Advice about traveling abroad with film

Chrisrw

Chrisrw

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Greetings,

I am planning a trip to Mexico this fall and wanted to know the in and outs of traveling with film. I am fairly new to film shooting and don't want any shots to be ruined while going through airports, x-rays, etc...Any advice and/or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
Thank you all in advance,
Chris
 
These are my "travel rules", Chris, worked well so far:

- use 400 ASA and below
- always hand carry film, never check in; you can leave the film in your carry-ons when scanned.
- when in very warm climate, if possible, put film in fridge

No big deal really. Way over-discussed on the intertubes, also by people who rarely travel 🙂

Enjoy your trip !

Roland.
 
There are many threads about this out there on the interwebs, but the basic gist of it is: anything above 400-speed film should be avoided--if they x-ray your film, and they likely will, film faster than 400 is at risk of fogging, which is not good. Best case scenario, you are polite and smile and ask nicely if they will inspect your film by hand, and they oblige. I've had success about 50% of the time with this. You increase your chances of avoiding x-rays by removing your film from all packaging and even the plastic canisters, and placing all film in a clear Ziploc bag.

I am sure many others here have far more travel experience than I, and they may offer variations on what I've said (or even disagree with me altogether), but that's how I've always traveled with film, and so far, so good.

Have fun!
 
anjoca76 said:
Best case scenario, you are polite and smile and ask nicely if they will inspect your film by hand, and they oblige.
Click to expand...

I've been pretty lucky with this so far, but travel mainly in Asia where airport security has generally better service. Also remember to thank them for their troubles since they are doing us a favour.
 
Never put film in checked luggage (if it gets scanned, the x-rays are much nastier than the checkpoint scanners they use for carry-on bags). Otherwise, don't worry about it--I routinely carry EI 3200 film on trips, and it survives several trips through the carry-on scanners without any ill effects.
 
I always asked for a hand check, not sure how is it over there but in Asia, the airports in Kuala Lumpur, Dhaka, Hong Kong and Saigon have been very accomodating the past two years when I request them with a smile........ I usually put the film cassettes, minus the box and plastic holder, in a clear plastic bag for them to go thru them faster.
 
Thank you all for your replies and guidance. I think I'll be alright with the 400 ASA and a zip lock bag (maybe I'll throw in my Ilford 3200 just in case 🙂. I may do some research into buying film in Guanajuato while I am there. At least I could 1/2 the potential number of exposures to xrays. Hopefully I'll have some good pics t post from my travels.
 
I travelled through India and Nepal in 2008. My film (tri-x 400 and fuji pro 160s) passed through hand luggage x-ray scanners maybe half a dozen times with no ill effect.

Ditch the boxes and carry your film in canisters in zip lock bags, it's just easier to carry that way.

I still have some rolls of unexposed film from the trip, which is now expired and was kept unrefrigerated. I shot a roll of the tri-x the other day and it turned out fine 🙂
 
I have read a few of these "travel with film safety" threads now and haven't seen any reference to film safes like the Hama Film-Safe X. I note there is a passing reference to a Domke X-Ray bag above.

If this is often discussed, I apologise for missing it.

Any experience/views on these as a travel aid? If film is merely left in these safes in hand luggage when scanned, are they usually required to be removed and opened and, most importantly, do they work for all film speeds?
 
Jimbot said:
I have read a few of these "travel with film safety" threads now and haven't seen any reference to film safes like the Hama Film-Safe X. I note there is a passing reference to a Domke X-Ray bag above.

If this is often discussed, I apologise for missing it.

Any experience/views on these as a travel aid? If film is merely left in these safes in hand luggage when scanned, are they usually required to be removed and opened and, most importantly, do they work for all film speeds?
Click to expand...

I've used the Hama bag for years and no one has ever asked me to open it

There's a lot of talk on the web about xray damage, but I've never seen any photographic evidence

I've done sales-trips that would involve 10 or more flights without any damage and regularly take 1600 film off to Greece in the summer without problems
 
I remember reading somewhere that the hand luggage xray machines should be safe up to 800iso as well. As an experiment I put 1600 iso neopan in hand luggage twice (in and out of the country, in Europe) to check for any ill effects and noticed no changes at all so usually I don't bother with hand check. I have carried high iso in my luggage since then and never got any negative effects.

I think I would be more cautious with multiple passes though and try to have them hand-checked if possible.

I definitely wouldn't bother with 400iso film and lower.
 
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