Rollei IR400S question

I've just watched a video about shooting with Kodak Aerochrome, and one of the things mentioned was to not use cameras with automatic film advance because they can fog infrared film. I want to use Rollei's IR400 in the summer and have a Pentax 645NII, which has automatic film advance. I've used SFX200 in the past with no problem, but that's not a true infrared film, so just wondering if anyone knows if using the Rollei film with my Pentax will be a problem because it has automatic film advance.
Thanks

It depends on how the film advance works. In some cameras it used to involve a little IR led and accompanying sensor to track the film transport, whereas in other cameras the tracking was done mechanically. I don't know how your Pentax does it, but it's probably documented somewhere. If you had no poblems with the sfx200 in an IR application, possibly the Rollei 400S will work too. Keep in mind the Rollei is alo not a pure IR film, but a film with a response that extends up to something like 820nm - similar to sfx, but the rollei extends sensitivity even further into IR territory. If your pentax happens to use an IR led+sensor at, say, 760nm, you may/will experience problems. So it's a matter of googling some info on your camera and if that doesn't yield anything, try a roll.

As koraks pointed out, it depends on film advance mechanism. Nikon F80, for example, uses IR beam for registering how far should the film advance, therefore it is explicitly noted in the manual that use of IR film is restricted. F90 and F100, on the other hand, allow IR film to be used. As for 645N and N II, I could not find any remark regarding the use of IR film in camera manual, however a quick search through other forums (photo.net and pentaxforums) gave me answers implying that it is safe to use infrared film, including Rollei Infrared 400 in that camera. There are even some sample photos on flickr.

Brilliant, thank you both of you. Will definitely give it a go now

M-88 said:

As koraks pointed out, it depends on film advance mechanism. Nikon F80, for example, uses IR beam for registering how far should the film advance, therefore it is explicitly noted in the manual that use of IR film is restricted. F90 and F100, on the other hand, allow IR film to be used. As for 645N and N II, I could not find any remark regarding the use of IR film in camera manual, however a quick search through other forums (photo.net and pentaxforums) gave me answers implying that it is safe to use infrared film, including Rollei Infrared 400 in that camera. There are even some sample photos on flickr.

Click to expand...

Absolutely right. Add the Nikon N75 to the list with F80 that cannot use IR film.