60 years old film developed in Latvia

[btgc]

Just read in local news someone found 60 y. o. Agfa film (about ASA45) from WWII and had developed it. From 12 exposures of 120 film 9 came out acceptable to look at (though fogged and affected by fungus). Exposures are made by national partisans after WWII (film is labeled 1948, supposedly expiration date).

 

[Tom Harrell]

Interesting! I wonder how many rolls of unprocessed film there are stored away, out of sight and forgotten about! Thanks for sharing!
Regards,
Tom

 

[paulfish4570]

rats. can't get the link to work for me. maybe later, and i appreciate the thread ...

 

[btgc]

Tom, some day someone may wonder about Kodachrome canisters laying around. Interesting if they will have a way to recover images o them?

Paul, link should work, I've checked again. Nice to see you around!
EDIT: oh, you should have hit a moment when server got busy.

 

[paulfish4570]

got 'em this time. very interesting. i enjoyed seeing the ppsh submachine guns and mosin-nagant carbine with the fellows who used them to fight. those guys could have been from the tennessee hills except for the weapons ...

 

[hans voralberg]

First pic looks like the shroud of Turin! Amazing for 60y.o film really

 

[Tom Harrell]

btgc I know you are right! I probably have a few rolls laying around that I have forgotten about! However they won't be as interesting as the ones you displayed! Those were great!
Tom

 

[charjohncarter]

Btgc, those are really good. They have it all; time, originally exposed correctly, a period type of composition, and your mentioned patina. I wish there were more of them.

 

[Seele]

The advice "develop film promptly" does hold true somehow!

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

My God, there's a LOT of fungus on those! The images are historically significant though.

 

[KoNickon]

Fascinating. I bet some of these partisans have been identified, too. With their beards they look like they stepped out of Czarist times. And like a gear geek, of course I'm checking out the PPSh-41s and the Mosin carbine (looks like an M-38).

Makes me think there might yet be found an undeveloped roll of film sitting in a certain Vest Pocket Kodak high on Mt. Everest, dating from 1924....

 

[MC JC86]

These are awesome. Military history is my other passion, thank you for posting these.

Now, I'm just waiting for the someone to compare these images longevity to digital... 🙄

 

[JohnTF]

Suppose they used R 09? ;-)

Could challenge digital ice. P

Posted to some Let friends, see if they recognize any relatives. I knew at least one Latvian who fought, but he was with the Germans, his father in law was in the Revolution on the other side with the promise of independence.

J

 

[zpuskas]

Thanks for sharing. Wonder if our digital files will be available in 60 years (remember floppies?)

 

[JohnTF]

Thanks for sharing. Wonder if our digital files will be available in 60 years (remember floppies?)

Folks talk about degradation of burned CD's, especially not the gold variety, it will be interesting to see if stored digital images in all media can be salvaged and precisely what damage will be evident?

I suspect the commercial reclaiming of such images might be quite expensive, it may be the best solution to have them printed RA4 and start new boxes for the future attics?

Regards, John

 

[Steve_F]

John,
I shoot a lot of E6 of my kids for future reference. My folks have hundreds of Kodachrome slides my father took when we were kids. He shoots digital now.
I shoot alot of digital of my kids too but have hundreds of prints (I believe theyre called hard-copies now 😉 )in case digital files can't be read or the storage media is useless.

Steve.