Favourite IR films...

[Wallace_Billingham]

Anyone have any significant experience scanning images with (and without) Anti-Newton glass? It was mentioned here in this thread to solve the Efke and Rollei Infrared film curling problem.

But my guess is any additional pieces of glass in the light path would be detrimental in some way. As a scientist with significant experience in microscopy I suspect that: more glass = more light loss and decreased sharpness.

Comments from those who may have tried a comparison would be welcome. Regards. Bob G.

I am guessing you are talking about with roll film. I have shot quite a bit of Efke IR820 in roll film form and just use the standard Epson holder. Yes the negatives are curley but they flatten out nicely once in the holder. I do however wear powder free disposable netrile exam gloves when I handle them to keep fingerprints off.

[rguinter]

I am guessing you are talking about with roll film. I have shot quite a bit of Efke IR820 in roll film form and just use the standard Epson holder. Yes the negatives are curley but they flatten out nicely once in the holder. I do however wear powder free disposable netrile exam gloves when I handle them to keep fingerprints off.

Wallace. Yes the roll film primarily is what is giving me the trouble. I have a lot of it in 4x5-inch but haven't had the curling problem with it like with the 120.

Mine is so curly that even getting it into the holder requires more hands than I have. I also haven't gone the route with gloves yet. I've been rather good at handling most all films by the edges so far... except for these. I'm doing 6x9- and 6x17-cm formats. The longer ones are near impossible.

The problem may lie with the film processor since I take mine to a local lab. I've been recently asking them to hang the film strips straight until I pick them up and this helps a bit. Thanks. Bob G.

[Wallace_Billingham]

Wallace. Yes the roll film primarily is what is giving me the trouble. I have a lot of it in 4x5-inch but haven't had the curling problem with it like with the 120.

Mine is so curly that even getting it into the holder requires more hands than I have. I also haven't gone the route with gloves yet. I've been rather good at handling most all films by the edges so far... except for these. I'm doing 6x9- and 6x17-cm formats. The longer ones are near impossible.

The problem may lie with the film processor since I take mine to a local lab. I've been recently asking them to hang the film strips straight until I pick them up and this helps a bit. Thanks. Bob G.

I develop my own and no matter what they have major curling issues. Even when I hang major weight on them when they dry.

Anyway what I do with the Epson holder is lay it down on my lap and open the swinging holder part, then I position the film in the holder using my gloved hands and close the holder. It still will not be quite right in position but you can still move the negs a bit in the holder.

Another trick that works very well but takes a bit more time is to put them into sleeves and place the sleeve under a large stack of heavy books. After a few days most of the curl will be gone

[rguinter]

...Another trick that works very well but takes a bit more time is to put them into sleeves and place the sleeve under a large stack of heavy books. After a few days most of the curl will be gone

Wallace: Thanks for the tip. Unfortunately I've been there done that... or at least something similar. We get tons of unwanted magazines here due to an address similar to a local beauty shop. Some of the magazines are extra large.

Since I sleeve all my roll film anyway in the Printfile archival sleeves I tried putting a sleeve in the middle of a magazine and rolling the magazine backward against the film curl. then rubber banding it to hold tight.

I found that even after leaving the film like that for several days rolled against the curl, the curl seems to come right back when I take it out.

So I'm still searching for a solution. The film gives great IR images though and I bought a ton of it in aura and standard versions, 120 and 4x5-inch. So I guess I'm committed somehow to getting past the curl problem.

Cheers. Bob G.

[rguinter]

Thanks Bob for the tip on Rollei Universal! It's pretty cheap; think I'll grab some and give it a try. Extended red up to 750nm so it says. As a Hoya R72 is--presumably--a 720nm cut filter, it should be sufficiently infrared-sensitive. :-/

Brian: I finally got around to shooting a test roll with the Rollei Universal 200 last week. I wish it were available at similar prices in 4x5.

My test roll was f16 @ 1 sec, 1/2 sec, 1/4 sec, and 1/8 sec in bright sun with my Fuji G617 camera and a B&W 092 filter. The 1/8 sec exposure was perfect and all the others were overexposed. I don't have my field notes handy so I don't remember the ev values but it was bright sun (north sky ~ ev 16 I would guess).

Looks to be a great film for IR but still the chronic Rollei curling problem. So I have the film sleeved and reverse curled in a magazine for a few days to see if it will straighten.

Cheers. Bob G.

[612tom]

No real idea as to how I'm developing it yet, just ordered 2 boxes of the stuff, give it a week or 6 for USPS to get it down here! I expect the first box will be mostly experimentation in both exposure and developing. The Massive Dev Chart has some timings (fantastic resource) for plenty of different soups, so I'll see how I get on. And I'm just going to dev them in my jobo tank as I understand it's IR safe. Famous last words

Thanks everyone for your helpful hints and suggestions. I've just developed my first couple of photos, nothing special, just experimenting to start with.

I rated the Efke 820 at ISO 1 through the opaque filter, which in the images below gave exposures around 4 seconds at f22, doubled to 8 seconds for reciprocity as I dont think this film likes underexposure.

Dev was 2 x 1 minute presoaks in tap water, followed by lfosol 3 for 8.5 mins reduced to 7.5 for constant agitation in rotary tank.

Not bad for a first attempt I thought, will definitely have some fun with this in the future. Thanks again