Old Kodak Negatives - purple?

cmacd123 · Dec 12, 2024

MattKing said:
And 35mm - 110 dupes were a significant sellers for Kodak Canada, because the 110 slides and projectors were great for sales representatives that travelled.

I believe Dad mostly used a Pocket Instamatic 60 camera.

yes, the pocket projector was about 1/4 the size of a regualr one, and had a 120 slide tray, which proably worked very relaibly as the 110 Slide mounts were PLASTIC and so warp resistant.

the Pocket 60 was the top of the original Pocket Camera line and would get everything posible out of KR-110-20P film. (and if you are traveling, Just pop the film in the mail and the slides would be waiting when you got home.) (and everywhere BUT the US, Kodachome included processing.)

foc · Dec 13, 2024

cmacd123 said:
Basically only old AGFA colour film would have been sold without masking.

Agfa colour negative film was maskless as Agfacolor CN17, then around 1965 it became CN17M with a mask and the in 1968 Agfa introduced a new film CNS, with a colour mask, and it basicly lasted until 1978 when Agfa introduced their first C41 based film.

Agfacolor and Kodacolor X were good films but when Kodak introduced C41, process and films, in 1972, it was a game changer.
I often think that this was the begining of Agfa's decline. That and taking 10 years to introduce C41 type films.

koraks · Dec 13, 2024

@foc @cmacd123 there's an excellent overview (which probably you've seen at some point) here: https://www.photomemorabilia.co.uk/Colour_Darkroom/Early_Agfa.html#anchorAgfa8
It places the introduction of CN17M in sheet film format at around 1963, and an improved masked color negative film CN17S also available in roll film formats in 1966. Apparently in that year Agfa ceased manufacture of their ISO 20 "CN 14" unmasked 35mm film. So it seems unlikely that one could procure Western-produced unasked color negative film by the late 1960s.

Kodak seems to have transitioned to masked CN film earlier; around 1948-1949 https://www.photomemorabilia.co.uk/Colour_Darkroom/Early_Kodak_CameraFilm.html
Kodacolor II paper, introduced in 1950, was aimed at masked negatives.

foc said:
I often think that this was the begining of Agfa's decline.

It seems Agfa had been unable to keep up with the pace of innovation set by Kodak (and later Fuji); maybe the tech transfer that happened at the conclusion of WWII played a large part in this as well. There are undoubtedly people who can say something about this; I've never really looked into it. I also suspect that the main reason why Agfa held out as long as it did was simply the less globalized nature of markets up to the 1980s.

cmacd123 · Dec 13, 2024

foc said:
Agfa colour negative film was maskless as Agfacolor CN17, then around 1965 it became CN17M with a mask and the in 1968 Agfa introduced a new film CNS, with a colour mask, and it basicly lasted until 1978 when Agfa introduced their first C41 based film.

Agfacolor and Kodacolor X were good films but when Kodak introduced C41, process and films, in 1972, it was a game changer.
I often think that this was the begining of Agfa's decline. That and taking 10 years to introduce C41 type films.

I recall that CNS came out during the coupleof years I worked behind a photo countr. the Photofinisher we used (ETCO Photo in Montreal) was one of the official processing stations for CNS. so it had built in customer resistance as it was NOT a "Standard" process. then about 6 months later C41, (Kodacolor II) came out. Fuji was able to sell their own C41 Film in a month or two (Probably benified from a required disclosure by Kodak) I was very surprised that GAF made a C-22 version of 110, (which would have been a manual process to get therough the work flow of a large Photofinisher) Only ever saw one batch of that and GAF was out of the film business after all those years.

AGFA may have had more customer Loyalty for CNS in europe.

MattKing · Dec 13, 2024

cmacd123 said:
Only ever saw one batch of that and GAF was out of the film business after all those years.

In a very roundabout way, GAF became Ferrania.
The Sears house brand C41 film I sold in the late 1970s/early 1980s was actually GAF.

perkeleellinen · Dec 14, 2024

Some prints. Firstly two which were very hard to colour balance - the purple Kodak neg and the Boots Safety Film neg. Both of these took ages and the final result is only 'acceptable'. The main difficulty in both of these was that by removing one cast I would introduce another and there seemed no middle ground. I both cases I decided a warm yellow cast was better than a green one.

The purple Kodak neg, my Aunt, probably late 1960s:

This is her husband, my Uncle around the same time:

Sorry about the lighting on these, a reading lamp, it's so gloomy here I can't get natural light indoors. But you can still see the warm cast I decided was better than a green one. Both of these took twelve (12!) test prints, that made me question my skills!!

perkeleellinen · Dec 14, 2024

More interesting, here are two unmasked Ilfocolor negatives from probably the late 1950s. Again hard to colour balance. The first was lit with a Philips Photoflux (you can see the box bottom right) which has produced a very cool colour on an austere Christmas day meal.

And here is a very interesting scene which was surprisingly easier to balance:

Interesting film, displays a bit of grain at this size but oddly not much detail when you look close. Again, crappy reading light casts over the prints.

perkeleellinen · Dec 14, 2024

Lastly, two unmasked Agfa CN17 negs. These were easier to balance but hard to fine tune, I kept going between browny skies and purple skies.

The negative sleeve has written on it 'Ilfracombe 12-9-65'. Could we be looking at the last days of steam with those enthusiasts out to document a final service? One chap seems to be recording sound.

koraks · Dec 14, 2024

These are great! Lovely prints indeed!

cmacd123 · Dec 14, 2024

the mask being missing may have somethig to do with not being able to corect the errors that the Mask is intended to minimize.

cmacd123 · Dec 14, 2024

MattKing said:
In a very roundabout way, GAF became Ferrania.
The Sears house brand C41 film I sold in the late 1970s/early 1980s was actually GAF.

3M was big in the photofinishing business, and used Ferrania to make store Brand film and alos colour paper. I belive that Sears, K-mart, and Zellers all sold private label Ferrania-3M film.

That GAF would try to sell C-22 film in size 110, implies that they gave up trying to make C-41 film. and they hadby then dropped the B&W Line. Part of the story of C-41 is that by redesigning the process, Kodacolor II (c41) was finer grained and sharper than Kodacolor X (c22)

Old Kodak Negatives - purple?

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