Developing Expired Film, Two Years Later
What I didn't expect to see
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Oh, film photography. It’s the slowest, sweetest, yet most postponed activity for me and there’s a reason for that. I’ve been doing my own developing and scanning since 2010 and attention to detail is my weakness, hence the long delay.
BUT I finally began developing a couple of the 12 rolls of 35mm that have been sitting for two years. The tedium of preparing and fumbling in my darkroom is only part one of the approximate 25 steps that follow. I’m maxing out on efficiency though with the larger sized tank.
So what did I find? The biggest surprise wasn’t the subject matter or the effect of the expired TMY400 shot with the Olympus OM-2N. It was discovering that I had images of sweet Chopper, my dog who died in January! What an emotion seeing his little face on the negative…
The rest are below. They are a gallery of the nature images shot from the same roll. I did not use my Epson V600 for this scan, but a new set up using my Micro Four Thirds camera and a macro lens.
It was enjoyable looking back in this way. I look forward to developing the other rolls…whenever I get to them!
I have a handful of rolls in the fridge from about three years ago. No idea what’s on them, not sure how I will decide when to develop them.
Lovely shots, well worth the wait.
I can certainly relate, having some 6 rolls of FP4+ I shot between 2018 and now still hiding in a bag in the freezer. Not to mention the HP5+ I pushed to 1600 back in 2017 or so... The last batch I developed had photos of our dog Sully who passed last July; I knew there were some of him somewhere among those but it was still pleasant seeing more pictures of him come out of the tank.