Comments on: Shooting a 50 Year Old Roll of Kodak Panatomic X 35mm Film

By: Tim Jagoe

Tim Jagoe — Wed, 03 Jan 2024 07:26:58 +0000

I was a contemporary of Pan X. Ah I knew it well. The suduction of ultra fine grain was a holy grail of my time. So trust me when I say this was and appears to still be really terrible terrible film. I never made a single exposure that didn’t turn out what awful prints. Even exposition #6 Grade paper you only get high contrast soft images. I was intrigued by the article drawn in once again by hope, springing eternal for old photographers (78) At first I was pulled in by your “cover “ shot the well composed majestic Mayflower. But then I viewed the lack of definition of the grainless float the boat PanX . A worthwhile exploration an excellent article. Honest and sad result. If you’re up for another blast from the past experience and potentially successful article. Get a 50 year old roll of 35mm TryX 400, exposed at ei 1000 incident meterd explorative “stuff”. Developed in Acufine “fine grain “soup . I used to run back to back double capacity Nikor reels no plastic with everything wet at 80 degrees. No heat air dry. Print on a high silver #3 paper. Then marvel at prints you can shave with. But what do I know. The old photographer/instructor.

By: Brandon Libby

Brandon Libby — Mon, 06 Nov 2023 01:13:41 +0000

I have to ask (just call me John Snow), what sort of issues might one experience with expired b&w film? I have seen the weird colors of expired color film as a wee laddie, but never shot b&w back then.

By: ºColor-Solinarº

ºColor-Solinarº — Tue, 10 Oct 2023 17:46:49 +0000

Well it just has to be said…..”located within the perpetual stinking miasma of the active commercial fish pier” is probably the BEST statement I’ve read online in many, many moons. I appreciate your humour, I enjoyed this article very much and it made my day. Thanks for that 🙂

Oh…and I like to ruin my film photos in Photoshop – so you’re not alone there.

By: Andy Umbo

Andy Umbo — Sat, 30 Sep 2023 16:19:55 +0000

In reply to Michael S. Goldfarb. Super XX was heavily silvered, had a very straight heel to toe “curve” (which means practically none), and was the go to film in photo college for making black & white separation negs for making matrices for dye transfer printing! This was for me, back in 1973. I always loved Panatomic X better than Ilford 50, and back in photo college as well, Kodak made a reversal processing kit for it to make black and white slides! It was killer, and we had to do it for a few classes.

By: Richard Jonathan Oakley

Richard Jonathan Oakley — Sat, 30 Sep 2023 16:05:26 +0000

In reply to John Fontana. Despite all the wonders of modern digital photography ,nothing beats ability to make you stop and think before finally pressing the shutter. I last used this film in 1988.. my simple pentax me super and a tripod with a 56lb weight hanging below let me get some amazing shots. Modern technology has dialed out the true photographer and brought in photoshoper.

By: Alexander Oh

Alexander Oh — Thu, 28 Sep 2023 07:54:19 +0000

Wonderful article and beautiful pictures from this old film stock. About the 1 stop per decade rule: I recently experimented with arrow pan press 4×5 film expired in 1945, so about 8 decades expired, and also found the 1 stop per decade is probably too much. Using 0.8 stops per decade gave me decent results, but I guess it depends a lot on how the film was stored.