Paper backed roll film made with backing paper cut at home.

qqphot · May 4, 2025

Cholentpot said:
Might as well update to.

The FK127 slitter worked fine. All I needed was the slitter, anyone with a little experience doing darkroom games doesn't need the whole kit. I can slit down 120 backing paper to 127 size now. I can even do an entire roll with the film if would want to. I now have a source of home made 127 backing paper. I just have to score a baby Rollie and I'll be set.

I'm curious which cameras and spools you're using that 127 with. I got a FK127 slitter but the 127 strip it produces is half a mm too wide for any recycled spools I have (mostly original Kodak metal ones, some Efke and Rera plastic ones) and in fact doesn't really fit the film channel of my baby rolleiflex. I tried to shim the blade a bit to adjust but there's no way that I can find to fix it. Maybe the one I got was just a fluke.

I currently use one of the XKAES ones (i think he's around this forum) and it's pretty easy and produces a very accurate width, but of course needs to be used in total darkness.

Cholentpot · May 4, 2025

qqphot said:
I'm curious which cameras and spools you're using that 127 with. I got a FK127 slitter but the 127 strip it produces is half a mm too wide for any recycled spools I have (mostly original Kodak metal ones, some Efke and Rera plastic ones) and in fact doesn't really fit the film channel of my baby rolleiflex. I tried to shim the blade a bit to adjust but there's no way that I can find to fix it. Maybe the one I got was just a fluke.

I currently use one of the XKAES ones (i think he's around this forum) and it's pretty easy and produces a very accurate width, but of course needs to be used in total darkness.

I'm using standard spools I've collected over the years. Mostly metal, a few plastic and a couple really nice brass and silver colored. I've been shooting on a Yashica 44 with a crank Yashica 44 with a knob, Ricoh Super 44 and a few brownies of different kinds. If anything the paper is slightly narrow rather than wide. I tend to get some edge leaks.

qqphot · May 4, 2025

Cholentpot said:
I'm using standard spools I've collected over the years. Mostly metal, a few plastic and a couple really nice brass and silver colored. I've been shooting on a Yashica 44 with a crank Yashica 44 with a knob, Ricoh Super 44 and a few brownies of different kinds. If anything the paper is slightly narrow rather than wide. I tend to get some edge leaks.

Interesting, I guess there must be some variation from unit to unit. I wish I had been able to shim mine to cut a bit narrower.

ozphoto · May 5, 2025

Wolfram Malukker said:
My involvement in this is more along the lines of unobtainable or difficult to obtain backing papers, like the 116, 127, 828, and 103/109 sizes.

There probably isn't a huge demand for this stuff but things like 116 and 127 were made for over 80 years, so there are a lot of cameras out there that could be used again if backing paper was available.

Ohhh 127 and 828 backing papers would be awesome!!

Donald Qualls · May 5, 2025

Cholentpot said:
I did not know that the 645 numbers are useful for 4x4. I've been marking the paper myself which is a pain.

You do get a little excess spacing (about 5 mm extra per frame) but the framing track is correctly located for either 127 or 828 cut from that edge of 120. I've done both a number of times. The 6x6 track is correctly located for the 4x6.5/4x3 on 127, too, if you cut for the 6x4.5 track but you'll have a few millimeters of frame overlap since the 127 full frame is 4x6.5. I've masked the frame in my Baby Ikonta and it works fairly well (double window on the full frame 127 track).

tezzasmall · May 5, 2025

Be careful though, of which camera one loads with paper negative lengths attached to backing paper.

I have only done it once so far, but I put a roll in my Bronica SQB, and did an exposure test over the whole roll, to find the correct ISO for the paper I was using.

The paper negatives came out brilliantly across the range and I'm looking forward to trying to enlarge one or two of them.

When I mentioned this to someone, they warned me that the tension on the internals of the camera would be put to a lot harder work, than with film, which the cameras are designed for and should think of only using a more basic camera like a Holga etc. Good point I thought!

Terry S

Donald Qualls · May 5, 2025

Look at how much spring travel the pressure plate has in the camera you intend to use. If it's as much as 2.5 mm, it should be fine to use RC photo paper in place of film. No harm will be done to the spring leaves by compressing them more, as long as they're not mashed so flat the metal takes a permanent deformation.

Paper backed roll film made with backing paper cut at home.

qqphot

Cholentpot

qqphot

ozphoto

Donald Qualls

tezzasmall

Donald Qualls

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