I like saving money as much as the next guy, so when I'm given some expired film or I find some squirreled away in a camera bag I gladly accept it- I just try to make sure I'm not shooting anything important on that old film unless I can test a roll first to see what my results will be. Sometimes I'll load up a test roll to go out on a photo walk, and if my results are good and I have more of that batch of film I'll know what to expect next time.
This past weekend while digging through the film fridge I came up with a roll of Ilford HP5 with a 2002 expiration date- and this gave me an idea... I had a fresh roll of HP5 that needed processing, so I could soup them together in the same tank for a comparison. I've shot lots of expired film, so I had a pretty good idea what results to expect and how best to increase my odds of getting usable images from the old stuff. I loaded the expired film in my Nikon FM2 and set the camera's ISO to 200- old film tends to lose some box speed so I decided to overexpose it by one stop and occasionally bracket shots as well. My wife and I took our son for a walk around downtown and shot the entire roll, concentrating on this month's Raleigh Photo Group project theme- "An Atypical Shot of a Local Landmark."
When I got back to the darkroom I processed the two rolls together in one tank using Ilford Perceptol, 1:1 for 15 minutes at 20ยบ C. The results are pretty much what I expected. The expired film has a very dense base and when I bracketed (1 stop over, normal ISO200, and 1 stop under) the normal frame was the best exposure. Here on the light table we see the top neg is the fresh HP5 while the bottom neg is the expired:
This density in the base will make it harder to achieve a good solid black, but it's still do-able. I scanned the negs as contact sheets, base-plus-fog and we can see that the expired film here has quite usable images, but to achieve a rich black and a bright white I am going to need to increase the contrast in either scanning or printing.
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| Expired Ilford HP5 400, rated at ISO200 |
The fresh film will give me the tonal range I expect from HP5, since it lacks that added density in the base. If greater contrast is what we want we can increase it in Photoshop or in the darkroom, but we can't create tonal range where it doesn't exist.
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| Fresh Ilford HP5 400, rated at box speed |
Here is a scan from the fresh film. Very little work has been done, just a levels adjustment and dust retouch:
And here is a scan from the expired film after adjusting levels and curves to achieve a good black point:
So we can get good images out of either the fresh or expired, however the old film takes a bit more work: testing the stock, overexposing to compensate for loss of speed, more careful scanning and adjusting in post or in the darkroom, etc. The fresh film is quite frankly easier. Shoot it at box speed and do a standard scan and the results are pretty good.
Unfortunately it's often the beginning film photographer who chooses to shoot expired film in an effort to save money, and they really do themselves a disservice. Shooting an unpredictable film stock makes it very difficult to learn from your mistakes. Shooting old expired film is part science, part educated guessing, and part blind luck.
So my recommendation is to go buy some fresh in-date film. Not only will you be more pleased with the results, but if we all buy film there's a better chance they'll keep making & selling the stuff!
