More Foma 400 120 issues

[p.giannakis]

It's pretty safe to say that I am done with Foma 120 films. I shot three Foma 400 films (120) since last year and two came out like you see below. The third one (Foma 200) came out ok. No issues with the Kentmere 400 (120) and HP5 (120).

Has this happened to anyone else? This has put me off from using it again.

 

[WoodallP]

Hi, I tend to use Foma 120 for testing of cameras and lenses as it is cheap so I don’t treat them well or look for perfection but I have never had anything like this with 100 or 400.

 

[valdas]

Yes, in fact it happened with sheet film (iso400). Some sheets were OK, but some came totally black. I was puzzled, thinking that maybe there was some kind of “operator error”, but could not really figure out what did I do wrong way. Now I start thinking it was not my fault…

 

[p.giannakis]

Yes, in fact it happened with sheet film (iso400). Some sheets were OK, but some came totally black. I was puzzled, thinking that maybe there was some kind of “operator error”, but could not really figure out what did I do wrong way. Now I start thinking it was not my fault…

As you can see in this bit here, the shutter fired correctly and recorded half an image. On the other Foma with the same issue, the well exposed images started after the damaged part which made me think that I did something wrong with loading. Now I am confident that the films were toasted...

 

[Evergreen States]

Back in 2023 I got weird white specks on several rolls of Fomapan 400 in 120 and that put me off shooting it in 120. I've not had QC issues with Fomapan 400 in 135 but since I've been shooting more 135 film in the last year or so, I've needed to push to ISO 800 and I don't trust the push capabilities of Foma 400, so I've pretty much switched to Kentmere 400. HP5+ when I can afford it.

 

[drangus]

I have also had white spots on 100 and 400 in 120 recently but not a roll of their ortho film. I’ll stick to kentmere for when I’m not testing a camera. Always disappointing to lose shots to QC

 

[trix4ever]

I tried a box of 8x10 Foma 100.
It was absolute rubbish, lumps of emulsion, patches with no emulsion, total waste of money, not cheap either.
I tried the print developer and had to use 3 times as much as the instructions said.

 

[yossi]

The last time I shot with Foma 400 120-film was July 2024. I bought 5 rolls of which from Taobao (a PRC e-commerce platform) for US$4.7/roll. Interestingly the seller gave me a warning AFTER I bought them, saying they received feedback that the films showed stain patches. They suspected the damage was due to high humidity and suggested that I should use the film immediately after the packing was opened, and not to leave it unused for more than 3 days. I shot only 1 roll and the result was fine. See image below.

I still have 4 rolls of them unused in the fridge. Think I would not use it for anything important after reading all these horror stories of it.

 

[Sanug]

With Foma 400-120 I had 2 parallel lines in the negatives, visible in the backing paper, too. Definately not caused by my camera, as I used different ones and had the same issue. See this problem with Lomo Potsdam Kino, too.

I buy Kentmere now and have no problems at all. However, the numbers on the backing paper of Harman made films are printed very thin, which makes it difficult when using a camera with red window.

 

[p.giannakis]

Interestingly the seller gave me a warning AFTER I bought them,

I have shot some foma400 in the past and they were mostly ok - some issues like the ones i post further down this comment but nothing that GIMP could not sort. But over the last two years i get lemons of half exposed rolls 😒

@Sanug I had issues with lines/scratches witn Foma 200 years ago. Nothing recently though.

@trix4ever : is it this what you call "lumps of emultion"? Look like dry water spots but they are not. i do get this blobs of low contrast often with Foma400 and takes some time to clone it out in GIMP. Strangely enough, the Foma100 has been the only one i haven't had any issues with (yet).

 

[santino]

Such a pity. I really sympathize with Foma. Their products were flawless but black frames are not ok. I hope they can solve this problem as soon as possible. I‘d hate to see another film manufacturer disappear.

 

[Joao]

I tried a box of 8x10 Foma 100.
It was absolute rubbish, lumps of emulsion, patches with no emulsion, total waste of money, not cheap either.
I tried the print developer and had to use 3 times as much as the instructions saisaidthi

This are bad news for me. I' ve just received a box of FOMAPAN 100 film sheets 13x18 to start LF this month.... OTOH , looking at this from the bright side, I may have an excuse for bad results.
Fomapan 100 in 120 never disapointed me.
I will see what happens
Joao

 

[p.giannakis]

I‘d hate to see another film manufacturer disappear.

Me too, i have shot some nice images with Foma 400 (135) . Looks like for 35mm i will stick to Foma400 but for 120 i will probably use the Foma100.