Another picture taken in close proximity to those posted over the last couple of days.
This is a bit of a “tripod holes” scene, and you can probably fine a large number of alternative (and probably better) photographs of the same location. It sits beside one of the main paths leading through Padley Gorge so, unless you take the path on the other side of the gorge, you can’t really avoid it.
Still, I’m quite happy with how it turned out. I’ve cropped in a little to remove some additional brightness where the grey and overcast sky was visible through the branches at the top of the scene.
Chamonix 045n-1, Schneider-Kreuznach Super-Angulon 5.6/90 & Kodak Ektar. Lab developed. Home scanned and converted with Negative Lab Pro.
Today’s picture was taken just a stone’s throw from the one I posted yesterday, but shot a year later. Thankfully the Kodak Ektar sheet fil, already expired by a few years when I loaded it into the holders, has stood the extended wait quite well, especially as it was just sat in my office and not refrigerated during this time. I wonder if we sometimes get overly concerned about the longevity of film if it’s not cold stored? I expect that, unless you’re in particularly adverse conditions, it will fare quite well at normal room temperature in a temperate environment.
Chamonix 045n-1, Schneider-Kreuznach Super-Angulon 5.6/90 & Kodak Ektar. Lab developed. Home scanned and converted with Negative Lab Pro.
It’s been a while since the last one of these posts, but with a shorter gap than before – 7 months this time, as opposed to the 17 month gap between the last two Expiriment posts.
This time, the subject was a roll of Kodak Vericolor HC which had expired in 1992. I have no idea of the entire provenance of the film before I got it, although it’s been in my freezer for about three years now.
Kodak describes Vericolor HC as follows:
KODAK VERICOLOR HC Professional Film This improved color negative film has greater sharpness and finer grain than KODAK VERICOLOR II Commercial Film, Type S. This film is ideal for commercial illustration, industrial applications, low-level aerial photography, environmental portraiture, and other applications that call for increased contrast. It may also be used for any copy work that needs increased contrast, and for outdoor portraiture under low-contrast lighting conditions, such as on cloudy days or in deep shade.
FEATURES • Extremely fine grain, extremely high sharpness, and high resolving power • Built-in dye mask • Balanced for exposure by daylight, blue flash, or electronic flash • Designed for processing in Process C-41 chemicals
BENEFITS • Produces excellent-quality high-contrast prints even with a high degree of enlargement • Makes excellent-quality color reproduction possible without supplementary masking • Allows exposures from 1/ 10 second to 1/10,000 second without filters • Can be processed with KODACOLOR and other KODAK VERICOLOR Films
I took a different approach when shooting this time. Usually I only have a single roll of a particular expired film and tend to take a chance and shoot the whole roll with the same settings, without any bracketing. This going-for-bust approach risks disaster if I misjudge the settings, but the reward is a full set of different images if it works well, rather than a curtailed set of identical compositions taken at different shutter speeds.
This time though, I decided to take the cautious apoproach. The primary reason for this being that I have an entire pro-pack of the film so using one roll as a sacrifice would mean I can shoot the other four knowing what settings will work well. In order to still maximise the number of different compositions, I chose to shoot the roll with my Bronica ETRSi, which gives me 15 shots per roll of 120 film. I decided to shoot each composition at three settings, allowing me five different compositions from the roll.
I didn’t see any point in shooting any of the shots at box speed, so planned on shooting each composition at one, two, and three stops of overexposure. As the film is rated at a box speed of 100asa, I chose to set my light meter to 64asa as a baseline, take a reading for the composition, and then shoot two additional frames with an increase of one stop of exposure for each. That was the plan, at least…
This plan worked ok for the first shot, and the results can be seen below, withe the first image shot at the settings given for 64asa, and the following two images with a stop more exposure over the previous one:
Fot this first shot, the results were all good. The middle image (effectively shot at 32asa) is the one I prefer. The first doesn’t show any major issues with underexposure, although the sky is a bit deeper, and the third, while clearly brighter, is still very acceptable (and I would have been perfectly happy with it if I didn’t have the others to compare it to).
The results were similar for these shots of a willow tree:
Again, the middle image is the best exposed, I think.
The next six shots had an issue – not only did I tamper with the process by changing lenses, I also managed to somehow mess up the metering – shooting each shot at box speed, then one and two stops over for both these compositions. While this was an error, it just means that the best exposed image is now number three, with the fist shot in each sequence being at actual box speed for the film. It clearly shows problems rated at box speed in terms of underexposure.
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For the final composition I realised my error and got back on track. The middle shot again being the best exposed.
Beyond the issues with underexposure and some small spotty defects in the emulsion, the results are pretty outstanding for a film that expired over thirty years ago. The colours still look very nice too.
I feel confident that, if I meter for 32asa, that I can expect pretty good results from the remaining four rolls I have, although I’ll perhaps overexpose a little more in dim conditions.
Overall outcome: Success!
Expiriment #6 coming soon (I do actually have some more expired film I’ve shot recently, so this might actually be true)…
Bronica ETRS1, Kodak Vericolor HC (expired 1992). Shot bracketed and lab developed for box speed.Home scanned and converted with Negative Lab Pro.
Taken on 11 November 2024
I’ve uploaded the images above directly to my blog, but if you want to see the ones with the best exposure at higher resolution, they can be found here on my Flickr account.
A couple of near identical photos today, both of the underside of the parasol that sheltered my sun lounger from the sun during our holiday in Dubrovnik.
The first was with the Canon Sure Shot Z135 on Kodak Gold. The Z135 has a noticeable vignette, particularly at the wide end, which is readily apparent here, and the sky is a rich and saturated blue.
The second was taken with my Ricoh GR III and is a lot more subtle in it’s tonality. The Ricoh’s excellent lens and the 24Mp digital sensor have also resolved more finer detail. The digital image also stands up to more post processing than the film scan and I think, in this case, that it’s the better picture.
Ricoh GR III
Canon Sure Shot Z135 & Kodak Gold. Lab developed. Home scanned and converted with Negative Lab Pro.
Despite my hopes and promises of doing one of these posts each month, I seem to have failed miserably when it comes to doing so – the last post in this (very occasional!) series was back in November 2022.
I did shoot another roll of expired film last summer but I was unhappy with the results and ended up converting the pictures to black and white. While they looks pretty nice after the conversion, these posts are aimed to be about keeping to the original results from the film used with a minimum of post processing. Converting to monochrome was a step too far.
No such worries with the next roll though, some 120 format Kodak Portra 400NC that expired in 2007. 2007 doesn’t feel like that long ago but it was prior to the global financial crisis and is fast approaching twenty years ago!
Portra 400NC was discontinued by Kodak in 2010, when the current range of Porta films (160, 400, and 800) was introduced. Kodaks description of 400NC was: “Offers fine grain, low contrast, and colors and skin tones that look real and natural in a variety of lighting situations.” There is a brochure online on Kodak’s website which covers the full rang of (as was) Portra films from this period. There’s a strong hint that it was aiming for the wedding photography market…
I don’t photograph weddings and, even if I did, there’s no way I’d risk a seventeen year old expired roll of unknown provenance on such a once-in-a-lifetime event. For the sort of subjects I normally photograph however, I was willing to take the risk.
Despite the limited number of shots, I decided to shoot it with my Fujica GW690 6×9 medium format camera, giving me just eight potential pictures from the roll. The first outing was to my favourite seaside haunt of Mablethorpe. Normally when I visit Mablethorpe I will wander around all day making photographs. However, this year, I took my dad along for a day out, so knew from the outset that I wouldn’t be shooting as much. In the even I only used three frames on this outing, and one of those was a misfire when the camera was in my bag! I’ve since started to avoid winding the film in the GW690 after taking a shot to prevent this expensive mistake from reoccurring. Unfortunately, the Mk I GW690 that I own doesn’t have the shutter button lock that the later models do.
So the first two shots from the roll were of beach chalets / huts that stand along the beach promenade. The weather on the day was bright, but a layer of thin high-level cloud, robbed the light of contrast. Nevertheless, for outdated film the results were pretty good.
The second batch of shots – the remaining five on the roll – were shot one misty morning at Rother Valley Country Park. While I find the park a little uninspiring due to over-familiarity, cold misty morning usually provide some nice pictures, and this occasion bore that out.
The first shot is a little dull perhaps, but the light was nice. It’s just a suburban street I walked on my way to the park. You can just make out the mist hanging over where the lake is in the middle of the shot though. There’s a line of pylons that run between the houses and the park. The towers are out of frame, but the powerlines themselves can be seen.
The next shot is one of my favourites from last year, a beautifully autumnal scene of a small maple tree, it’s leaves turning but not yet fallen, nicely separated from the background by the mist. I’m not sure if the colours are true to life, but they look gorgeous, so I’ll take that as a win.
The mist was already burning off under the gaze of the morning sunshine when I took the next picture. A simple landscape scene of the lake with the boating centre on the far bank. There’s still enough mist left to provide some pleasant atmosphere to the photo though.
I took another photo very similar to the one above which had a couple of swans in the frame, but the one above is the best, I think.
The last shot is another lone tree, but this time I shot directly into the light. It’s not as good as the other tree picture, but I do like the way the tufts of dew and cobweb covered grass are illuminated at the bottom of the frame. The lens of the GW690 shows no signs of flare, even in this challenging scene.
So, apart from a wasted shot, this was another expired film success. When I shoot old colour film I’m not really expecting accurate colours, just pleasing ones, and this delivered on that.
Overall outcome: Success!
Expiriment #5 coming soon (Yeah, I know…)…
Fujica GW690, Kodak Portra 400NC (expired 2007). Shot at 160asa and lab developed for box speed.Home scanned and converted with Negative Lab Pro.
As a treat for my birthday this year, I decided to get myself a Bronica ETRSi. I’d been thinking about a different aspect-ratio medium format camera for some time (and almost bought one a few months back), so my birthday seemed a good time to take the plunge. The camera I got is in nice condition and came with the 75mm Zenzanon f/2.8 lens, the speed-grip, and the AEII prism finder. The camera is very heavy in comparison with any others I own and, especially when the lens hood is fitted, looks like I’m carrying a movie camera around with me!
The camera came fitted with the standard, plain ground-glass focussing screen. While this is in pristine condition, I found that it was very difficult to finesse my focusing – especially when using wider apertures at closer distances. However, I managed to find a split-prism finder that someone had advertised as faulty and scratched, so I took the plunge and took a chance on it. The new focusing screen works fine and, while it’s certainly seen some action and gained a number of battle scars in its time, it’s still nice and bright and the focussing is much, much easier with the split prism.
I took a few family shots last week and decided to finsh off my test roll this lunchtime so headed out to the nearby village of Ridgeway for a short walk and to shoot the remaining six frames. While the camera is very weighty, the speed-grip makes it pretty comfortable to handle in both landscape and portrait orientations, and I had no problems controlling it.
I dropped the film off on my way back to work and was very fortunate when the lab were able to process it before they closed this afternoon, so a big thanks and shout-out to the great people at Peak Imaging.
Here are three of the shots that I’ve scanned and uploaded.
Bronica ETRSi, Zenzanon 75mm f/2.8 PE & Kodak Tri-X (expired).
Steel City Snapper photography 