Fujifilm · ISO 500 Cinema
Fujifilm Eterna 500T 8573
Eterna 500T 8573 was Fujifilm's high-speed tungsten cinema flagship, released in 2004 and produced until the company shuttered all motion-picture film on March 31, 2013. Of the four Eterna negatives Fujifilm sold, this is the one with the biggest filmography behind it. ShotOnWhat lists 82 feature credits including Mr. Nobody, La Vie en Rose, The Mist, and parts of Slumdog Millionaire. For a stock that only ran nine years, that is a real footprint.
The headline number is ISO 500 under tungsten, directly competitive with Kodak Vision2 500T 5218 and Vision3 500T 5219. The Fujifilm look ran cooler and slightly less saturated than either Kodak high-speed tungsten. Grain at 500T speed was, by 2004 standards, exceptionally tight: Fujifilm leaned on their Super Nano Structure crystal architecture to keep noise down in shadow areas, which is where a fast tungsten stock usually shows its weakness.
For still photographers running 8573 through a 35mm body today, the practical result is a stock with one stop more shadow detail than CineStill 800T (no surprise, since 800T is a remjet-stripped Vision3 500T rated about two-thirds of a stop higher to compensate for the C-41 process shift). Skin under tungsten holds neutral rather than warm. Daylight without an 85 filter goes blue-cyan, which some shooters love.
Processing has the same constraints as every Eterna stock. The remjet backing kills standard C-41 unless you pre-bath in soda solution or send the roll to an ECN-2 cinema lab. C-41 cross-processing pushes contrast and shifts color hard; ECN-2 keeps it accurate.
No new production exists. The only 8573 in circulation is freezer-stored short-ends and bulk-loaded ends repackaged by outlets like 35mmdealer.de and Camera Valley. Prices have climbed steadily since 2018.
Reciprocity exponent is 1.10. Zone Light Meter applies the correction past one second. A metered 8-second night exposure becomes around 10 seconds at the negative. For city-street tungsten work past about four seconds, the correction is small but worth keeping in.
How the app handles this stock
- Box speed: ISO 500. Picker exposes pull/push chips so you can shoot it at any speed you want and the meter follows.
- Reciprocity: Above one second the app raises metered time to the power of 1.10.
- Expired film: if you load an old roll, set the expiry year and storage in the app and the ISO scales for you. Cinema decay rates are baked in.
Frequently asked questions
What ISO is Fujifilm Eterna 500T 8573?
Fujifilm Eterna 500T 8573 is an ISO 500 cinema film from Fujifilm. You can rate it at box speed or push and pull it; set the speed you actually shot and the meter follows.
Is Fujifilm Eterna 500T 8573 still in production?
No. Fujifilm Eterna 500T 8573 is discontinued, so it is freezer stock and the secondhand market now. Expired rolls drift slower over time, so many shooters overexpose a stop.
Does Fujifilm Eterna 500T 8573 suffer from reciprocity failure?
Yes, on exposures longer than about one second. Its reciprocity exponent is 1.10, so a metered 10 seconds becomes about 13 seconds. Zone Light Meter applies this automatically.
What formats does Fujifilm Eterna 500T 8573 come in?
Fujifilm Eterna 500T 8573 was available in motion-picture.