Orwo Wolfen NC200 First Impressions

For the first time in two decades, the future of film production is actually looking pretty bright. The past couple of years have seen releases of new color film stocks from Ilford (Phoenix 200) and Orwo (NC400, NC500), but both company's attempts have felt more like prototypes than actual finished products. But this year, Ilford has released Phoenix II, the Chinese brand Lucky has created color film stock Lucky 200, and Orwo has started churning out NC200. Of the three announcements, NC200 had me most excited. I don't care much for Phoenix, and the sample images I've seen of Lucky 200 aren't what I'm after. But a new Orwo product holds some real potential. I feel like one of the only people in the world who actually likes NC400 despite its many weaknesses, so naturally a more advanced product from the same lineage had me holding my breath.

I think part of the reason NC400 and NC500 garnered so little interest is Orwo's complete lack of a competent marketing department. New film stocks should be huge news to the community, but Orwo didn't even seem to bother to send out test rolls to the press or The Influencers. Ilford, on the other hand, provided factory tours, interviews, test rolls, and a great story: the black and white giant is revamping their process, pouring tons into R&D, and releasing their first color film. Orwo could have done this too, but they didn't. Lomography released the stocks as LomoChrome '92 and '92 Sunkissed, but even they didn't seem to latch onto the community particularly well. Fortunately, things seem to be different with NC200, largely thanks to a partnership with photo lab Optik Oldschool. While Orwo is being Orwo, Optik Oldschool has gotten word of the film out by releasing preproduction rolls under the name "Opticolour 200" in both 35mm and 120 formats and sending them to all the relevant outlets.

Lomography and Kono have also gotten hold of the stock, releasing it as LomoChrome Classicolor 200 and Kono Color 200 repsectively. I bought a few rolls of the Kono branded film, as it was the easiest to obtain in the US prior to Lomography's release. My lazy ass does not go out and shoot much, but I got a chance to burn through a roll on a recent trip to Michigan. And let me tell you: this film fucks. NC400's handling of reds and purples was already pretty pleasant, and now NC200 brings improved greens and significantly better dynamic range (though it still falls short of a Kodak product).

Out of focus tree with changing leaf colors.

This picture is extremely out of focus, but it shows the colors nicely I think.

The grain still isn't fantastic, but it's an improvement over Orwo's previous attempts. The Kono rolls I got must be from the preproduction batch. The anti-halation layer is definitely missing, and there are small red, green, and blue spots randomly spotted across the frames. Both of these issues are mentioned in Optik Oldschool's post about the film and should be fixed in the final production run. The promise of an anti-halation layer has me very excited. As is, the film starts to lean in the direction of Kodak Aerocolour IV (sold as Washi X, Santacolour, Flic Elektra, and 1 billion other names) when shot with strong backlighting, which isn't a stock I particularly like.

Example of the RGB spots, indicating that this is the preproduction batch of the film.

Example of the halations, which should be improved in the final version of the film.

All of Orwo's color films are based on old Agfa cinefilm recipes (Orwo is based out of Agfa's former East German factory), so I leaned into that by editing with a flatter, low contrast look. At least, that's my excuse. In reality, I've just been really into that shallower level of contrast lately. With this film, it gives landscapes a bit of an ethereal look that I like. Generally speaking, I think the film does well with both styles. Here are some of my edits compared with the default output from Negative Lab Pro, to get a better idea of how the film looks with higher contrast levels, as well as a demonstration of the dynamic range. Open the images in a new tab if you'd like to get a better look.

Boardwalk over the water with grass growing out of it.

NLP defaults left, my edits right. I went a little overboard here.

Looking out onto a golf course covered with gulls

NLP defaults left, my edits right.

Brush in the foreground is in the shadows, while a strong backlight shines in. There are strong halations, but some detail is maintained in the shadows.

NLP defaults left, my edits right. The dynamic range: exists, unlike NC400

I'm really looking forward to shooting more of this film. The beautiful greens bring something that Kodak generally strays away from in favor of warmer colors, and the added versatility means it's significantly easier to shoot than NC400. Once the anti-halation layer is introduced, I think it could become one of my favorite films. It's also nice to see Orwo putting this stock out in Super 8 format. With some post-processing, I think it could bring a nice home movie look without looking too dull (I think the test footage looks too dull wnoops).