Panatomic-X - WOW!!

[donbga]

What Grain?

My comment was tongue in check

 

[kb244]

My comment was tongue in check

By the way, so you know that roll of Panatomic-X used to shoot the above... has been expired since about 1972 or so, without refrigeration.

 

[braxus]

Pan X seems to keep very well regardless of age or if its kept cold. There may only be a slight increase in grain size. That's about it. I have my Pan X done in Xtol for 7 minutes. Seems fine there. Its a shame Kodak won't bring this film back.

 

[lowellh]

The speed and resolution of this film is why the Navy and Air Force buy
Aerial Developer from Clayton and Kodak to process this film for strike photos. These are very exotic developers and provide amazing results.

 

[rusty71]

Any truth to the rumor that Panatomic X contained cadmium? Is this why it was discontinued? I've heard it was for environmental reasons, just like AGFA Portiga Rapid.

 

[Donald Qualls]

Highly probable -- it's my understanding that most commercial emulsions did prior to the 1970s (cadmium is chemically similar to silver, but slightly less reactive, which makes it useful for controlling crystal growth, reaction rates, etc.). Unlike emulsions such as Plus-X and Tri-X that were reformulated without the cadmium at some point, there was little enough market for Pan-X by the time that reformulation was necessary to make it uneconomical to do so -- faster films had gotten enough finer grain that they could replace Pan-X for most applications, and Tech Pan was available as well by that time.