(Maybe) Expired 16mm negative stock...

[dogstarman]

Hate to open this can of worms on the S8
forum again, but I'm hoping Nigel or
someone else out there can help me out...

I recently aquired 1000' of 16mm Kodak
stock. 300' of it is Tri-X reversal and the
rest of it is Vision 320 negative. The guy
I got it from informed me that it had "sat in his 'fridge..." for around two years. I'm not so worried about the Tri-X, because I'm thinking it should still be alright...

But, the Vision 320 is giving me the willies
because I have no idea how long this stuff can sit around, refridgerated or not, before it starts to deteriorate. I'm wondering if anybody has any insight on if this stuff is worth shooting or not, assuming that it is somewhere in the area of 2-3 years old. As I said, it was supposedly kept on ice, but I have no idea really. I really don't spend $50 on processing and a daily for one roll just to find out it's all greens and browns or something...

Any help is appreciated.

[blackangus1]

Most labs offer a "snip test" service. I know Yale charges about $5.00, Fotokem charges about $6.50. They'll take a 5' or so section of the film and test it and tell you whether it's good to shoot or not.

[jefury]

That's a good idea, to test it at yale.

Usually still shot 35mm film can last more than 2-3 years, unrefridgerated. I don't know if it's the same for any other guages but I don't see why it wouldn't.

Well, hope it turns out!
Good Luck

Jeffery

[MovieStuff]

I would do at test for sure. However, I once had a client shooting in my studio that ran out of 16mm film. This was back in about '91 or so (when I had a studio!) and I remembered having a 50 foot roll of some Kodak ASA 320 stock sitting on a shelf in the animation camera room. It had been there for a couple of years, totally unrefrigerated, and I said he could have it to bail him out. He shot it and it looked no different that all his other "new" 320 stock.

After that, I no longer refrigerate my film at all. If I know I am going to use it within the next couple of months, I just keep it on a shelf at room temperature (air conditioned) and it works fine. As counter intuitive as this may seem, I would even go so far as to say it seems more stable than when I used to keep it in the fridge. I get more consistant colors than I used to and I never worry about condensation on the film anymore (something that always bugged me, though it never happened).

Anyway, I'm rambling. Do the test. If not, as long as he didn't store in in his garage, then based on my experience I'd say you are safe but the test is the best thing to do.

Roger

[Scott Spears]

I've found that Color Neg film is pretty darn resiliant. On a feature I just shot, we used some 3-4 year old film that had been refrigerated and spent a little time out (2-3 months) of the frig. and it looked great in telecine. There was a screw up and we ran out of film, so I had this film laying around. I'd say, if you're going to print, be careful, but if your going to video, it should be ok.

As others said, when in doubt, run test if you can afford it and have the time.

Scott

[MovieStuff]

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size=2 face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">quote:</font><table border="0" width="90%" bgcolor="#333333" cellspacing="1" cellpadding="0"><tr><td width="100%"><table border="0" width="100%" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2" bgcolor="#FF9900"><tr><td width="100%" bgcolor="#DDDDDD"><font size=2 face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Originally posted by Scott Spears:
I'd say, if you're going to print, be careful, </font></td></tr></table></td></tr></table></BLOCKQUOTE>

A 16mm print? What's that? Oh, yeah. I saw one on exhibit in a museum recently. Interesting. [img]wink.gif[/img]

I agree. Printing is going to make things more critical. That said, the workprint we got off the older stock looked find and matched the newer stock pretty good. I think I saw a bigger difference due to different emulsion batches than I did from age.

Roger

[Nigel]

Dogstarman--Strange that you make a post in so long. I was actually wondering about your filmic career a couple of day ago.

I would shoot it and not worry. You could snip test and that would'nt hurt. I have some Fuji that is about that old that I need to shoot and I am not going to worry. If anything you might see some added "Blue Noise".

Good Luck