A couple of days ago I tested out a new film.  I've always been a big fan of infrared b/w photography so I was happy to see that the German Hans O. Mahn Co. had come out with a new IR film.  Macophot IR820c is so named because it is sensitive to 820nm which is well into the infrared part of the spectrum.  This makes Macophot the only real competition for Kodak's High Speed Infrared or HIE.  Unlike Kodak's film, Macophot has a fine grain and an anti-halation layer that keeps highlights from bleeding into huge blocks of solid white.  However, I found that it is a much slower film--I always rate HIE at E.I. 500 metered through a red 25a filter.  The Macophot was rated at E.I. 100 metered with a handheld meter (not through the filter) and then was pushed one stop in development.  I developed it for 20 minutes in straight D76 and still got thin negatives.  Next time I will rate it at E.I. 100 and meter it through the filter which will come out to something around an E.I. of 25.  I also found that the infrared effect is not nearly as pronounced with Macophot.  This is probably because the Kodak film is sensitive much farther into the infrared spectrum and therefore more effected by infrared radiation when using a red 25a.  If a darker red filter or even an IR. pass only filter such as an red 87 had been used with the Macophot much more infrared effect may have been seen.  The best thing about the Macophot IR. film is that it is available in 120 and 4x5, formats that are sadly missing in Kodak's HIE.   Hope that you liked my review of Macophot IR820c.  I'm sure that you stopped reading a long time ago unless you are a photographer interested in infrared.
If you are such a photographer, let me know if what your experiences with this film have been.

April 17,  2001

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"At the Trojan Nuclear Power Plant"
Taken with a fisheye adapter mounted on a 35mm camera