways too. For example, photographing on a bright day at a reflective surface (like light-colored concrete) can produce an across-the-board halation, causing a diffuse reddish yellow color cast. We have noticed that using Cinestill 400D on sunnier days produces a bit more of this warmer tone than using it overcast days or in muted lighting where colors seem naturally more neutral, and we think this is what is going on.

Cinestill’s halation effect is easy to see when including bright, specific highlights in your images.

But the halation effect can also show up in more subtle ways.

Note the overall light warm cast on the above two images, both shot in bright conditions of relatively highly reflective scenes. Cinestill 400D’s halation is likely a contributing factor here.

Meanwhile this image was photographed under the cover of forest canopy on a cloudy day and if anything has a cooler cast to it.

Moving right along, our next stop on the 400D tour is its grain. This stuff looks so good. Of the three above sample images, one is medium format and the other two are 35mm but you would be forgiven if you cannot tell which is which based on perceived grain. That is because there is hardly any visible grain with Cinestill 400D, at least for a 400 ISO film. It is pretty remarkable and maybe one of Cinestill 400D’s sneakiest greatest features. One of Vision3’s big innovations when it was introduced by Kodak in 2007 was the refined grain structure that gave the film a very fine grained, highly detailed look. It seems this feature has flowed down to 400D as well.

In summary, with Cinestill 400D you will find yourself a very interesting film. On the one hand, it is a versatile emulsion from its 400 ISO speed rating to its wide dynamic range to its softer contrast and color palette. It can easily be used in any manner of circumstances from bright, harsh light to dimmer indoor settings to nighttime photography. On the other hand, Cinestill 400D offers a distinct and highly characteristic look with its halation effect, whether that is happening overtly or more discreetly. It is possible to make images with 400D that cannot be confused for anything but a Cinestill film. It is a very interesting combination of personalities.

At the time of this article Cinestill 400D is only available in 35mm and 120 (both of which we carry here at Blue Moon Camera) but there Kickstarter hinted at their goal of producing this emulsion in both 4x5 and 220 formats, so perhaps the future will hold even more great Cinestill-related news.

Meanwhile we will close this out with a last sprinkling of sample images for you to peruse and enjoy!