outdated film and paper

[removed account4]

i am a huge fan of using outdated film
and paper. the magic of seeing how things processed or
came back from the lab ( or the lab tech's wondering what went wrong )
is almost as much fun as seeing a print appear in the developer.

 

[Thomas Bertilsson]

Voted 'occasionally', because I'm a cheap skate (fancy way of saying that I'm fairly poor). I have Plus-X in 120 that expired in -96, HP5 in 5x7 that expired in -96, and FP4+ in 5x7 that expired in -94. And thanks to an extremely generous gentleman of these forums I have a crap load of expired of paper that I use for lith printing.
So I use it occasionally, but I don't like surprises, so if any of it is too old, I get rid of it. If I could, I'd use fresh all the time.

- Thomas

 

[pesphoto]

Ive got a little of both in my arsenal.
Right now I have a bulk roll of TriX that I bought a few years ago and Im just trying now.

 

[PhotoJim]

I like to play with expired film - I hate to waste it - but I use it in situations where I can afford the risk. I don't consider all past-date film to be expired; if I bought slower film fresh and kept it frozen, I know it will shoot as well as new film.

As for paper, I find that paper keeps very well in my darkroom and can be four or five years old and still provide good results. However, I have occasionally used paper older than that and the results have been slightly disappointing. Such paper is good for learning (I went through a bunch of really old Ilford Multigrade III 11x14 guiltlessly proofing some large prints, and learned a lot in the process, which allowed me to make a beautiful print on fresh Multigrade IV). However, I think the frustrations of trying to do quality work with old paper exceed the cost benefits. With old film, particularly black-and-white film, if it was reasonably stored you can work around the limitations and still get quality work.

 

[trexx]

I can't say all the time as I shot a lot of new too. But expired film tha has been in your possession since new and been cold stored is can hardly be considered out of date. I have 50sheet 8x10, 20 rols 120 and countless roll of 35 Tech-Pan dated 04/07 in the freezer and handles as good as new.

Now out of date film on special, I'll do that too. But always test some first.

 

[Mike Keers]

I recently came across a bunch of old paper in a lot of photo stuff I got on eBay. I would guess the guy had been a portrait photographer by the other stuff in the lot. I had several hundred sheets of paper from 3-1/2" x 5" size stuff up to 8x10 and 10x10. Some of it wasn't dated but it was old obsolete brands, and some had expiration dates as far back as 1959. The 'newest' paper was an envelope of 8x10 Kodak Medalist with a 1968 expiration date. I've used up all of it, or tossed what didn't work well after trying it, but I tried it all. Some came out surprisingly good (Luminos Bromide for example), other stuff, not so much. Great fun, but it was all just experimentation.

 

[Rick-in-LB]

Heck I am so new at developing I don't know the difference of the two. I don't think the instructor would grade me an a curve if I do use outdated paper or film. Now, when is paper expired? I have some that is about a year old that was given to me and have not used because I am not sure.

Rick

 

[RMP-NikonPro]

90% outdated film, It's cheap! & still works! (I find T-Max. lives forever) ;-p

 

[Guillaume Zuili]

Pola 665 all expired and lovely unreliability...
Verichrome, not any trouble.
Tri-X trouble...

 

[panastasia]

Ive got a little of both in my arsenal.
Right now I have a bulk roll of TriX that I bought a few years ago and Im just trying now.

I buy Tri-X in bulk - cases of 5 pro packs - and freeze it, I've been doing it for 2 or 3 years now, but the last ten rolls were fogged and they were only 3 months past the expiration date (frozen long before that date). I'm beginning to think that freezing Tri-X isn't a good idea, I'll know after I break into the next case. Warm-up time is ample (days) and my processing methods and materials haven't changed.

No problem with Plus-X so far, and no problem with papers that were frozen for many years.

 

[removed account4]

seeing that it looks like more than 1 or 2 of us use outdated -stuff
would it be helpful to start a group or tally (in this thread)
of the expired film we use / lots exp dates and how we stored it,
what development methods we used and how it worked out ?

i have a lot of tri x sheet film ( 5x7 ) that i use off and on, most of it is expired in the 90s
stored on a basement shelf + not too much if any fog at all, tmx+tmy+tri x 4x5 the same thing ...

 

[panastasia]

Hi John,
I seems like storing Tri-X in a cool place is better than freezing. I'll know for sure when I open a new box that was frozen around the same time.

Paul

 

[PhotoJim]

Fast film gets fogged over time by cosmic rays. Technically, so do slow films but it happens at a much slower rate.

T-Max 3200 or Delta 3200 don't keep much after the expiry date at all, frozen or not. Pan-F Plus will keep for many years past its date.

Tri-X is in the middle. Frozen, a year past its date, it won't be as nice as fresh film - it will have some base fog. It'll still be usable, but the fog is unavoidable unless you have a deep cavern underground in which to store it. (You have to store film hundreds of metres underground to avoid cosmic rays.)

Ideally, use film as fresh as you can.

 

[panastasia]

I suspected those cosmic rays were the culprit but I didn't want to believe they acted so fast! I don't think a deep cavern will solve the problem because neutrinos can penetrate lead, or anything, with a thickness measured in light years.

My question would be why would freezing make any difference? I, like jnanian, have had film stored unfrozen well beyond the expiration date with no fog issues.

 

[jgjbowen]

I have lots of Azo that is expired, but will last longer than I will. Most modern VC papers seem to fog soon after the expiration date.

Film.... I rarely shoot expired film

 

[nemo999]

i am a huge fan of using outdated film
and paper. the magic of seeing how things processed or
came back from the lab ( or the lab tech's wondering what went wrong )
is almost as much fun as seeing a print appear in the developer.

I store film in a fridge, not a freezer, since I find freezing 120 film makes it curl like hell. I will use film up to 1 year out of date, the value I place on my time (high) plus the amount of film I shoot (relatively small) means film that is any older is too much of a risk. It's always good to have a stock of really old film to check the film transport of collector's cameras and to give to newbies to practise loading reels, etc.

Using older b+w paper has generally been successful, with Agfa and Kodak VC, I have experienced paper on which the low-contrast (yellow-sensitive) emulsion coating has died, leaving only the high-contrast one active. With this paper, changing the filtration affects only the exposure, not the contrast - definitely one to avoid, newbies in particular will confuse themselves to death.

 

[ricksplace]

I have used some paper that was more than 20 years past its expiry date, and it was fine. I have had other paper fog a short while after the expiration date. I'm like Thomas, I buy paper and film on the cheap so I can afford to shoot more. I bought two 400' rolls of FP4+ movie film on ebay quite a few years ago. I keep the film frozen. I have almost burned through the first 400' roll, and all of it has been perfect. I have quite a bit of tmax in 4X5 that I got from a closed lab. I keep it frozen too. It seems to be lasting well. I had some Kodak fine art elite fibre that started to act weird just before it fogged. The images on the paper had a fine grained mottled look that looked like very old b&w prints. I tried to print a few with it last week, and the paper was hopelessly fogged. Not knowing what happened to the paper before I got it makes a bit of a mystery as to how long it will last.

 

[SteveinAlaska]

I didn't put anything in the poll since I tried for the first time after opening a sealed folder of Kodak Polycontrast N with an expiration date of 12/77 and I am surprised with the results! The film was Ilford Delta 100 in a 1936 Voightlander RF 6X9 folder. On top of that is was photos of an antique auto meet.

 

[Muihlinn]

I do use expired paper as it's easy to correct the usual fog if there is any, and not so often expired film unless it's mine.

 

[Akki14]

I said yes all the time... because that's at least true for film. I'm trying to think of any in-date stuff I've recently used and that might just be the 600 polaroid for my sx-70... for just about everything else it's expired. I like people who think film goes off immediately; then they give me this film and I never have to buy any, or if I do, I tend to buy the cheaper expired or near-expired stuff. I've not had a problem with it except for some radically out of date polaroid 600 film my husband got from work(2004) for free but even that can be pretty with its orangey tones; it was quite nice for pictures of pumpkins.
I've not come across out of date paper; does paper have a date on it? I guess I got some old paper with my enlarger but never had problems with it. I most likely have out of date Fuji Crystal Archive as I bought it in the end of 2001 for university colour enlarging work and never touched it again after I left a few months after that. Some time I will sort out an RA-4 setup and play with it even though I've heard bad things about Fuji Crystal Archive ageing.
I don't fancy store my film, it stays away from heaters and usually away from direct sunlight and that's it.

 

[mhulsman]

I use old paper just because I have enough of it.
It is Agfa Brovira and from 1987 (at least that is written on the box) , there is a little bit of fog on some boxes others are good.
I just got it with some other equipment.
For good prints I use fresh paper.

 

[df cardwell]

Yes, and no.

35mm, only fresh film. Too important to know what I'm going get, and I go through it pretty fast.
I only use one type of film anyway.

But there IS a freezer full of 8x10 film. It is stable, and I only use it for my own fun.

Paper ? Fresh. Only one kind of paper, control the results with different developers.

Just a cranky old stick in the mud, I guess.

" want expected results ... not a mystery"

Actually, John, I think that mystery is what causes me to make pictures in the first place.
Having seen the mystery, I do my best to express it.
Random results in the darkroom have nothing to do with mystery !


.

 

[Mark Layne]

Yes, and no.

35mm, only fresh film. Too important to know what I'm going get, and I go through it pretty fast.
I only use one type of film anyway.

But there IS a freezer full of 8x10 film. It is stable, and I only use it for my own fun.

Paper ? Fresh. Only one kind of paper, control the results with different developers.

Just a cranky old stick in the mud, I guess.

Hmmm! A freezer full of film on the back of a truck headed for Cape Breton!
Stop in Pictou and plug it in for a while
Mark

 

[df cardwell]

A freezer full of film on the back of a truck headed for Cape Breton!

A little dry ice is all we need !

 

[Konical]

Good Morning,

I have little concern about using slow and medium speed films well past expiration dates. Right now, I have a box of 02/2007-date TMX in the freezer; when I get around to using it, probably soon, I won't expect any problem whatsoever. I also have a brick of frozen 02/2008 Fomapan 200 from which I use a roll now and then with no apparent problem. I'm least worried about several hundred sheets of Kodak Commercial, most of which I acquired a couple of years ago when I learned that it would no longer be available. I know that stuff will be fine, because, not long back, I used some which was over fifteen years old and had never even been refridgerated; the results were excellent. (Now, if there only more call for copying old B & W photos these days. . . Apparently, lots of folks are trying to get by with scanners and digital prints.)

Konical