Strange Pattern on Film

RattyMouse · Mar 17, 2015

I'm seeing some strange patterns on a few shots from a recent roll of film. If you look on these two images, you'll see on the back wall a series of shapes arranged in a circular pattern. In the first photo, there's one circular pattern on the left side and one on the right side, also in the back of the image.

I cannot understand what caused this to happen. I'd appreciate some suggestions. These patters appear on at most 3 images from a 16 roll of 120 film. Thank you!

Thanks!

Ghostman · Mar 17, 2015

Those patterns come from the backing paper. FP4 Plus? Have you got a light leak on your camera back? Was the film loaded in subdued or bright light?

BrianShaw · Mar 17, 2015

Is it a red window camera? That and FP4 could be the answer.

goros · Mar 17, 2015

Shangai films are also famous for this problem.

BrianShaw · Mar 17, 2015

Also, which 3 images - the first 3, last 3, or randomly throughout the roll?

Simon R Galley · Mar 17, 2015

This indeed looks like wrapper offset:

As Ghostman says, did you load in bright light ?, is it a red window camera ? : Is the film in date ?

How long was the roll of film in the camera ?

Regardless you should return the film to us, and the wrapper and we will have it examined, do you have the batch number ?.

As an FYI I have checked we have no QC's outstanding for wrapper offset on any 120 ILFORD film product.

Regards

Simon ILFORD Photo / HARMAN technology Limited :

SLVR · Mar 17, 2015

No this totally looks like leak from a red window. You can see the leak in the top left corner of the second image. What does the neg look like? How do the edges of the film look? You have to decide whether its a leak from the red window, or from unloading or loading in bright light.

darkosaric · Mar 17, 2015

That is why I always use black tape over the red window - and only remove a tape for a short time when winding for the next frame.

sagai · Mar 17, 2015

Kind of like those spots anyway

pentaxuser · Mar 17, 2015

Nice offer Simon but I can see nothing in the OP's statement that says what the film was. It may not have been Ilford.

pentaxuser

gorbas · Mar 17, 2015

Recently I had been hit with the similar problem with 3 different 120 films from 2 major manufacturers.
Agfa APX100 expired in early '90s, Ilford FP4 expired in 07/93 and Pan F+ expired in 04/95. Ok, all films were well expired but kept in original packages. With out this "transfer" all negatives will be usable.
Last year I processed (there was a url link here which no longer exists) that was sitting in the camera with missing red window for 60+ years and no bad affect from backing paper.
Is that hard to make chemically & mechanically neutral backing paper for roll film?? I did fair share of using expired 35mm films in the my last 38 years in photography, but it looks for me from this recent experience that most of expired 120 films are suffering from the same "backing paper transfer" effects??? Or it's cool way to turn people form using 120 expired film?? Have yet to find it on Kodak and Fuji 120's?

BrianShaw · Mar 17, 2015

My experience with red window cameras is that Kodak B&W paper was best for avoiding this kind of bleed-through problem and Bergger was the absolute worst. Ilford is somewhere in the middle and has no problems if caution is exercised/exercized. For some reason it seems that Kodak color is more problematic than Kodak B&W in this regard.

frobozz · Mar 17, 2015

pentaxuser said:
Nice offer Simon but I can see nothing in the OP's statement that says what the film was. It may not have been Ilford.

pentaxuser

I think the pattern of the marks nails it as Ilford, since I don't know of anyone else whose paper is printed like that.

Duncan

railwayman3 · Mar 17, 2015

frobozz said:
I think the pattern of the marks nails it as Ilford, since I don't know of anyone else whose paper is printed like that.

Duncan

and the pattern seems to correspond exactly with the specimen of Ilford backing paper shown in Ghostman's post.

Hatchetman · Mar 17, 2015

If the roll somehow isn't tight when you take it out of the camera, that can happen.

RattyMouse · Mar 17, 2015

Simon R Galley said:
This indeed looks like wrapper offset:

As Ghostman says, did you load in bright light ?, is it a red window camera ? : Is the film in date ?

How long was the roll of film in the camera ?

Regardless you should return the film to us, and the wrapper and we will have it examined, do you have the batch number ?.

As an FYI I have checked we have no QC's outstanding for wrapper offset on any 120 ILFORD film product.

Regards

Simon ILFORD Photo / HARMAN technology Limited :

Hello Simon and all,

The film was Delta 400, in date, and shot in a Fujifilm GA645 camera. I *might* have another roll with the relevant production data but will have to dig around and see if I can find it. Right now it's 5 am here in Shanghai and I don't want to wake up the family.

I'm not concerned with this problem enough to send film back to Ilford. I just want to understand what I'm seeing here. These marks only appeared on a few frames.

Thanks for the help teaching me what this is.

RattyMouse · Mar 17, 2015

pentaxuser said:
Nice offer Simon but I can see nothing in the OP's statement that says what the film was. It may not have been Ilford.

pentaxuser

The man clearly knows his paper, as the film was Delta 400.

RattyMouse · Mar 17, 2015

BrianShaw said:
Also, which 3 images - the first 3, last 3, or randomly throughout the roll?

I'll have to check on this later. I am not certain if the scans are in the true order of the film.

RattyMouse · Mar 17, 2015

Why even have marks on the paper? Who uses these signs in any way?

pentaxuser · Mar 17, 2015

RattyMouse said:
Why even have marks on the paper? Who uses these signs in any way?

Those who have red window cameras. Only modern MF's have auto-winding systems that have no need for the user to do anything once the film has been wound to the start

pentaxuser

DWThomas · Mar 17, 2015

pentaxuser said:
Those who have red window cameras. Only modern MF's have auto-winding systems that have no need for the user to do anything once the film has been wound to the start

pentaxuser

Yes indeed, my Brownie Target Six-20 and my Ercona II use the red window, there's no mechanical indexing. Others, like my Perkeo II use the window just to set the start, then index from there. Except for the Brownie, there are metal flaps to close the window, although some of those don't stay put too well. So then it appears this case is not a red window problem, but chemical transfer -- bummer -- annoying either way, for sure.

It's amazing the pitfalls that lurk in the most simple things. I'm thinking there have been a lot of changes in printing technology over the decades, some of it to use less nasty chemicals. Mayhaps some of the newer soy based inks and such don't dry hard like in the old days.

mooseontheloose · Mar 17, 2015

I guess I'm used to the red window as many of my MF cameras (Holga, pinholes, other) have one. In fact, some Holga users will deliberately flash a light into the red window to get the frame numbers to show up on the film (I have to admit I've done that a couple of times). But in your case I'm not sure why it happened in the first place.

RattyMouse · Mar 17, 2015

mooseontheloose said:
I guess I'm used to the red window as many of my MF cameras (Holga, pinholes, other) have one. In fact, some Holga users will deliberately flash a light into the red window to get the frame numbers to show up on the film (I have to admit I've done that a couple of times). But in your case I'm not sure why it happened in the first place.

Yes, since my camera has no red window, I'm not sure how this series of marks ended up on my film. I've shot many rolls of film through this camera, including plenty of Delta 400 and 3200. Never before has this occurred.

albada · Mar 18, 2015

Two strange things I notice: (1) in the first image, the pattern appears twice, in the upper-left and upper-right, and the upper-right image is smaller. (2) The pattern appears twice in the second image as well, the second being the same size as the first, but fainter and directly under the first.
If these were backing-transfers, how could they be different sizes? I have no idea...

Mark Overton

Simon R Galley · Mar 18, 2015

Dear All,

the manufacture of 120 Film wrapper is INCREDIBLY complex and is a very high tech coated product and has to perform many functions.

I think the poster said it only appeared on three frames, this indicates the film was 'off the roll' in the back of the camera, it also seems to have some 'flair', my initial thoughts is that light has leaked into the camera somehow, but I cannot be 100% without seeing the film.

Simon ILFORD Photo / HARMAN technology Limited :

Strange Pattern on Film

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