The Curse of Condensation

[John Layton]

Thanks for educating me about Kodak special orders...sorry if I stepped on any toes and I should probably be thankful that I can still find this film. But I'm still a little suspicious as I've been doing this for so long and only now am seeing what seems to be a disproportionately high number of "condensation" artifacts. At any rate...I think I'll go out "into the dampness," set up my camera, go through all the usual motions of making an exposure, then pull a dark slide or two and see what's what.

[Mark Sampson]

None of my toes stepped on; you've got a problem and I was just trying to narrow down your search for the answer. My own recent experience says that there are few things more frustrating than such unexplained artifacts, so I can sympathize. I don't have any better ideas, but I wish you the best of luck in solving it.

[David Lobato]

In my old job I did a bit of analytical work on humidity and condensation with respect to the dewpoint. If your film and film holders are a few degrees warmer than the outside air, condensation should not form on the film. Condensation happens when your film and film holders are at a cooler temperature than the outside air. It applies to any surface, like lenses too. That's why astronomic photographers use warming devices on their lenses during the night to prevent condensation. So, keep your film in a warm area before venturing out. And maybe keep them in an insulated cooler with a warm bottle of water or chemical hand warmers, like Wilie suggested.

[cowanw]

Could it be that coming into a warm area after you are done is the problem.