Film Restoration - Magenta/purple dye transferred to film base

[Andrew Wise]

Hi all,

I have some 16mm film with signs of vinegar syndrome, mostly just smell. But it was stored in a can with another film with full blown VS.

I’m not 100% sure on the correct word to use, but I believe it’s Ferrotyping? 

It seems the emulsion has leached some dye, and it’s become pressed into the base. It doesn’t come out with alcohol or water. 
it’s only purple/magenta in colour. 
the film still seems to have ok colour going on.

its marked as Kodachrome on the film edge. it’s the first time I’ve seen this before. 
 

Is there any fix either chemically or in post?

 

thanks! 
 

 

[John Rizzo]

The best thing to do is to scan it, the purple color should be easily correctable.   

[Daniel D. Teoli Jr.]

If it is too far gone and you can't color correct in post...turn it into B&W.

I'm not sure about ferrotyping. 

Ferrotyping is what we used to do to 'Type F' semi-gloss paper to turn it into glossy photos. You would squeegee the wet paper into contact with a highly polished chrome plate and let it dry slowly. If it dries too fast, it develops clamshell cracks.

You can tell the difference between ferrotyped gloss prints versus RC gloss by looking at the edge of the paper. The ferrotyped paper has a smidgeon of non-ferrotyped semi-gloss gelatin still left on it. The RC has a perfect gloss right to the edge. Also, some pin hole defects in a ferrotyped gloss finish when viewed at an angle.

Ferrotype plates, so called, were also used in making daguerreotypes, but had nothing to do with making gloss prints. 

Next time send in a photo / scan of the problem. It is good to see this stuff.

Good luck!

Edited May 12 by Daniel D. Teoli Jr.

[Robert Hart]

Andrew. If you could get hold of some green lighting gel, probably about 1/8 or 1/4 and place that over your light source, that might be helpful in bringing the blue and red channels back into balance if the magenta masking in the base is consistent in density.

[Andrew Wise]

On 5/12/2024 at 2:52 AM, John Rizzo said:

The best thing to do is to scan it, the purple color should be easily correctable.   

Unfortunately it’s not just the standard magenta fade that you’d normally see which I can correct, It’s magenta ghosting from the frame that was rolled on top of it in the wind. 
here’s an example - https://app.frame.io/f/df4571a5-c6a7-40f1-a81f-d48e8f0d563c

 

a friend told me it could be from a tight wind, or maybe film cleaners or lubricants used in the past. 

[Robert Houllahan]

Jeeze that is a tough one to fix.

I wonder if you could do some kind of notch or bandpass color filter in Resolve or Phoenix that just selects the fairly uniform color range of the dye imprinted onto the base from the tight wind and extract it.

If they dye is really soaked into the acetate base it probably won't ultrasonic clean off.

 

 

[Robert Hart]

I wonder if once you have a safety copy scanned off the film and the owner of the film consents to possible loss, that you could bleach the base face of the film and wash/wipe the bleach off before it can touch the emulsion face. 

I would be inclined to still try adding a green gel filter to your scanner's backlight source to balance the magenta. The ghost image may however remain as a faded black and white image. You have a conundrum there that I do not envy on little bit.

[Robert Houllahan]

Most scanners these days have pretty sophisticated RGB LED lamps which can be calibrated to any RGB balance making the filter unnecessary.

Doing a good 4K scan which is un-clipped and then trying to work on the base to remove the transferred dye. I would suggest finding a section at the head or tail to experiment on. Start with alcohol and move up in solvent strength to see if anything works.

[Andrew Wise]

Thanks for all the replies and advice everyone. 

On 5/15/2024 at 6:32 PM, Robert Hart said:

I would be inclined to still try adding a green gel filter to your scanner's backlight source to balance the magenta. The ghost image may however remain as a faded black and white image. You have a conundrum there that I do not envy on little bit.

Thanks Bob, I used the filmfabriek here so I could push the RGB light source, I balanced it to be peak white. 

I've tried some colouring in resolve but I'm not that skilled, and it just takes away from the other colour of the film. 

6 hours ago, Robert Houllahan said:

Doing a good 4K scan which is un-clipped and then trying to work on the base to remove the transferred dye. I would suggest finding a section at the head or tail to experiment on. Start with alcohol and move up in solvent strength to see if anything works.

I took some of the leader where the dye had also pressed into it, I couldn't get it out with any alcohol (iso and ethanol) and water. But it could be different to the film base. I could try steal some from the tail. 

 

It might be something I just have to leave as is. Just do the best scan I can. Maybe someone down the track can do some further work on the files

[Robert Houllahan]

I think that if the emulsion dyes have transferred into the base it will be very hard to remove them because they are now part of the base not just on the surface.

You might try soaking a small head or tail piece in Film Renew or Vita Film and then take some more very aggressive action like using a scotch brite pad to it just to see how far you need to go to possibly get it out.

You might want to ask some more experienced colorists about how to "notch" out the color spectrum of the transferred dyes as they seem to be a very specific color range. There are great color picker tools in all the modern software like Resolve or Phoenix. Maybe make a post on the Lift Gamma Gain forum to get some more colorist opinions.

[Brad Miller]

Andrew - I have seen this EXACT issue on a film we received that arrived in cans on cores with "Film Title > soaked in FilmRenew date ______" on the cans.  The general consensus was that FR was put in the cans with the film and likely stored in a hot environment.  In fact there was a tiny bit of liquid still in the cans (maybe a teaspoon's worth) and it was an almost blood red color, which made a lovely stain on the carpet where a few drops fell.

When we inquired to the owner he said the print was absolutely in lab mint pristine condition and he had intentionally soaked it in FR to make sure it stayed like new.  (I don't think we ever got an exact answer as to if he put the film in the cans with the FR and then put it directly into storage, or if he soaked the reels for X days and then emptied the FR from the cans and THEN put it into storage.)  He did however admit it was stored in a non-air conditioned space.

If anyone is going to use FR remember it should not be used as some sort of preservation chemical / storage.  Just use it it per the manufacturer's recommendation for a day or whatever, NOT an extended period of time and definitely NOT in a hot environment. 

"More" of anything is not always "better".

[Andrew Wise]

On 6/11/2024 at 4:04 PM, Brad Miller said:

Andrew - I have seen this EXACT issue on a film we received that arrived in cans on cores with "Film Title > soaked in FilmRenew date ______" on the cans.  The general consensus was that FR was put in the cans with the film and likely stored in a hot environment.  In fact there was a tiny bit of liquid still in the cans (maybe a teaspoon's worth) and it was an almost blood red color, which made a lovely stain on the carpet where a few drops fell.

When we inquired to the owner he said the print was absolutely in lab mint pristine condition and he had intentionally soaked it in FR to make sure it stayed like new.  (I don't think we ever got an exact answer as to if he put the film in the cans with the FR and then put it directly into storage, or if he soaked the reels for X days and then emptied the FR from the cans and THEN put it into storage.)  He did however admit it was stored in a non-air conditioned space.

If anyone is going to use FR remember it should not be used as some sort of preservation chemical / storage.  Just use it it per the manufacturer's recommendation for a day or whatever, NOT an extended period of time and definitely NOT in a hot environment. 

"More" of anything is not always "better".

Thanks for the info, that’s really interesting to hear. Good to know about that to keep an eye out for it.

I’m really not sure if anything was used on this film, the other films in the collection didn’t have the same issue, although they were different stocks, and could have been stored elsewhere and treated different before they came together.