Film Characteristics

Barney

Barney

Suspended / Banned
Messages
3,043
Name
Wayne
Edit My Images
No
Morning everyone,

I am starting to notice that different film have individual characteristics, not the grain, sharpness etc of course but when handling them through the development process.

Some films dry flat and yet others remain curly despite my best efforts. I have not tried all films but does anyone else notice this.

Foma films handle beautifully, easy to load onto reels even though at first seem a bit "floppy" initially I thought this was what was meant by a "thin" negative. LOL
However some of the Illford films I find incredibly difficult to load onto the reel and rarely lie flat when going through my scanner.

As usual I blamed myself but I am starting to see a pattern.

Does anyone else consider the handling characteristics for film selection or am I doing something wrong with them?
 
I have (had) most trouble in 135 with Kodak Tri-X, which used to be my film of choice. For me that always dried with a curve across the film, as if it was cut from a section of bicycle tube! by comparison, I found the Ilford films dry lovely and flat, and Kentmere films even better. The Adox HR-50 I used recently was outrageously curved long wise, a real pain to get into the film holder.

Not sure I can remember any particular problems with modern 120, maybe the substrate is more robust? Many of my late father's 6x9 negatives however, seem to be twisted so no two edges lie parallel. That's probably because of how they've been stored this last 70 years!
 
I've had an odd experience or two with 4x5 Cinestill colour. It is a thin film base, and curls up quite a bit, but actually uncurls as it dries.

When handling any 120 film in the changing bag, I unroll it and the paper backing back to the start while separating them. Then I load up the spiral from the start of the film, which seems to make it a little easier. They always dry with a slight curl, but they never close in on themselves. I let them dry very slowly, though. Sometimes they will go through a cycle of curling a bit, then "flattening" again - at least to some extent.
 
Last edited:
I've had various films suffer problem from curls over the year, although I've never had that problem with any Ilford film. My experience with about 25 rolls of Adox HR50 was that it was extremely flat. Certainly if a film was consistently curly, I wouldn't buy it because film flatness is fundamental to getting a sharp scan.
 
Look at the state of this one?

Should I expect the film holder to keep it flat? I want the film to lay flat. I cant ever get a good scan, can I. I have been cropping the curl out but I am now at the point of trying to figure it out.

tower-2.jpg
 
There's no easy way to get away from curled film (in either axis) unfortunately, other than only using film stocks that you know will lay perfectly flat. You can cure the issue to a degree by placing them inside the pages of heavy books to flatten them, but it's not a perfect solution. Decent film holders which allow the negatives to be held flat for your scanner are the best bet if available.

Tri-X can be like a watch-spring sometimes!
 
Nothing surpassed my dad's 35mm ilford films from the 1950s for longitudinal curl. They seems to almost be able to burst out of the Epson film holders. The worst were stored in the film cans.
 
Xp2 is like a spring,

When developed would it be possible to relax the film in warm water without detriment?
 
Nikon photographer said:
When I had a darkroom, I built myself a film drying cabinet, never had any films, 35mm and 120 curl up on my after they'd dried properly.
Click to expand...
What temperature did you dry at Geoff?
 
Barney said:
What temperature did you dry at Geoff?
Click to expand...
Too long ago to remember, but what I used was a cupboard, the height of a wardrobe, but was around 12 inches or so wide, I put a ventilation slot of the door at the top, and a false shelf at the bottom with a load of 1 inch holes cut out and covered over with fine mesh, then fitted a bulb holder and and a 100 watt bulb, beneath the shelf, and a net curtain rod fitted towards the top, it gave just enough heat to dry film after they had been washed and squeezed, and film clips fitted on the film strips with a weighted one on the bottom bottom of the film, I must look to see if I still have any photos of my darkroom.

I'm thinking of getting a darkroom set up again.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top