Shooting Expired Slide Film

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Nomad Z

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There are a couple each of Velvia 50 and Reala in my medium format bag that expired some time around 2013 or so. Never been frozen or refrigerated, so stored indoors at south east Scotland temperatures. One Reala is in an ETRS back, the others are unopened.

Are they worth using? Should I rate the speed differently? Are there likely to be any colour shifts? If it's likely to be a bit shonky, I can use three of the rolls in other 120 cameras (I'd rather have film that will render normally in the ETRS).
 
The Reala of course is colour negative film rather than slide. It should work well with a modest amount of over exposure. General rule suggests one stop per decade expired, so shoot at 50 rather than 100, but I've been getting reasonable results with my 2007-expired Reala shot at 64, previously 80. This shot was taken two years ago at the Lake District meet, the colours look OK to me ;)

Derwent morning by Chris R, on Flickr

I've had rather less luck with expired Ektachrome I had, and eventually sold the remaining rolls (mention Lomo and colour shifts and you'll get something for them)... this was from the Llandudno meet, after some massive PP work to reduce magenta!

CS1309PMEE05.jpg
 
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ChrisR said:
The Reala of course is colour negative film rather than slide.
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Blimey, so it is. :) That's good, because I can process that cheaply in the Jobo, so I'm happy to burn it and see what happens.

It should work well with a modest amount of over exposure. General rule suggests one stop per decade expired, so shoot at 50 rather than 100, but I've been getting reasonable results with my 2007-expired Reala shot at 64, previously 80. This shot was taken two years ago at the Lake District meet, the colours look OK to me ;)
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Aye, that's a lovely shot. Would you say that it has acquired some magenta in the sky, or was that close to how it looked at the time? The greens look very good. Rating the Reala at 50 or so sounds like a sensible plan.


I've had rather less luck with expired Ektachrome I had, and eventually sold the remaining rolls (mention Lomo and colour shifts and you'll get something for them)... this was from the Llandudno meet, after some massive PP work to reduce magenta!
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So, a fair chance that the Velvia will be 'Lomogrammed' for want of a better way of putting it. (Not worth the hassle of selling two rolls - got a TLR and a folder that should have decent control of exposure, so fine for a little on-the-side thing.) Rate the Velvia somewhere between 25 and 50? (25 sounds a bit slow for half a decade if the 1-stop rule applies.)
 
Nomad Z said:
... Would you say that it has acquired some magenta in the sky, or was that close to how it looked at the time? The greens look very good. Rating the Reala at 50 or so sounds like a sensible plan....

So, a fair chance that the Velvia will be 'Lomogrammed' for want of a better way of putting it. (Not worth the hassle of selling two rolls - got a TLR and a folder that should have decent control of exposure, so fine for a little on-the-side thing.) Rate the Velvia somewhere between 25 and 50? (25 sounds a bit slow for half a decade if the 1-stop rule applies.)
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It was very early, the sky was all over the place...

The one stop per decade rule applies to colour negative film (and I just found advice that suggests much less if you know it has been refrigerated). Advice on slide film seems to vary. One source I just found suggests box speed, then there's this written by Daniel Scneider for Popular Photography:

Slide film has less latitude than negative film, generally speaking, so nailing exposure is even more important for fresh or expired film. While I have had good luck with expired slide film, most avoid it.

“The blacks go to nothing. You can push it, you can pull it—it’s just bad,” says Frank. “I would steer anyone away from it if its origins and storage are unknown.”

Trial and error can help, though. If you can get multiple rolls of the same expired film, (same source, similar age, likely to have been stored together in the same conditions) you can experiment with one roll and refine.

Bracketing your shots on the first roll may give you a better chance of getting pleasing results on subsequent rolls. For expired film, bracket around the speed you plan to rate the film, or use normal, one stop over, and two stops over (instead of one over and one under).

When in doubt, overexpose. Negative films can handle quite a lot, and slide film generally tolerates overexposure better than underexposure.
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Cheers Chris. Sounds like the Reala will be fine. If I'm reading that right on slide film, my guess of somewhere between 25 and 50 seems about right. I think the two Velvias willl still go into some other camera in case of colour shifts that end up more dramatic than I'd want from the (I'm not a luvvie, I'm a serious artist) ETRS gear.
 
I can't see you having any problems. I shot some 5 to 10 year expired Velvia and Ektachrome on holiday last year, and it all turned out fine. I shot it at box speed and processed normally.
 
This is old post, however i thought i would add here, I believe 1 Stop P/10 Years applies to C41 film Only.
 
Ive got a batch of Velvia 50 dated 2009. I would shoot this film at least 1 stop over (i.e at 25) and more likely 1.5 stops. In my experience, Velvia 50 does not age that well as far as speed goes.
 
... you may be right, but 1 stop per decade seems like a good starting point!

(BTW I noticed that the second shot in my earlier post was hidden due to the Photobucket ransom. I went online to work out what it was prior to uploading a copy here. Corblimey, PB has really outdone itself is sheer absobloominlutely awfulness now!)
 
ChrisR said:
... you may be right, but 1 stop per decade seems like a good starting point!

(BTW I noticed that the second shot in my earlier post was hidden due to the Photobucket ransom. I went online to work out what it was prior to uploading a copy here. Corblimey, PB has really outdone itself is sheer absobloominlutely awfulness now!)
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What I do now is any image on PB (saves me hunting for the original jpg on my hard disk and converting it to 1000px on the longest side)... I copy and paste in PS save the image to a directory then upload to imgur, then post here.
Ok course if I know where the shot is that I want to upload then I would would bi-pass PB...but PB is still handy for storing many selected shots from all the folders on my hard drive.
 
I also have some old film, but it’s been stored in the fridge, would it still need an exposure increase?
 
9Designs said:
I also have some old film, but it’s been stored in the fridge, would it still need an exposure increase?
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That's something I've often wondered; how much longer does refrigerating (normal domestic fridge at around 2 to 4 degrees C) film extend the 'use by' date? I know this will depend on the film make and model, but I'd imagine someone must have done some research on this subject. So does anyone in the F&C section know the answer?
 
Oldest is some colour Fuji slide and neg about 2006 exp. then some newer, Ilford B&W around 2011 exp. Always in domestic fridge.
 
The B&W will be fine. If it’s been fridge stored you could probably shoot it at box speed, especially if it’s a slower film, or maybe overexpose it slightly - say half a stop or less. The last roll of really expired film I shot was some Tmax 100 that was 23 years old - I had no idea how it had been stored before I got it - which I shot at asa50 and the results were gorgeous.

The slide film might be more susceptible to age, but probably not too much if it’s been cold stored. I’ve never shot expired slide film, but have seen some good results.

Here're a couple of examples of the 23 year-old Tmax 100:


FILM - White rose by fishyfish_arcade, on Flickr


FILM - Window(s) light by fishyfish_arcade, on Flickr
 
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9Designs said:
Oldest is some colour Fuji slide and neg about 2006 exp. then some newer, Ilford B&W around 2011 exp. Always in domestic fridge.
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I shot various rolls of Kodak and Fuji slide film last year that were around 10 to 15 years expired. All at box speed and all of them look exactly like new film, to my eye at least. They had been fridge stored most of their life, then frozen for 6 to 12 months.
 
The roll of Ilford Pan 100 I shot in the Peak District was 10 years out of date - I didn't adjust at all, shot it at box speed. It was fine!
 
I thought 1 stop per decade was for C41 Film only and does not apply to slide! Anyone?
 
After doing a bit of research on the internet I believe that refrigerating or freezing film can slow the aging process of the film materials themselves but, from what I've read, this doesn't protect the film against damage from naturally occurring radiation and, as a rule of thumb, the higher the ISO rating of the film the more prone to damage and deterioration it becomes. If so, I just hope my fridge isn't too radioactive as I've got 3 rolls of Aug 17 dated Portra 800 120 in there! :D
 
Mr Badger said:
After doing a bit of research on the internet I believe that refrigerating or freezing film can slow the aging process of the film materials themselves but, from what I've read, this doesn't protect the film against damage from naturally occurring radiation and, as a rule of thumb, the higher the ISO rating of the film the more prone to damage and deterioration it becomes. If so, I just hope my fridge isn't too radioactive as I've got 3 rolls of Aug 17 dated Portra 800 120 in there! :D
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I reckon you will be okay, unless your fridge is the main reactor at Sellafield.
 
Don't worry about the food that's only been bombarded with deadly rays - worry about the bananas that are emitting those rays :)

(Yes, bananas are radioactive. From memory, if you eat more than 400 bananas in a day you'll have doubled to radiation exposure you've had that day).

More seriously...

The difference between "professional" films and the rest used to be that the professional films had both a shorter shelf life, and were only sold when they had ripened (films, like bananas, need to be ripened). Amateur films were expected to take longer to finish, and hence ripened "in camera". Oversimplification, but it's about right.
 
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The ethylene (also given off by bananas - gosh, how much weight do they loose just sitting around? :D) makes other fruit ripen faster, so is film a fruit?
 
Mr Badger said:
Have you never heard the expression 'a peach of a photograph'? ;)
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There are two replies to that that spring to mind....

1. Only when I'm stoned and

2. "a peach of a photograph" - expression derived from the considerable reputation enjoyed by Henry Peach Robinson, and so transferred to other wondrous photographs.

The second is at least photographic in origin....
 
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