Lomography Lady Grey 400 film.

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seany65

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I've read on the interwbnet that this stuff is actually Kodak Tmax 400. Does anyone know the truth?

I've got a chart of filter factors which show that filter factors for Yellow, Deep Yellow and Yellow-Green are slightly less for T max film, than for 'other film'. The doesn't mention Green filters though.

Here it is:



Click on the pic to get a slightly bigger one.

Is this chart correct and if so, what about Orange and Green filters?

Any help woul dbe much appreciated.
 
Nah, it's not TMAX, I heard it was an old emulsion called Kodak Cosmos 400. I shot a few rolls earlier this year and didn't have any problems :)

These were all taken with an M6, Nokton 40mm and developed in HC-110





 
Thanks for the reply and the info, grouchos tash. Good pics too. except the first one which is making me feel a bit sick.

Hmmm, "old" film you say? Is this umm, "oldness" because it's gone past kodak's "Best before" date, but Lomo are selling it as though it's "in date"?

This would be a little odd as I bought a 3x box for £8 from boots last thursday because it's short-dated, it'll be out of date in feb 17. This would mean that batches of film are being given two "Best before" dates by two different companies.

Or do you just mean that it was past the date Lomo gave it?
 
I work in a photo lab and sometimes I see random canisters of film branded with another label but really, it's current commercial Kodak/Fuji film.

If you have the negatives, you can tell from the code on the negs itself/google it.
 
seany65 said:
Thanks for the reply and the info, grouchos tash. Good pics too. except the first one which is making me feel a bit sick.

Hmmm, "old" film you say? Is this umm, "oldness" because it's gone past kodak's "Best before" date, but Lomo are selling it as though it's "in date"?

This would be a little odd as I bought a 3x box for £8 from boots last thursday because it's short-dated, it'll be out of date in feb 17. This would mean that batches of film are being given two "Best before" dates by two different companies.

Or do you just mean that it was past the date Lomo gave it?
Click to expand...

By 'old' I mean a film that Kodak no longer sells themselves :) I also bought it short dated from Boots for £8, I would buy it regularly from there if that was the normal price but the normal price for their films makes me wonder if anyone buys it at all! I found some in another branch that went out of date at the end of the month and asked for a discount and they refused, I wonder what happened to it when it expired, hmm?

sara said:
I work in a photo lab and sometimes I see random canisters of film branded with another label but really, it's current commercial Kodak/Fuji film.

If you have the negatives, you can tell from the code on the negs itself/google it.
Click to expand...

When I looked up the code on the negs it came up as Kodak Cosmos 400
 
Thanks for the new replies and the info.

When did kodak stop making cosmos 400? Did they sell it around the world or was it just in a few countries? I've never heard of it.

Boots charge about £15.90 for a 3x pack for non-short dated lomo lady grey 400. Not as cheap as fomapan but not as dear as ilford.

Edit: It isn't normally £15.90, it's normally £17.90, I'd been remebering the wrong price.
 
I've never shot the stuff, it's not available retail where I live and honestly I prefer to concentrate on in date or at least recently expired films personally, however I have developed a roll or two for other people, who have used it. I seem to recall some issues with lightproofing and frame numbering from the paper appearing on some frames. I have no idea what sort of camera the rolls were exposed in, how they were loaded or how they were stored before or after exposure, so of course your experience may be completely different but, FYI.
Cheers
Brett
 
I think Lomography purposefully uses a low-grade backing paper to help produce "effects". The paper doesn't "dome" like most backing papers do, which leads to light leaks on cameras without pressure plates. This gives the look Lomography fans probably want. I also noticed, last time I used Lomography film, that I got some slight frame overlap, a problem I never have with other films. I think the frame numbers on the backing paper might be slightly closer together than usual - either for cheapness, or to produce more Lomography effects.
 
seany65 said:
Thanks for the new replies and the info.

When did kodak stop making cosmos 400? Did they sell it around the world or was it just in a few countries? I've never heard of it.

Boots charge about £15.90 for a 3x pack for non-short dated lomo lady grey 400. Not as cheap as fomapan but not as dear as ilford.
Click to expand...

I've seen rolls on eBay from the 90s but I don't know when the last rolls were sold. You must have bought 120, 3x 35mm is £22 at Boots normally (too much).

Alpsman said:
My dealer told me it is Fomapan 400.
Click to expand...

Different developing times to Fomapan.

Sarcophilus Harrisii said:
I've never shot the stuff, it's not available retail where I live and honestly I prefer to concentrate on in date or at least recently expired films personally, however I have developed a roll or two for other people, who have used it. I seem to recall some issues with lightproofing and frame numbering from the paper appearing on some frames. I have no idea what sort of camera the rolls were exposed in, how they were loaded or how they were stored before or after exposure, so of course your experience may be completely different but, FYI.
Cheers
Brett
Click to expand...

Those sound more like problems with the cameras the films were used in. Film that is short dated is unlikely to be any issue.
 
If you search for 'Kodak Cosmos' on eBay you will probably see several examples of expired versions of this film on sale. Some will be labelled 'School Activity Film'.

Kodak probably made this type of film for a limited English-language market (no idea where though) and now Lomography are marketing it instead - I expect Kodak still make it for them or maybe Lomography are using up a (recent) production run that Kodak aren't marketing.

What a 'School Activity Film' is though I've no idea either - something for school sports days perhaps?

Regards

Andrew C. More
 
Thanks for the new replies and info.

I know lomog. do a range of films that are meant to be 'weird', but I don't think lady grey is one of them.

I'll know sooner or later (prolly after xmas) whether the films I bought are 'weirdies' or not.

@grouchos tash, £22? My local Boots' (Ashton-under-Lyne) normal price for 3x 35mm lady grey @36 is £17.90 and £15.90 for 120. Your local one seems to be trying a bit of daylight robbery.

@ andrewmore, I think 'school activity' maybe smoking or snogging behind the bike sheds, and 'school acivity film' may be for teachers to photograph this so that they can tell the kids' parents.
 
grouchos_tash said:
I've seen rolls on eBay from the 90s but I don't know when the last rolls were sold. You must have bought 120, 3x 35mm is £22 at Boots normally (too much).



Different developing times to Fomapan.



Those sound more like problems with the cameras the films were used in. Film that is short dated is unlikely to be any issue.
Click to expand...
With most films I'd think this might be the cause also, but the backing paper on this stuff was unimpressive, from memory (it was a year ago now), it looked like ordinary coloured paper, and wasn't blackened on the film side. I've seen a few images from it on the web that also had frame numbers visible. I suspect tunalegs may be right and perhaps it's meant to be a "feature".
Cheers
Brett
 
The 35mm film that I have (lady grey 400 and colour negative 400) seems to be 'normal' enough, Maybe it's adifferent company that makes the 120 and they ain't as good as they should be?
 
I was at the camera shop today and looked at the lomography films. The 400ASA B&W says made in the U.S.A. on the packaging. So it's going to be Kodak. Lomography has the film packaged elsewhere (Mexico? China? It says somewhere on the packaging in even smaller letters) so Kodak wouldn't be to blame for the backing paper.

The 100ASA B&W says made in Czech Republic, so that'll be Foma.
 
I've been in photography for a long time and never heard of Cosmos 400. I'm wondering if it's something like a surveylance film or aerial emulsion. They don't sell much if any of either and may be cutting it from leftover master rolls. Kodak did make a number of specialty films. Could it be for astronomy?
 
I should have explained in my earlier post that the boxes of this film on sale on eBay have the wording (including about its use for school activities) in both English and French. The end of the boxes shows the outline of a helmeted sports player with an oval ball which I assume would be an American Football player (or a player of something similar if there are other related games). Could this have been a film originally sold only in Canada which is bilingual in English and French and which may play American Football (or similar)? The code on the box end is CSY-400 if that helps. See the UK-version of eBay for examples - no idea how such a film ended up in the UK or Europe though if was a Canada-only issue film.

Regards

Andrew More
 
I've just put in the number (010764) under the bar code onto that website. it says "Kodak Cosmos 400".

So it seems 'Lady Grey' is a re-named film no-one's really heard much of.
 
I recently came into attention for lomo film, the CN is quite probably Kodak but there's no exact word about it. Kodak 100VR = Gold?
It is an interesting way to get another option too.

Surprising to see that the code points towards an obscure Amateur film. Logic says that commonality lowers cost, the TMAX theory. Lomo could very well just be given a cheap custom option with some older product.
 
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