Adox CHS 100 II

CHS 100 II is Adox's attempt to revive the feel of classical silver-rich emulsions from the pre-T-grain era. The original CHS chemistry came from the 1950s Schleussner Adox formulas, which Fotokemika in Yugoslavia produced under license from 1972 onward as the Efke line, and the current second-generation version uses a thicker silver layer than most modern ISO 100 films. The practical effect is a longer tonal scale: shadow detail stays open longer and highlights take more exposure before they block, which gives the film a latitude that feels more forgiving than its speed number suggests.

The grain is conventional cubic-crystal structure, not tabular. Under a loupe it reads as rounded individual grains rather than the flat oriented clusters of T-Max or Delta films. Some photographers prefer this for the way it renders skin and organic textures; the grain integrates into the image rather than sitting on top of it.

It works well across a wide range of developers. In ID-11 or D-76 at 1:1 it produces clean mid-tones and a traditional curve. In Pyrocat-HD or PMK the silver-rich base responds well to the staining, producing negatives with excellent shadow separation for alternative printing processes. Several large-format contact-print workers use CHS 100 II specifically because the silver density prints well on platinum-palladium.

Available in 35mm, 120, and sheet sizes including 4x5, 5x7, and 8x10. The sheet film is where the long tonal scale is most apparent and most useful.

Reciprocity exponent is 1.26. Past one second, Zone Light Meter applies the standard correction: a metered 30-second exposure becomes roughly 90 seconds at the negative. For long exposures with a large-format setup where CHS 100 II is most commonly used, this correction is routine.