Time Capsule--Found Old Unprocessed Film

That's old?

Oy. It's from the eighties. Anything pre-DX is old. That ain't old. (Humm.... eighties... reminds me it's time to clean the fridge.)

I'm guessing early mid 90s.

C41 processing, CVS, Wallgreens, grocery store, WallyWorld, one hour drive thrus.......

As it's been kept in such undesirable condition, I don't see why you wouldn't get any prints off it, but be prepared for some colour shift and casts... probably green or magenta! Stick it through on a quick turnaround and get the scans on a CD... you might be able to clan them up a bit in photoshop?

I recently found a roll of Gold 200 film I had exposed in 1992. It was stored in conditions similar to your time capsule (bottom of a bedroom dresser drawer). I didn't think that I would get anything useful after 14 years, but I decided to drop if off at Walgreen's nonetheless.

The film produced usable images, although with a heavy magenta cast. I don't have a scanner and didn't ask Walgreen's to make a CD. But my guess is that the images can be successfully manipulated in Photoshop.

> I'm posting a picture of the role in case anyone out there recognizes the time period of the film canister.

I believe that style was used in the late 80's - early 90's. If I had to specify exact years I'd guess between 1989-1993.

Adding dates to your original guesses:

>I believe that the roll was exposed between 6 [2000] and 13 [1993] years ago, with the most likely range being 8 [1998] to 10 [1996] years ago. There is a very small possibility it was exposed on a trip 18 [1988] years ago.

I think this roll is from before 1996. 1993 and 1988 are both possibilities.

> How stable is this film once exposed?

It's consumer film, so Kodak makes sure it will give acceptable results at least a year or two after exposure. As I read somewhere, consumers sometimes shoot two Christmases on the same roll! (I can't comprehend doing that...) So they take that into account.

Beyond that, you'll get something, it just won't be guaranteed much by the manufacturer. I'd guess 5 years might be okay, beyond that, probably not so great. I don't have much experience in this area.

> Do you think I would have any luck taking it to the local Ritz Camera Shop and getting it developed?

You'll likely get results, perhaps not the best results possible, but it will probably produce something.

> Has anyone had any experience with a place like "Film Rescue International" which claims to specialize in this sort of circumstance, but typically produces Black and White output?

Color to black and white is usually only done where there's little other choice, such as on old (pre-K14) Kodachrome. A lab such as Rocky Mountain Film (RMF) will almost certainly process it in color. Film Rescue should be similar, I'd guess. Don't hesitate to ask upfront, to avoid misunderstandings later.

The advantage you get of dealing with a specialist like that, is they *might* be able to *partially* compensate for fog *as the negative is processed*. Which you won't get by going to a local 1-hour shop. And if RMF or other specialized 'old film lab' makes the prints, they may do a better job than other places, since they're experienced at dealing with old film.

You pay for that level of service. But if the film might be important to you, they're the best choice in this situation. If you don't care much about the results much and are just curious, give it to your local 1-hour shop.

I should add that if the color isn't great after development, scanning, converting, and printing the film as black and white is always an option.

Gold 200 Super is from about 1992. I would just give it the MiniLab treatment - the worst that could happen is that you get a magenta cast.

Hello Renny

Being Film Rescue, I have a lot of experience with Film Rescue. When we have a customer call us with similar circumstances as yours we will first try to determine how important the film is to the customer. Most often with any older Kodak Gold film (vs. Kodacolor Gold) we will recommend that you find a reputable local developer that is willing to take a little extra care with the film and a close eye on their video color corrector. In most cases this will yield decent results. Some may actually have color correction channels programmed into their printers to deal with slightly distressed film. If you know that the film has spent a good deal of time in the "attic" then perhaps we will be your best option. You would be given a choice with this situation to either take the safest route - developing the film leaving the much more resilient silver content in tact or if color is important the film would then be developed in AN-6 high contrast color aerial film developer. In either case the film will be worked on digitally before printing. As you present your case here I'd simply recommend that you find a decent local lab that has their customers concerns in mind. Worst case scenario, if prints do come out very poorly you can send them to us to be corrected to the best of our ability. Hope that helps.

cheers

Greg Miller

Film Rescue International

Oh....and also worth mention....This film will not pre-date the 1990s. If so it would have the "Kodacolor" designation.