film and airports

sineadw

Quick question - I'm flying in the morning and have decided just to bring the film camera. I have some Ilford HP5 and some Fomapan. Will the xray machines effect it? All in hand luggage...

melekalikimaka

nope dont think so, just ir.

Fajitas!

Generally it'll only affect the higher iso's.

If you're very worried, but your film on the other side and get it dev'd over there.

DaireQuinlan

sineadw wrote: »

Quick question - I'm flying in the morning and have decided just to bring the film camera. I have some Ilford HP5 and some Fomapan. Will the xray machines effect it? All in hand luggage...

nah. I've had rolls of portra 800 that have been through a ton of xray machines and I've never noticed anything awry about them*. Just make sure it goes in your carry on, and not your checked baggage.

*or at least anything more than the usual weird stuff that happens as a matter of course when I develop them ...

Fajitas!

http://www.kodak.com/global/en/service/tib/tib5201.shtml

And also, it happened to some older 400 speed film coming back from an airport in the middle of nowhere... So I wouldn't say it's completely unlikely to happen. They were using some pretty old x-rays though.

wersal gummage

melekalikimaka wrote: »

nope dont think so, just ir.

put IR through an x-ray myself a few weeks ago and it turned out fine.

Fajitas!

True IR or extended range/SFX film?

wersal gummage

Fajitas! wrote: »

True IR or extended range/SFX film?

it was SFX film.... the more i find out about these things the more i realise how little i know.

care to tell me what true IR film is ? thanks.

while i'm at it - some IR shots i've seen have colour in them - I think my film must have been b+w - it didn't look very 'IR' to me when i got it developed - more like b+w with a bit of punch to the whites. it was the first time i'd tried IR (i was using a red filter as well).

Fajitas!

Ah, see SFX isn't actually an IR film, it's just got an extended range of sensitivity - If you want to bring out the 'IR' in it, you're going to need to use a dark red filter - But, however, the film is all B&W, so you're not going to see much colour in that. It's mostly digital IR that's going to have colour tonings present in them (There is an IR slide film out there from at least Kodak, but I've never got my hands on it).

Here's some info on 'true' IR film, a run down of Ilford's SFX and other IR films (and why they're such a royal pain in the arse); http://www.vividlight.com/Articles/2915.htm

DaireQuinlan

wersal gummage wrote: »

while i'm at it - some IR shots i've seen have colour in them - I think my film must have been b+w - it didn't look very 'IR' to me when i got it developed - more like b+w with a bit of punch to the whites. it was the first time i'd tried IR (i was using a red filter as well).

SFX is whats known as an 'extended range' IR film. Its only sensitive a small way into the IR spectrum, but still more sensitive than normal B&W (into 720nm iirc). Using a dark red filter, the SFX cokin filter for example, will result in a recognisable IR effect (dark skies, white foliage) but again nowhere near as strong as the far IR films. Also it has an anti-halation backing. IR films from kodak didn't have this, resulting in that characteristic blooming that people recognise as IR.

There were colour IR films available aswell.

DaireQuinlan

Incidentally, wouldn't IR film be LESS sensitive to fogging by XRay ? Up the other end of the spectrum if my physics classes stood me in good stead :-)

Fajitas!

It's at the other end of the spectrum as far as light goes alright, it still fogs it up proper though.

wersal gummage

fajitas & daire - thanks very much to both of you.

i was using the cokin red filter system you mention daire. i also have a filter for the digital camera but haven't really given this a proper go yet as the weather has been so bad and i've only had it about two weeks.

with digital, i shoot in raw and then convert to b+w afterwards is it ? i tried the digital once or twice - in 'normal' mode, the photos just look a bit red, when i turn the camera to b+w and then shoot, the photos do look a bit IRish.

DaireQuinlan

Here's about the only one of mine that looked in any way IR-y




Even so its not a great example. The big problem here is the weather :-) I've had a roll of SFX stuck in my FE-2 for the last month waiting for some IR weather and a good place to go to shoot it...

wersal gummage

this came off the roll of SFX i was using with the red filter. as i said above, it isn't really what i had in my mind as IR.

Fajitas!

wersal gummage wrote: »

fajitas & daire - thanks very much to both of you.

i was using the cokin red filter system you mention daire. i also have a filter for the digital camera but haven't really given this a proper go yet as the weather has been so bad and i've only had it about two weeks.

with digital, i shoot in raw and then convert to b+w afterwards is it ? i tried the digital once or twice - in 'normal' mode, the photos just look a bit red, when i turn the camera to b+w and then shoot, the photos do look a bit IRish.

With digital, when you get the 'wierd' looking colour photographs, make sure you're shooting in RAW, then with whatever RAW converter you use, get a custom white balance from the grass, and use that. You can do it in camera too, take a photo containing just grass/foliage, and use that to set a custom white balance. That'll go a long ways to getting your photos looking 'IR' afterwards

Also, it appears I've been lucky being back in Waterford the last two weeks, plenty of weather perfect for IR at the moment!

padocon

On an X ray machine when I was passing trough recently it said no film. I presume that if you ask they will not pass it trough.

Fajitas!

It's where I keeps my drugs.

trooney

padocon wrote: »

On an X ray machine when I was passing trough recently it said no film. I presume that if you ask they will not pass it trough.

Years ago you used to be able to request your camera to be searched by hand so it didn't have to go through the x-ray. And that was in pretty much any airport I had been through, from NY to HK and any inbetween. The one exception was Cairo, but after a bit of the aul oirish charm they did it by hand. Good luck getting that anywhere now.

padocon

trooney wrote: »

Years ago you used to be able to request your camera to be searched by hand so it didn't have to go through the x-ray. And that was in pretty much any airport I had been through, from NY to HK and any inbetween. The one exception was Cairo, but after a bit of the aul oirish charm they did it by hand. Good luck getting that anywhere now.

No the camera just the film.

_sparkie_

i have had electronics searched by hand at my request in JFK. if they will do it, i dont see why dublin wouldnt.

sineadw

Thanks all Reading up a bit more - it seems you can formally request a hand search in the US, but maybe not anywhere else. I'll give it a go anyway - can't do any harm to ask. I don't want to buy over there as I'm guessing Fomapan isn't freely available in Perth :rolleyes: Perth Scotland that is. I'm planning on pushing it from 200 to 800 as per Thonda's instructions. There's a fairly good old fashioned camera shop over there where I *might* be able to get it processed properly for that. But if they look at me like I have 4 heads then I'll be in the darkroom with it myself. My mate's coming back on the ferry the next day so I can give it to her. I'm hoping one xray won't kill it...

And speaking of IR - I think the problem with it is that it's shipped in metal cannisters as it's so light sensitive, so they tend to blast the hell out of it at airports as they're a bit dubious of small metal cannisters in your hand luggage. Which will kill it no matter what end of the spectrum its at. Or so I've been told. Although I talked to a guy in DCC a while back who said he never had a problem with bringing it through. Either way, I'm planning on trying to source some in Edinburgh as NOWHERE in dublin has true IR film.

thefizz

I have never had any films fogged by x-ray machines and sometimes my films may have got up to 10 x-rays so don't worry. Last year I brought some Rollei IR film with me and asked in Dublin airport for a hand inspection. They just laughed, not a chance of them doing it. It got a good few scans in total on my trip but turned out fine when I got home and developed it. And that film is a lot more IR sensitive than SFX.

Re Kodak IR films: The colour and B&W film are both discontinued so you won't get them in Edinburgh unless its old stock.

I have never seen any IR films in metal cannisters