If you’re looking for the best film for your Pentax K1000 you can rest assured there are plenty of great options. Finding the right option for you is all about realizing what kind of photography style you want to shoot.
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People & Portraits – Portra 800
You can’t lose with Portra 800 when shooting people and portraits. It gives some of the best color palettes and renders skin tones perfectly with soft hues.
Portra 800 can also work well for travel photography as you can see below.
Vibrant Landscapes – Fuji Velvia 50
If you want to capture landscapes or scenes with vibrant, rich colors then Fuji Velvia 50 is for you. It gives dazzling bright colors with a vivid color palette, perfect for any landscape scene.
It does not work well for portraits or people as skin tones become very orange.
If you’re shooting sunsets or in lower light, prepare to take a tripod with you since you will be shooting at a low ASA, probably too low to get a crisp image from a handheld shot.
Experimental – Infrared Film (Rollei IR 400)
If you are feeling a little experimental with your photography then you can’t go past having a shoot with some infrared film – it must be one of the best films for the Pentax K1000 to have a play around with.
Infrared film, as the name might suggest, captures the infrared portion of the light spectrum. Forget that visible light nonsense, here you get an actual photographic heat map.
Neopan 100 – Super sharp fine grain structure
With black and white film photography there’s kind of two camps of thought. Those that love grain and those that like sharp fine grain. Neopan 100 falls into the latter category.
With its super fine grain structure it may be one of the sharpest black and white films available on the market.
The following shots speak for the film itself.
Some would argue, why bother taking photos on film that looks like it has been taken on a digital camera? Well yeah, fair play.
Ilford HP5 – For When Grain Is Good
If you’re shooting film there’s a pretty good chance it’s because you love the look of that grain throughout your photograph.
If that’s the case then take a look at Ilford HP5, one of the most popular black and white films for 35mm photography enthusiasts.
These are some of what I think are the best film for the Pentax K1000. Get a couple of different rolls and experiment to find the kind of results you like!
3 comments
Not being a fan of the K1000 but of the Pentax KX, LX, Z-1 and MZ-S i can state the advise applies to these and all other analoge camera’s too, regardless of brand.
As for the chosen films:
Portra 800 is hardly available here. Shops will have to do a special order from abroad adding to the costs, it will be exceptionally expensive. I have seen images shot on Portra 400 which were beautiful too. Portra 400 is boind to be even better albeit slower but again probably only available on special order. Readily available, and thus cheaper alternatives will result in any generic iso 400 film e.g. gold 400 or another consumer-grade film.
Velvia is well known but a very niche in this country, even in the heigh-days it was not commonly available.
Infrared film has always been a niche and a special order item. Many camera’s including the Pentax MZ-S and most of the Canon EOS-line are unsuitable due to a framecounter working with infrared light.
Neopan 100 is definately va good film but Neopan was never as popular as T-max, Delta or the classic films.
Neopan 1600 was good though, unfortunately i never tried the other ones. For those who do not develop themselves or wish to digitize their films with a filmscanner, a chromogenic film is mandatory. While Kodak and Fuji having discontinued their offerings, Ilford XP2 is the only choice.
As for a classic, grainy film, HP5 is still popular but the king of the grain is Kodak Tri-X. Especially on mediumformat it renders beautifully.
Loved the photos, any tips for film for an Asahi Pentax Spotmatic?
Thank you! Sorry, I haven’t used an Asahi Pentax Spotmatic before. I’ll get there one day!