Received a vintage camera body recently and it had a roll of film inside with about 5 exposures left. I finished the roll and am wondering how to best handle the film? There was an unopened roll in the bag from the late 90's so I'm assuming the used roll is from the same year or maybe earlier. Don't want to just drop it off at Walgreens because I'm not sure they would handle it properly. Any suggestions? Thanks!
Late 90s is not that old. You should be able to have E-6 or C-41 film processed today. I would not use a drugstore for film processing if results are important. Which format and film type is it?
Thank you EBH for the reply, your expertise is much appreciated.
The film that came out of the camera is:
Kodachrome 200, Process K-14, 35mm Film for Color Slides, 36 Exp, KL 36 * 200/24°
My uncle gave me the camera along with two lenses, 6 filters, a flash, awesome leather bag, and really cool old school Canon strap. He said the last time he remembers the camera being in use was when my cousin was using it for an art class in college while she was pursuing her journalism degree, I think. My uncle said he used the camera when he taught music and would use the film somehow on a projector with music notes or something. I'm hoping to find out more when we meet for lunch tomorrow to celebrate my grandmother's 95th birthday.
The unopened film is:
Kodachrome 25, KM 135-36 Film for Color Slides, ISO 25/15°, 35mm and expires 10/1996
Not sure what any of the numbers mean besides ISO 25, but not sure how that correlates to digital ISO, in which my 30D only goes down to ISO 100. I know the 5D Mark II can be set to ISO 50, but never heard of ISO 25 before.
Do you have any recommendations for what film to use in the future while I explore this camera? I really don't know much at all about 35mm besides I used to use a point & shoot a long time ago and didn't know what film to buy so I always bought 800 because I thought it was supposed to be "better", so naive!
I suppose I'll send the film to BRI, unless other recommendations change my mind. Thanks again!
As far as I know nobody develops Kodachrome anymore. I remember seeing a while back something about the last lab to process Kodachrome ceasing Kodachrome processing.
The second number is DIN (I mentioned this in your other thread before I found this one ). ISO is ISO. Film that is 200 should be pretty similar in speed to your DSLR set on 200. Forget about the unexposed Kodachrome. There are methods methods of developing it in b&w which will yield usable black and white images, but it is much more annoying to process than normal b&w film. Places like film rescue can develop it for about $30 a roll. If they aren't critical pictures, it probably isn't worth it. For now, stick to color negative film (something saying C-41), it will be easiest to process. At this point, I wouldn't say there are any 'bad' films, but the new Kodak Portras (160 and 400) are really, really great. Unless you're shooting night scenes, you might as well stick to slow-medium speed films, 100-400 speed.
If you want to see what different types of film look like so you can find something you like it's a good idea to go on flickr and search for the name of the film. There are always enough examples for you to get a good idea of what each different film looks like. I'm new to film and I ended up getting some Portra 400 and Ilford Delta 400 (B&W) based off of my flickr search.
Just hit up a Wolf camera shop and was pretty disappointed with their 35mm film selection. No surprise I guess, but they couln't even tell me of a place to get film developed! Is the 35mm film community that small now?? Any suggestions on where I can develop locally or will it pretty much always have to get shipped out from here on out?
Jewced wrote:
If you want to see what different types of film look like so you can find something you like it's a good idea to go on flickr and search for the name of the film. There are always enough examples for you to get a good idea of what each different film looks like. I'm new to film and I ended up getting some Portra 400 and Ilford Delta 400 (B&W) based off of my flickr search.
Thanks for the advice. Just checked out a few on Flickr and read the comments...pretty surprised at some of the things I read. Seems as though one really needs to find a photo lab they can trust due to the nature of developing and handling negatives, chemicals, etc. Still haven't found an online photo lab to look into. BRI doesn't develop 35mm film.
Another one of the comments I read indicated that the majority of the retailer photo labs (Walgreens, CVS, Target, etc.) that still develop film basically just scan the negatives and digitally print via a computer. Not sure how this affects the print and/or film or negatives.
I know Google is my friend, but if any of you old-schooler's have any favorite links/books/articles that you could throw my way I would greatly appreciate it!
BTW - I picked up one roll of Kodak Tri-X 400TX Black & White 135-24 film today. Can't wait to see how well (or not) the camera/lens operates and how the film turns out.
Lastly, any suggestions on how to handle the film/camera after the film is loaded? I read somewhere that 35mm film is best kept in the freezer prior to use to prolong its life. Silly question, does one allow it to thaw at room temp prior to loading?
Yeah, that is not good. Freezing film is for very long term storage. I always refrigerated it instead. You need to let the film warm up slowly even from a refrigerator or there may be condensation issues. I learned that the hard way in the 70s.
Exactly a year late for Kodachrome. Now there's a film we're all going to miss. Kodachrome 25 was always one of my favorite films. I had two rolls in my studio fridge last December that expired in '91. Shot them at ISO 12 and they were fantastic. Kodachrome 25 drum scanned at 8000 ppi is site to behold. The first Kodachromes were, depending on film size, ISO (ASA) 8, 10,12 and 16. And a fast lens back in that day might be an f/3.5.
Thanks all. I'm pretty sure I won't be buying enough film to require it being stored in the refrigerator or freezer, but that's good to know.
Question: Once the film is processed and developed, can any additional post-processing be done to the negatives such as making another print with a higher or lower exposure? Or is it pretty much set in stone once the film is turned into a negative that won't be harmed by light?
A negative (and to a lesser extent) a slide is like a RAW file, generally holding far more information than a print. You might want to buy a book about photographic printing. Even if you will not be printing yourself, you will be able to speak knowledgeably with the people at the labs.
Thinking about 135 film just makes me cringe now. I'm sooo past that era.
Well, there is (or was) something called Farmer's Reducer, which would attempt to reduce the density of overexposed black and white negs, and something called Intensifier, which attempted to increase the density of black and white negs. Then, if you used "professional" black and white films, you could also manually retouch with retouching pencils or even an etching knife if you were brave enough. You could also bleach, spot (like spotting a print) and even airbrush a neg. For color transparencies, you could use Kodak Retouching Dyes to do an overall wash to affect global color correction and use the same dyes to spot color selected areas. Of course, you'd lose your dye job if your film was fluid mounted on a drum scanner. You could also dupe color transparencies and change color and density during the dupe exposure. You could make color transparencies directly from color negs by using a special film called VPF that I'm sure is no longer made. These are all post development manipulations that were all done in the analog era. I'm sure I'm leaving some stuff out, but you get the general picture.
These days a good scanner is all you need to digitize your film images and have at 'em in Photoshop. It's amazing just how good film still is today.
Processing normal b&w film isn't that difficult but trying to process Kodachrome as b&w film yourself would IMHO be a nightmare. Those photographs would have to be mighty important before I'd even begin to try that and I processed everything from 35mm color negative film to 35mm, medium format, 4x5, 5x7, and 8x10 b&w film in my darkroom for years.
If you're looking for someone to process b&w film and haven't been able to find anyone, go to www.largeformatphotography.info and ask there. Even though your film isn't large format, someone there will be able to give you the name of a lab to use or will offer to do it for you.
Looks like this is going to be fun! Any suggestions?
