When Film Goes Bad (expired Ektar 25)

Hi Folks, I finally used the last of my stock of long-frozen Kodak Ektar 25 color negative film. It was quirky and a bit hard to use, but had a unique color palette. As a test, I bought two rolls from a seller who honestly said he did not know the storage conditions. Many of these expired films come from estate sales, where a buyer opens an old camera bag and finds film. This time the film was clearly ruined. Of a roll of 12 exposures from my Rolleiflex, most were grossly underexposed, and I could only extract 5 frames. I used an exposure index (EI) of 12, but possibly if I tried EI 4 or 6, I might have saved a couple more frames. Here are a few samples, and I rather like the funky colors and streaks. All are from central Mississippi, exposed with a Rolleiflex 3.5E with 75mm Xenotar lens.

(For some more successful Ektar 25 results: https://worldofdecay.blogspot.com/2018/05/footloose-around-vicksburg-with-ektar.html)

Interesting results. Indeed, as you say, "unique". Interesting color palette. Still very sharp.

At first I was amused that you had bothered to put your name and copyright logo on the posted images - but then I thought, hm, well! These are unusual enough that some may well consider them as Fine Art...

I recall using Ektar 25 in 35mm way way way back, but I cannot locate the negative files in the mess of what is optimistically known here as "my archives" at home. I also happen to have five or six old (very old - late 1980s, IRRC) 120 rolls of this film moldering quietly in my freezer, which is about to be cleaned out of all its film and then disposed of (both films and freezer). I must take them out and defrost them and put them to the test, in my Rolleiflex T with a '16' kit.

Andrew, a question for you. Did you sharpen those posted images during the scanning/PP? Or is the film still naturally that sharp? And what if any PP work did you do on the images? Okay, three questions.

Just tryin' to save myself time at the laptop. Many many many thanks, and if you happen to have more of them cute Ektar 25 images, please post!

(Added later) Just noticed your link, and am exploring it now. I like your title, "Urban Decay", it suits my local area here in Tasmania very well. I may take a tip from your shoot and go walkabout in the nearby streets with my Rollei T andsome ancient Ektar. An extra many thanks to you, mate!

I am back with a new post. Andrew has an interesting web site - anyone into architectural, geographical and/or historical photography will do well to click the link and explore what he has posted.

Your photography I will describe (like mine) as "pleasantly documentary" but you have a good eye for detail and a fine way of describing what you see.

What is a "shotgun house"? When I was growing up in a country town in eastern Canada in the 1950s, there were quite a few "shotgun weddings" in the local churches, but I have never encountered the term applied to a building (a house) before. And I am an architect (retired).

From your photographs I would say you have many subjects to explore without leaving your home town. As I am of an age where carrying a 'blad and a tripod is fast becoming somewhat beyond me, I now plan to go roaming the local streets with one of my Rolleis to see what I can record for posterity. The late '50s four-door Chevy is one I can easily and comfortably relate to, having seen many such cars in driveways and back yards of my community. All gone now, mostly sold for scrap and not a few towed to the local dump and bulldozed into burial sites now being regrown into fir and maple forests. All that iron must be good for North American trees.

Apologies for having gone off topic a bit, but then Andrew has posted Ektar 25 photographs on his site.

I recommend a visit, very interesting, well presented and written.

Thank you for the kind words! Comments on my blog are always welcome. As for scanning, the quick answer is no sharpening during the scan, but minor sharpening added when I resize for web display or my blog. This is my procedure:

Step 1. Scan 6×6 and 6×9 negatives with a Minolta Scan Multi medium format film scanner. I operate it with Silverfast Ai software running on an old Dell Windows 7 computer. The Dell is not networked and is necessary because of the SCSI interface. Settings: no sharpening, 4× multiscan, Kodak Ektar profile, 2820 dpi, output TIFF. The profile is not quite right, and, of course, with expired film, the color balance will be strange regardless. I save the files in a convention: date_address_city.TIF. If I used took many pictures in a day, I add a, b, c, etc. to the date. Note: I formerly sharpened during the scan, but some negatives looked really bad, sort of blotchy or fuzzy. I thought it was jitter in the scanner, humidity, old lubricants, who knows. Then I read that you should never sharpen during the scan but rather do that later as needed. For some reason, Fomapan 100 film responded the worst during sharpening. So now I want to rescan some of my older negatives, but that takes a lot of time.

Step 2. Add EXIF information such as description, photographer, lat-long coordinates, etc. with EXIFChanger software on a MAC computer.

Step 3. If needed, use Photoshop CS3 to clean up scratches or chemical blobs/bubbles, crop, rotate. Not all negs need it. Then I save as: filename_cleaned.TIF

Step 4. For display on the web or here in APUG, I resize, sharpen, and add the copyright logo with ACDSee Pro 2.5. The ACDSee is 20 (?) years old, but works for me. I tried a newer version but it did not have an ability to add the logo. For sharpening, I use a setting of 35%, but I do not know how that compares to settings in other software packages.

As for a shotgun house: It is a long thin house built in high numbers early in the 20th century for urban and rural (poor) workers. Many in the US south have been demolished, so they are becoming rare in some cities. Here are some examples:

https://worldofdecay.blogspot.com/2010/05/more-shotgun-shacks-arcadia-place.html

Good information, many thanks. Some useful points. You have an easy but good workflow to give you the results without having to spend endless time on the computer.

I spent two hours last evening strolling thru your web site, so much there. Left a few comments (as 'Anonymous' but the date will give me away). I found one post with more information about the shotgun houses, most likely the ink you posted. Well worth looking up. We had those in Canada also, known in New Brunswick in the 1950s and 60s as "shacks" (a distinctly Canuck term) and "shanties" (more New England American, but essentially the same architectural type).

I've now taken my Ektar 25 out of deep freeze and hope to use it this coming weekend for a local shoot in Tasmania. I also plan to focus (sorry - concentrate) on houses, we have several old mansions in the area dating to the 1840s that were broken up (the properties, I mean) 20-30 years ago and redeveloped into newer, housing but the original old residences were kept. One old residence has 12 bedrooms. No ruins - all still well maintained by new owners or descendants of the original English settler families.

I will be returning to Andrew's website in the near future for some extended browsing time. Well worth it. Bogs are all so well documented, a true pleasure to read and a learning experience as well as enjoyable. It's what I have long wanted to do but so far have not summoned up the time or dedication to do it - someday, I hope. As for your web site, Andrew, I cannot recommend it enough (obviously!).

I hope others will comment in this thread on ancient Ektar 25 and other old films. Surely we all have some...

One more example from the long-expired Ektar 25 film, an abandoned house off Old Port Gibson Road, Reganton, Mississippi (about 20 miles SE of Vicksburg).

The very thing that made Ektar25 as sharp and fine grained, gave it the chance of having bad keeping. I think you have an example of this.

Great photos nonetheless.

PE

Great photos Andrew. It's great that you are enjoying the hobby to its fullest.

I've shot 2 rolls of Ektar 25 (in 120) in the past 2-3 years. The first was slit down to 127 and gave me some decent, if inconsistent results, but still quite sharp and well exposed, with a bit if a rose-green cast to the scans.

I erroneously presumed that this being a slow speed film and being a well made premium Kodak product would make for a great candidate for it having minimal degradation over the decades.

Then I shot the second roll in 120, in somewhat less than fully bathed sunlight, and it came out awful. I could only salvage one or two frames from the roll, and they looked nothing like those from the first roll.

It's interesting to hear PE's insights that this film has the capability of degrading badly under poor keeping. I can definitely believe it, having witnessed it.

The pictures above are rather representative of what might occur with old Ektar 25. The film also took on a rough texture on the surface sometimes.

PE

ozmoose said:

I hope others will comment in this thread on ancient Ektar 25 and other old films. Surely we all have some...

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Oh wow! Ektar 25? I still have a roll of 135 that was a free gift attached to a photography magazine in the early 90s! It was very sadly forgotten about, never used and eventually ended up in a box of *photojunk for many years. I found it last year after my analogue renaissance...

Photo Engineer said:

The very thing that made Ektar25 as sharp and fine grained, gave it the chance of having bad keeping

Click to expand...

Marvellous! That bodes well for my very badly stored roll then, which expired in 1992! Once I get the UK festival season out the way, I'll go and throw some light at it and see how badly it's gone, then post some (if any) results!



*Photojunk - Usually consists of items that include: random odd sized skylight filters, a dedicated TTL flash shoe for a camera you have never owned, empty film canisters, a shorter than useful cable release, a not quite fully working motorwinder from a camera you no longer use and a completely unidentifiable rear lens cap!

I have a bunch of Ektar 25 (and royal gold 25) - much in 35mm but some in 120 too. I shot some of the 120 recently in a Rollei and will try to process it soon. Most of it is frozen, but some isn't. Back in the day this was easily my favorite color film, and still has a lot going for it even now, despite the dicey keeping characteristics.

There's an old comparison of Ektar 25 vs Kodachrome 25 on Popular Photography, you can read it on Google books.
They said it was by far the sharpest most fine grained colour negative they had tested but still nowhere near K25.

There's an old comparison of Ektar 25 vs Kodachrome 25 on Popular Photography, you can read it on Google books.
They said it was by far the sharpest most fine grained colour negative they had tested but still nowhere near K25.

Wow you created your own Instagram filter!