Storing uncut roll film

peoplemerge · Nov 10, 2021

The pandemic has given me the chance to greatly improve the efficiency of my workflows. I process all my own films and nowadays, I now do most printing using Beseler Negatrans carriers so I have little opportunity to get dust, fingerprints, and scratches on my film. If you don't know, a Negatrans is a carrier where you feed the film into the carrier, then advance frame by frame by turning a wheel. I use the same enlarger setup for DSLR scanning but putting the camera on the easel and removing the lensboard.

I've always hated cutting and handling the negatives to put them in printfiles sleeves and wondering if anyone stores them uncut. I bought a continuous sleeve from Freestyle, who sell two types of continuous roll sleeves, by Lineco (clear) and Printfile (translucent but cheaper), each offered in 35mm and 120.

I've thought of building a wood box and hanging them with stick on labels for organization but maybe someone here has thought this through more than me.

MattKing · Nov 10, 2021

Doing that will impart what will eventually become an essentially permanent curl.
It will also end up using a lot more space than the sheets will.
I've never done it myself, but I have had to both deal with customer's films that were stored that way and, on a couple of occasions, print from them - yech!
You might get to the point that even the Negatrans won't work well with the curl.

FotoD · Nov 10, 2021

MattKing · Nov 10, 2021

FotoD said:

Thanks - that is wonderful!

peoplemerge · Nov 11, 2021

I was thinking of hanging them vertically. You mean is they’re in a tight curl? Yeah not planning on doing that.

MattKing · Nov 11, 2021

peoplemerge said:
I was thinking of hanging them vertically. You mean is they’re in a tight curl? Yeah not planning on doing that.

This is much of what I have from the 1970s:

I have about 3.5 feet of shelf filled with more binders, plus boxes with customer's files.
Just think of how big a box I would need if I stored t you are asking about!
I think if you sture them that way, they will take up way too much space, and you will end up handling them more than you might want.

peoplemerge · Nov 11, 2021

I admit that when printing, holding very long end strips get in the way. Most of what I print is shot under controlled lighting, so I often want to make a fine print off the first frame, the with the negate and I can blast through the roll, producing 8 more like it.

It would be cool and compact if it were in the shape of a grandfather clock that folds out like an accordion.

But I guess I’m on my own because nobody else has tried this. Thanks @MattKing for the feedback.

eli griggs · Nov 17, 2021

I have 120 sleeves, and am considering 135, instead of strips of four which I also have and use.

My one concern is long term storage, difficult to reduce negative bend.

So far so good but it is a possibility, IMO

peoplemerge said:
The pandemic has given me the chance to greatly improve the efficiency of my workflows. I process all my own films and nowadays, I now do most printing using Beseler Negatrans carriers so I have little opportunity to get dust, fingerprints, and scratches on my film. If you don't know, a Negatrans is a carrier where you feed the film into the carrier, then advance frame by frame by turning a wheel. I use the same enlarger setup for DSLR scanning but putting the camera on the easel and removing the lensboard.

I've always hated cutting and handling the negatives to put them in printfiles sleeves and wondering if anyone stores them uncut. I bought a continuous sleeve from Freestyle, who sell two types of continuous roll sleeves, by Lineco (clear) and Printfile (translucent but cheaper), each offered in 35mm and 120.

I've thought of building a wood box and hanging them with stick on labels for organization but maybe someone here has thought this through more than me.

eli griggs · Nov 17, 2021

I have seen some World Class Photographers, archives in which they stored unsleeved rolls of negatives in 35mm cans that come with the film, so I suggest we look up collections that used this method and see if curl will actually damage a roll of film, or can such a roll be rewashed in distilled water and recovered that way.

120 films might be stored as rolls, in a cut to length, (rolled length) plus, like a coin sleeve, with tucked ends on both sides.

gone · Nov 17, 2021

There's a little trick to getting the cut negs into the print sleeves (sorry, I can't help you w/ getting them out of the *#%$! things). I found that if I just leave them hanging in a humid bathroom to slowly dry they stay pretty flat. Then I lay them on the kitchen counter, cut 'em into strips, and it helps to hold the strip between your thumb and another finger to squeeze it a lil and get it to curve a little lengthwise. That makes it non flimsy, sorta rigid, and you can slide it into the print sleeve.

I'm seriously thinking of thrashing print sleeves, and putting the neg strips into glassine envelopes. Balky print sleeves that are finicky can be frustrating, and it's just one of those aggravations that doesn't need to be there in photography. Those aggravations add up, so it's good to deal w/ them.

Sirius Glass · Nov 17, 2021

MattKing said:
Doing that will impart what will eventually become an essentially permanent curl.
It will also end up using a lot more space than the sheets will.
I've never done it myself, but I have had to both deal with customer's films that were stored that way and, on a couple of occasions, print from them - yech!
You might get to the point that even the Negatrans won't work well with the curl.

I agree. I use PrintFile pages.

Sirius Glass · Nov 17, 2021

eli griggs said:
I have seen some World Class Photographers, archives in which they stored unsleeved rolls of negatives in 35mm cans that come with the film, so I suggest we look up collections that used this method and see if curl will actually damage a roll of film, or can such a roll be rewashed in distilled water and recovered that way.

120 films might be stored as rolls, in a cut to length, (rolled length) plus, like a coin sleeve, with tucked ends on both sides.

I use strips of 6 in PrintFile.

peoplemerge · Nov 17, 2021

I feel like I haven’t explained the idea: if you want your clothes to not wrinkle, you hang them in the closet on hangers. To keep the dust off your dry cleaner covers the clothes and hangar with plastic.

I’m thinking of doing something similar with negs. Dry, processed film that is hung generally doesn’t develop a curl. Possibly with the exception of ultra thin films like Kodak high speed infrared.

MattKing · Nov 18, 2021

I now understand what you are thinking of.
I know I certainly wouldn't have the closet space to make this work.
And if I did, I would be concerned about how much handling of the sleeved film would be required in order to locate and access a particular roll.

Don_ih · Nov 18, 2021

You can compromise by cutting the rolls into two shorter strips and having a box 2.5 feet long to store them in. You could store many, many rolls of film in such a box that was only 8"x8"x30".

As for storing negatives in the film can, lots of enlargers have the metal "wings" for holding the coiled negative strip as it's fed through the enlarger - so it was something that was very common, at least for long enough to get those enlargers designed. As for how damaged it would get being stored in a coil in a film can, how damaged does it get before it's exposed and developed, when it's more tightly coiled?

I have coiled rolls of negatives that someone shot in the 1950s. It's a pain to try to look at them against a light and it would be horrible to try to scan them but they go through the enlarger without issue.

Storing uncut roll film

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