42 year-old (+) Plus-X

[pschauss]

I picked up a 100' roll of Plus-X (expiration date 9/1976) from a guy on Photrio, advertised as "always frozen". I made up an 18 frame roll and shot it at 50. The sheet which came in the box suggested HC 110 B at 4.5 minutes for 70 F which is about the temperature of my basement darkroom at this time of year. I used dilution H and doubled the time. The negatives looked a little thin, but were easy to print. I used a #3 contrast fllter instead of my usual #2.

Three shots from that roll, scanned from prints, are shown below.

 

[bluesun267]

Nice. I like the somewhat soft look. A couple years ago I came across some military surplus Dupont 16mm movie film from 1964. ASA 64. I had it processed same as Kodak b/w reversal (D-94a) and it was some of the most sumptuous b/w film I've ever seen. I'd say it lost about a stop of sensitivity is all, but no loss of d-max. In still film, I've had good luck with Panatomic-X from the 1980s and ORWO from the early 90s. Shooting aged b/w film under 125 asa is a fairly safe bet. On the other hand, I wouldn't bother with 400 speed and up if it's more than 5 years out of date (some may disagree).