FujiChrome 100 

Date shot : 25.03.23

Location : Newcastle

Blog Updated : 07.25

I didn't have high aspirations when diving into shooting this roll. Slide film is notorious for being incredibly difficult to shoot (when new). It has a very restricted dynamic range, less latitude, and is very fussy about being under or overexposed. It is also known not to expire well, having very abrupt colour shifts, poor grain and sharpness, or becoming completely unusable if stored incorrectly. 

What was interesting for this roll was that I knew the expiry date, which was 1989; however, I knew nothing about the storage conditions it was kept in. But me being me, with an over-enthusiastic curiosity, clicked the buy button and anxiously waited for its delivery. In 2023, I paid £15 for this roll of film, which, compared to new or other used or expired rolls, was expensive, but as always, my curiosity got the better of me. 

I go into shooting every expired roll of film with the same frame of mind. "Take photos, I don't mind losing" If I stuck by this every time I shot an expired roll, I wouldn't be disappointed in losing something I wanted to keep. 

I took it with me on a trip to Newcastle, it was loaded into my backup camera at the time, my Canon AV-1, while I was using my Canon A-1 for work I wanted to keep. I also developed this at home myself using the now-discontinued Tetenal E-6 development kit. 

Technical Information :

Expiry: 1989 

Expiry age at time of shooting: 32 years

Box Speed - 100

ISO Shot at - 50 (1 stop)

Recommended ISO - 12 (3 stops)

Camera - Canon AV-1 

I wanted to shoot this roll at ISO 12, but a few things stood in my way of easily doing that. The first thing was the camera, the Canon AV-1, which only goes down to ISO25, and I didn't have any other way at the time of metering any lower. The second problem was the weather and daylight. It was early spring, and in the north of England, which meant it was grey and wet. Not much daylight to shoot at ISO12. It was also fairly cold at the time, which can affect the sensitivity of the film; however, with not much option to shoot at the recommended 3 stops below the box speed, I settled for ISO 50. 

As you can see in the above seven sample shots from this roll, the results were very inconsistent; however, I did get images! The negatives (which I have put below) are very faint and washed out. The scans are extremely grainy and lacking a lot of detail, sharpness, especially in the shadows. There is also a noticeable change in the colours, they appear on some frames to be washed out or muted, while in others the colour has shifted and become very vibrant with an overall faint blue tone.  A lot of the frames also have artefacts which look like dye burns (if that is a thing) and also other damages which look like dust, but the negatives are clearer than the scans make them look, which I found interesting. Some of the images below just go to show how poorly this film expired. It doesn't appear to have been stored correctly, possibly being left out in a normal room, being slowly degraded by the light and heat of the environment. 

You can also see some light leaks from the sprockets above, which I am unsure if that was done by developing (as this effect can be caused by the film being agitated too aggressively, causing the liquid to rush through the sprockets of the film) or if it was a byproduct of the film being 32 years old. The above far left image was the worst image I had from this roll. It has no detail at all, and the negative just appears to be wrecked. 

This was my first roll of FujiChrome I had shot, and since then, I haven't shot any more. If I were going to shoot this again in the future, I would aim to have as accurate exposure compensation as possible to account for the expiry, and probably take a tripod with me and overexpose slightly to try and draw out some details in the shadows. 

However, overall, it was a fun experiment to try. Some people have asked me why I even bother shooting expired film, and while it can be daunting or a complete waste of time and money. It is fun to do, and that is the main point I will always push across: if you enjoy doing something, do it. It also adds another layer of uncertainty and complexity, and pushes your technical knowledge to the limits, and you also learn and adapt more, which is why it's something I enjoy doing.