Old powder chemistry (C-41)

[Eirik Berger]

I work at a small local newspaper and even if everything photo-related has gone digital years ago, I often find traces of a chemistry-based past. The other day I found twenty packs of Tetenal C-41 kits stored in a "hidden" box in a storage room. The kit is based on powder, not liquids.

I guess it pretty much is the same as this:
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/produc...s_Kit_for.html

It must be relative old, from the late 1990´s or so. Would this chemistry be useful for me or should I toss it away and buy new chemistry? Will powder chemistry degrade over time?

Until now I have used mostly BW-films and funky color positives (E6) such as Fortia SP. But the last few months I have started using more and more color negative film, and I expect some (120-film) rolls of the new Ektar 100 in the mail soon. Good food for my roll-film holders.

I am moving back home this fall, and back to my deeply missed ATL-3000. It has served me well during the years, developing all kinds of film and paper. While living "up here" I have developed film in my bathroom, and with a bit of dicipline it works well.

It strikes me that film based photography is funnier than ever. Reasonable deals are easy to come by for medium and large format equipment. New and exciting products are launched, like the mentioned Ektar 100, the new T-max 400 and not to forget that positive BW-paper discussed in another thread recently. Perfect for pinhole or in LF-filmholders. And with the new range of Epson-type scanners it is possible to get descent scans without selling your house.

Ok, this thread became a bit out of focus. It was the C-41 kit I wondered about.

[Bjorn Nilsson]

As it is powder, there is a good chance it will still be good. But the answer lies in the testing. You could shoot just about anything on just about any C-41 film to see if the color and exposure comes through alright (i.e. it doesn't have to be a new roll of Ektar 100).

//Björn

[RPNugent]

Tried some last year or the year before, it was terrible. All negatives had a significant magenta shift that could not be corrected in printing. If you use some do it on film you don't care about first.