50-year-old GAF Versapan film: it works and looks good

[Kodachromeguy]

Early this year (2020), a friend gave me some GAF Versapan film packs. They had been frozen since the 1960s. They proved to be fine and I liked the look, so I checked for other film sizes. An eBay fellow had three rolls of 135-size Versapan that he said had been frozen. I couldn't resist (film GAS). I exposed the first roll in my Spotmatic II and Leica M2 at EI=100. Northeast Photographics developed for me (probably in Xtol).

Results of roll 1: It is 99% viable. There are some spots which, I think, are deterioration, but you barely see them. This Versapan has an old-fashioned gritty look, perfect for the gritty stuff that I photograph. I did a bit of touch-up with the heal tool in Photoshop. Surprisingly, the best film profile in Silverfast Ai for my Plustek scanner was the one for Kodak BW400CN. I tried the profiles for Plus-X, Tri-X, and Ilford Pan-F, but they looked muddy and uninteresting. It is amazing that a 50-year-old film still works. I have another roll in another camera now. Here are some examples at 1000 pixels wide.

 

[Donald Qualls]

I didn't look that good at fifty...

 

[Kodachromeguy]

I didn't look that good at fifty...

I should have taken a selfie, but that would have destroyed my Leica and fogged the Versapan with ugly photons.

 

[relistan]

Very nice! Encouraging results. It's a different emulsion, but I have 100 ft of GAF Super Hypan from the 1960s in the freezer that I have not yet tried...

 

[MattKing]

I love the wording of the guarantee on the package: "Pictures guaranteed to satisfy or a new roll free".

 

[Paul Howell]

I did not like Versapan and used it quite often as it sold by Kmart as their house brand film a good price. GAF 500, not so much.

 

[Trask]

I did not like Versapan and used it quite often as it sold by Kmart as their house brand film a good price. GAF 500, not so much.

Paul, could you have meant that you DID like Versapan, hence your using it quite often, as opposed to your not liking GAF 500? If not, then I guess you didn’t like either of them! Me, I like OP’s photos with the Versapan...

 

[Kodachromeguy]

Very nice! Encouraging results. It's a different emulsion, but I have 100 ft of GAF Super Hypan from the 1960s in the freezer that I have not yet tried...

Thank you! I called my friend who gave me the GAF film packs earlier this year. He said he used Super Hypan in the past. It was a competitor to Tri-X, but he preferred Tri-X. Being a high speed film, I do not know if it will have survived the decades as well as the ASA 125 Versapan. Try some and let us know how it performs!

 

[relistan]

Thank you! I called my friend who gave me the GAF film packs earlier this year. He said he used Super Hypan in the past. It was a competitor to Tri-X, but he preferred Tri-X. Being a high speed film, I do not know if it will have survived the decades as well as the ASA 125 Versapan. Try some and let us know how it performs!

Thanks! Yeah I figure it's les likely to be good but I'll give it a shot and see soon. I've seen a coule of other people who've managed to get decent results out if it.

 

[Deleted member 88956]

This is encouraging as I have some rolls from 50-60s of various brands. although unlikely to have been frozen outside of tough winters in the attic. No idea about their history, just boxes look really nice.

 

[Paul Howell]

Paul, could you have meant that you DID like Versapan, hence your using it quite often, as opposed to your not liking GAF 500? If not, then I guess you didn’t like either of them! Me, I like OP’s photos with the Versapan...

Your right, I did like Versapan, did not like GAF 500.

 

[Paul Howell]

Very nice! Encouraging results. It's a different emulsion, but I have 100 ft of GAF Super Hypan from the 1960s in the freezer that I have not yet tried...

Super Hyerpan was replaced by GAF 500, very grainy compared to Tri x of the day. When in college our darkroom instructor hated Kodak with a passion, not the products the company he called Great Yellow Father from Rochester New York which he thought was anti competitive. We used GAS, Defender and some Ilford chemistry, he had a stash of Dupont paper. The one Kodak film he would buy was Tri X. If your Super Hyerpan has not fogged you want to use a solvent developer to tame the grain.

 

[cerber0s]

Looks great!

 

[relistan]

Super Hyerpan was replaced by GAF 500, very grainy compared to Tri x of the day. When in college our darkroom instructor hated Kodak with a passion, not the products the company he called Great Yellow Father from Rochester New York which he thought was anti competitive. We used GAS, Defender and some Ilford chemistry, he had a stash of Dupont paper. The one Kodak film he would buy was Tri X. If your Super Hyerpan has not fogged you want to use a solvent developer to tame the grain.

Very good info, thanks Paul! I suspect it's fogged... the question is how badly! I saw some folks getting EI32-64 out of Super Hypan the same age. So there may be hope

 

[Pentode]

A couple of years ago I bought a 100' roll of Ansco Finopan with an expiration date of 1945. I'm pretty sure it was military surplus and I'm equally sure that film never saw a refrigerator in its 70+ year lifetime before I got it.
There's not a lot of speed, a fair amount of fog and plenty of grain but it's usable so I'm not surprised that your film is still working. It's 30 years younger and lived a life of luxury in a nice, cool freezer!

 

[Terrence Brennan]

Wow, Versapan!

In the Spring of 1972 I had access to a quantity of GAF 35mm Versapan motion picture film. It bore an expiry date of September 1967, and it had a stated speed of ASA 80...this being the title given to what is now the ISO designation for B&W film speeds.

It was also before my days studying Photographic Arts at Ryerson University (then known as Ryerson Polytechnical Institute) in Toronto, Ontario. My education (indeed, my enlightenment) about the proper exposure and development of B&W film was still about three years in the future. I used to assign film speeds of between 400 and 1600 to this film, and give it LOTS of development in--believe it or not--Microdol-X developer, which as I was to find out, was not exactly the best choice when the (alleged) photographer underexposes his film by a factor of between 5 and 20 times.

Still, I did get some usable negatives, and it was a source of free film when I was so broke that I was hitchhiking to and from school.

 

[Kodachromeguy]

Still, I did get some usable negatives, and it was a source of free film when I was so broke that I was hitchhiking to and from school.

That is a great story. In a similar way, in the early 1970s, I had access to as much Tri-x film as I could ever use. In the lab, we loaded the Tri-x in Zeiss microscopes that we used to examine foraminifera from deep sea cores. I loaded the film into reusable metal spools using a bulk film loader. That was another life....

 

[BradS]

Geez, that’s amazing!
Lovely photos too.
Thanks for sharing.