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Exposure for 10 year old recans


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Hey everyone, I've been "lurking" on these forums for years and finally got around to creating an account, so this is my first post.

I recently stumbled upon about 3000 ft of recans and a couple short ends of 5213 and 5219 that have been sitting in a freezer for ten years. Considering it's been frozen, came from a trusted source and hasn't been sitting in a sweaty closet (in SC) for that amount of time, how much would you want to overexpose it to get a healthy negative? I'm guessing one stop at the very minimum, but I've never dealt with any film quite that old and these experiments can get expensive, so any advice would be appreciated ?   

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If there's a lab not too far away I'd do a strip test and expose/filter based on the measured density curves. Expired fast film isn't as predictable as old slow stock.

That said, low-contrast negative like Vision 3 can tolerate virtually any amount of overexposure. You can literally shoot 7 stops over and get an image (although scanning negative this dense is problematic to say the least). I'd expose expired 5219 at EI 100 or denser if I had to shoot without testing.

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I'd try and get a clip test rather then guess. But I guess transport to a lab at the mo would be interesting/expensive. Atlanta has a lab (closed due to Covid Juice), hopefully it will reopen soon.  It's almost a day trip away, you can stop at Cracker Barrel on the way. 

Also you never know about conditions if your not the person that stored it (something could have happened). I was given about 30 unopened rolls in date 35mm, 16mm film from a friend. I only discovered after the clip test he'd stored it in his attack for a while, destroying it.  I was annoyed about the wasted money on the clip test...but it was nothing compared to what I would have spent on kit hire and setting up a project to film on it

I would never gamble with old stock without tests, it would be too upsetting if it came back unusable. 

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Thanks for quick the responses. I'm definitely still going to test, I guess I just wanted to know a little more what to expect with something that old. I'm way too exposure paranoid on fresh stock / even digital to gamble it on a gig or important shoot... 

Any scanners I should stay away from as far as low DR or having trouble with higher densities? I haven't shot much celluloid since school, its been quite a while, but have been getting back into it fairly recently. I've gotten 2K transfers from an HD Spirit on my last three shoots as they were pretty cost efficient, no issues but I was pretty much going box rating / a third of a stop over. No situation like this  

  

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Do a clip test, we are open if you want that soon.

 

I would scan dense neg on a Spirit4K, Scannity,  Arriscan, Scan Station 6.5k or Xena 6.5K

I would avoid the Blackmagic Cintel and Scan-Station 5K for dense material.

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