Dating Film

I picked up some loose rolls of expired 120 Tri-X 400 on ebay. How can I date the film based on the roll ? Is there a way?

The film is sitting in the fixer right now, there are some numbers on the backing paper, is there a way I can find out how old the film is by that ?

The film was not in the box. Just loose rolls..

Thanks

Greg

Sometimes the yellow foil wrappers will have expiration dates on them; but as far as I'm aware, there's no way to date a roll based on the roll of film itself, either 120 or 35mm. Regardless of the expiration, you should still get great results however.

Can't speak for Kodak film but I am pretty sure that Ilford puts a code on the 35mm cassette which dates it. However you can't work the date out from the number. You have to contact ilford. Given that manufacturers need to keep track of such things I'd be surprised if Kodak doesn't do the same

pentaxuser

Must...not...make...bad...joke...

Vaughn said:

Must...not...make...bad...joke...

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What's your reasoning behind that faulty decision?

I make it a point to never date without knowing age, regardless of how loose.

lecarp said:

I make it a point to never date without knowing age, regardless of how loose.

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if I was more like you, I wouldnt have wasted the best years of my life.


Luckilly, film wont cheat or dump you (ok, well, the manufacturers might ), so just give it a try and see how it goes. If you get something good, awesome. If you dont, then you're helping the photochemical industry. If you think the film is years past expiration, overexpose a stop or two, develop normally, and tweak with VC paper. At least, that's the advice I remember reading. Never personally used black and white film so out of date I needed to use this advice

dehk said:

What's your reasoning behind that faulty decision?

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Because I know someone else will do (and did) as fine of a job of it...