Color negative · ISO 400
Kodak Portra 400 Grain Look
What Kodak Portra 400 grain looks like, and a free recipe that recreates its texture and tone on digital photos in your browser.
Published October 3, 2026 · Updated October 3, 2026 · Written by Maximilian Braun
Original
Processed with imagegrain
About Kodak Portra 400
Kodak Portra 400 is a professional ISO 400 color negative film made for people photography. It is one of the most popular film stocks for portraits, weddings, and everyday shooting, and it is available in 35mm, 120, and sheet formats.
Photographers choose it for natural skin tones, moderate contrast, and very wide exposure latitude. Many deliberately overexpose it by a stop or more, which gives the soft, airy, slightly pastel look associated with the stock.
Grain character
For an ISO 400 film, Portra's grain is fine and smooth. In a typical 35mm scan it is visible as a soft texture in shadows and smooth backgrounds rather than as distinct specks, and in 120 it can be hard to see at all.
Kodak Portra 400 grain recipe
| Intensity | 28% |
|---|---|
| Grain type | fine |
| Grain size | 2px |
| Roughness | 6% |
| Softness | 45% |
| Color grain | 10% |
| Shadows / midtones / highlights | 75% / 100% / 50% |
| Fade | 12% |
| Warmth | 14% |
| Vignette | 8% |
| Black and white | Off |
| Seed | 400400 |
Why these settings
- Fine, soft grain at low intensity keeps skin smooth while adding a film-like surface.
- A little color grain (10%) avoids the sterile look of purely monochrome noise on a color image.
- Reduced highlight grain mimics how bright, dense areas of a negative scan look cleaner.
- Light fade and warmth approximate Portra's gentle contrast and warm skin, not its exact color palette.
What this recipe cannot do
This recipe does not reproduce Portra's color science: its specific skin-tone rendering, its highlight roll-off, or how it shifts with overexposure. For that you need a color profile or LUT; use this recipe to add matching grain and tone afterwards.
Best for
- Portraits and weddings
- Lifestyle and family photos
- Soft, bright daylight scenes
Kodak Portra 400 FAQ
Is Kodak Portra 400 grainy?
Not very, for an ISO 400 film. Its grain is fine and smooth, most noticeable in underexposed shadows and smooth backgrounds in 35mm scans.
How do I make photos look like Portra 400?
Match the color first with a profile, LUT, or careful grade: warm skin, slightly muted greens, soft contrast. Then add fine, soft grain at low intensity and a touch of fade, which is what this recipe does.
Portra 160 vs Portra 400: which has less grain?
Portra 160 is a slower film with finer grain and slightly lower contrast. Portra 400 is more versatile in changing light. For a 160-style look, lower this recipe's intensity to about 18%.
Kodak and Kodak Portra 400 are trademarks of their respective owners. imagegrain is not affiliated with or endorsed by them; recipes are digital approximations of grain and tone, not film-stock emulations.