Velvia Skin Tones

This is another post dealing with my ongoing review of recent experiences with Fujifilm’s Velvia 100. One of the things I read about Velvia film was that it did not render skin tones accurately. I know this is at least partially true for other Fujifilms I have used. People always seem to have a red to yellow cast which is why I generally prefer Kodak color film for people photos. Of course, some photographers claim Kodak films have a blue/green cast to skin tones. I personally find Kodak Portra especially pleasing and Ektar has those beautiful and intense blues while at the same time rendering faithful skin tones.

That said, the shot above taken with Velvia 100 shows Ian walking on the riverfront during a recent photo safari. This is one of the few shots of people on this roll of film since my purpose in shooting it was to judge Velvia’s efficacy in shooting landscape type subjects. Although it definitely displays a warmer set of colors than most films the skin tones here are not objectionable at all. I think I will continue to use Kodak Portra for people pictures but it’s nice to know that if I have Velvia in the camera I can still take people shots and not be completely disappointed in the results.