Sean Moran
Established
Hello folks,
I just thought I'd share a solution to a recent problem of mine, which maybe afflicts some of you also.
After storing my negative files in a damp cottage in County Leitrim, Ireland, while moving house from Belfast to Tipperary (it's a long way...) to my horror, I found fungal growths on most of them. Some of these negs go back to the 70's, so I was understandably distraught. The chromogenic films were beyond treatment, but, thank God, I found a cure for the conventional B&W (mainly Ilford Hp5 and Hp5+).
Here is my method.
1. Find a strip of negs containing a keeper.
2. Blast it with compressed air
3. Examine it though a loupe (a Jupiter 50mm f/2 in my case)
4. Place it on a sheet of A4 paper and wipe the non-emulsion side with a microfibre lens cloth dampened with isopropanol (isopropyl alcohol)
5. Leave it to dry for a few seconds
6. Re-examine it with a loupe
7. Transfer the neg to a new, clean, dry neg file
8. Put it somewhere darkish and dry
9. Rejoice in saving an apparently-lost image from the past, so that a brand-new print can be made from it.
Small bottles of isopropanol are easily-available in pharmacies here in Ireland, so perhaps they can also be found where you live.
Hope this helps,
Good luck,
Sean.
PS I don't think that this works on corrupted memory-cards
PPS Read the warnings on the bottle
PPS No liability is accepted by me for any injury to yourself or your negs by using this method. It worked for me.
I just thought I'd share a solution to a recent problem of mine, which maybe afflicts some of you also.
After storing my negative files in a damp cottage in County Leitrim, Ireland, while moving house from Belfast to Tipperary (it's a long way...) to my horror, I found fungal growths on most of them. Some of these negs go back to the 70's, so I was understandably distraught. The chromogenic films were beyond treatment, but, thank God, I found a cure for the conventional B&W (mainly Ilford Hp5 and Hp5+).
Here is my method.
1. Find a strip of negs containing a keeper.
2. Blast it with compressed air
3. Examine it though a loupe (a Jupiter 50mm f/2 in my case)
4. Place it on a sheet of A4 paper and wipe the non-emulsion side with a microfibre lens cloth dampened with isopropanol (isopropyl alcohol)
5. Leave it to dry for a few seconds
6. Re-examine it with a loupe
7. Transfer the neg to a new, clean, dry neg file
8. Put it somewhere darkish and dry
9. Rejoice in saving an apparently-lost image from the past, so that a brand-new print can be made from it.
Small bottles of isopropanol are easily-available in pharmacies here in Ireland, so perhaps they can also be found where you live.
Hope this helps,
Good luck,
Sean.
PS I don't think that this works on corrupted memory-cards
PPS Read the warnings on the bottle
PPS No liability is accepted by me for any injury to yourself or your negs by using this method. It worked for me.
troym
Established
Does the fungal growth affect only the non-emulsion side of the negatives?
payasam
a.k.a. Mukul Dube
I have some negatives on which the emulsion has been eaten away in places. Hopeless.
Sean Moran
Established
payasam said:
Perhaps I've been lucky, but the fungus is only on the non-emulsion side. It consists of fine whitish, powdery threads, which have not etched the neg but just sit on top of it.
Sean
Sparrow
Veteran
payasam said:
I have a few thousand like that after they were stored in the garage, for only a few months, after moving house, I only saved about a quarter; with a UV lamp and a rinse in detergent.
Sean: Glad you caught yours in time
oftheherd
Veteran
Considering fungi spread from spores, I hope you were outside and a long ways down wind from anything else you consider important before you used the compressed air. I would watch that "loupe" carefully too.
Sean Moran
Established
Oops!
I did it in the house!
The loupe is an old Russian Jupiter 50mm f/2 lens, so I'll take a look at it tonight. I understood that the spores are just about everywhere anyway, and that it is avoiding the conditions which enable them to thrive which is the crucial thing, not having a spore-free environment. However, I've heard of one lens-maker (Zeiss?) who will not repair fungus-attacked lenses for fear of the spores spreading in the workshop.
Any thoughts on this.
Seán.
I did it in the house!
The loupe is an old Russian Jupiter 50mm f/2 lens, so I'll take a look at it tonight. I understood that the spores are just about everywhere anyway, and that it is avoiding the conditions which enable them to thrive which is the crucial thing, not having a spore-free environment. However, I've heard of one lens-maker (Zeiss?) who will not repair fungus-attacked lenses for fear of the spores spreading in the workshop.
Any thoughts on this.
Seán.