Film: Check it in or carry on

Film: Check it in or carry on

  • Check in the luggage

    Votes: 7 6.4%

  • Carry on and hand check

    Votes: 102 93.6%
  • Total voters
    109
giganova said:
I have been yelled at and abused by security officers in Latin America and I am always being treated like **** by German airport security agents who have refused to hand check my film.
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The best experience I had was at the old Tehran airport before a flight to Shiraz. The security guys sat me down and gave me a cup of coffee while they hand checked my film!
 
I travel a lot with film in my carry on and they get scanned. No problem. Don't check in your film! I was in India last week and had the lead bags going through the scanner. I got everything rescanned 3 times because security couldn't figure out what was in my luggage until I showed them. So always tell security you have these bags and have them in their own tray.
 
DrMcCoy said:
Really? I've never heard this. Why is that?
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because high ISO film is more sensitive. in fact even low ISO film is affected by X-rays, it is just that it is invisible to the naked eye, but if you put ISO 100 film through the scanner dozens of times, fogging would start to show.

I saw something to this effect on the 'net - so it must be true.

rjstep3
 
bmattock said:
It's true. There are some studies done by the film companies but I don't know if they're online anymore.
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Hey Bill... long time no see. (I've been scarce for a long time and tend to stay scarce). The industry organization who did the study no longer hosts the report online. If RFF has a place for storing reference documents I'd be happy to post them there. Over the years I've posted to threads and mailed to individuals until my fingers were sore... so if there is a persistent repository I'd be willing to do that one more time.
 
Gumby said:
Hey Bill... long time no see. (I've been scarce for a long time and tend to stay scarce). The industry organization who did the study no longer hosts the report online. If RFF has a place for storing reference documents I'd be happy to post them there. Over the years I've posted to threads and mailed to individuals until my fingers were sore... so if there is a persistent repository I'd be willing to do that one more time.
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I've been gone for a long time as well; I just came back recently after a very long hiatus. I don't know what RFF has and doesn't have in the way of a repository, I'm afraid.
 
Gumby said:
I believe they are pretty well obliged to listen to requests... and not much more than that. :p
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I agree. I used to travel for a living - twice a week every week, for seven years. I got really well acquainted with the TSA after 9/11. I'm sure things are not the same as they were when I stopped traveling for a living, but at the time, the TSA was pretty much above the law and could do just about anything they pleased, and did. Objecting or pointing out that they were 'supposed' to do this or that would get you some fun time with the local gendarmes.

As others mentioned, being friendly and making requests but not demanding that they follow their own rules tended to work best with those guys. They are at least part of the reason I decided to find a job where I didn't have to deal with them twice a week.
 
Carry-on..... but .....

Ditto other folks experience with airport security. I've found its not worth bothering engaging with TSA / security in the US about travel related matters (such as carrying film). It usually leads to too much stress and anxiety.....
 
Jeep trekking trip in the Negev Desert
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If you plan on bringing a Giotto rocket dust blaster, put it in your suitcase. I had mine taken from my hand luggage and till this day cannot imagine how it could have served as a weapon. Also advisable to bring Ziploc bags to manage the unavoidable dust problems.
 
giganova said:
.... I am always being treated like **** by German airport security agents who have refused to hand check my film.
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I flew from Stuttgart to Atlanta last October. I asked the German security persons at Stuttgart to hand inspect my 30 rolls of B&W 400 35mm film.

They did it with a smile and were very nice. No issues at all :) .

I had all the film in a 1 gal Ziploc bag, out of the cardboard boxes, and in the plastic containers.
 
In my average trip I get 4 carry-on scans on film, often 6 or more, without any noticeable problem. This is with ISO 100 and 400 film, both B&W and color.

Once I checked a camera body with film in it, by mistake, and it was duly fogged.

This confirms what is said abundantly above. Carry-on scans are usually safe for film up to ISO 400 included. But avoid film on checked bagagge, because it will be fogged (not really fried, but well fogged, in my limited experience).
 
I absent mindedly checked some film a few months ago. Clearly it got scanned and I couldn't believe how bad the damage was to the quality of the images. It looked like the film was extremely expired. Will never make that mistake again.
 
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