Heat damage to negatives?

[ekindangen]

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6 hours ago, 250swb said:

Or you could Google 'reticulation' and compare the identical patterns in the emulsion with those posted by the OP. Here for an example is an article by somebody who actually wants reticulation to occur

https://www.ilfordphoto.com/unleash-that-reticulated-film-python/

 

Well my case wasnt as bad as the OP's or the one in the link you provided. I have to learn to live with it since I have many rolls like that. Exposure must be a bit over to reduce the effect. In general the grain is a bit coarse and there's lack of contrast. Lightroom could help with finishing touch. Here is an example after lightroom job.

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[250swb]

2 minutes ago, ekindangen said:

 Exposure must be a bit over to reduce the effect. 

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I can't really tell from your example (a classic photographers shot, we've all done it! ) but you are right that more exposure can reduce reticulation, you can see in the OP's examples there is less damage in the 'fatter' highlight parts of the negative where there is more emulsion on the film. But as reticulation is all down to processing temperatures I think that's where you need to look to reduce it. 

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[giannis]

8 hours ago, jaapv said:

Yes - That works about as well as "Fragile-handle with care"  🙄

Yeah you're probably right.

Seems like the "fragile" tag is treated like "we'll abuse it, treat it like a football just like everything else, but ah well we might have to give a refund without fighting the customer much, if it actually breaks". 😅

[giannis]

2 hours ago, ekindangen said:

In general the grain is a bit coarse and there's lack of contrast.

Exposure must be a bit over to reduce the effect.

Yeah sounds exactly like damage from xray scanners. The exact same things I noticed too, pics related.

Also, like you said, it's more obvious when there's shadows and the film is not overexposed (especially so when underexposed). First pic shows it more clearly (ignore dust/scratches).

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Edited July 3, 2021 by giannis

[Stuart Richardson]

Lack of contrast and increased grain can also be from heat, independent of x-rays. Basically, anything that adds energy to the film...light energy or heat energy. You want to keep film in the cold and dark at all times. The more you do it, the better it holds up.

That said, the examples that the OP shared are almost certainly reticulation, as several people indicated. The telltale cracking of the emulsion is not something that happens with x-rays, which tend to either cause flare and light leak style effects, or increase overall base fog and grain. The reticulation is almost certainly heat shock of some sort. Most likely from warm water temps to a very cold rinse.

The only other option could be that it is just a terrible scan with lots of jpeg noise. The scan does look very bad, and it would be more useful to see the original negative to see what was actually happening.

Edited July 3, 2021 by Stuart Richardson

[ekindangen]

10 hours ago, Stuart Richardson said:

Lack of contrast and increased grain can also be from heat, independent of x-rays. Basically, anything that adds energy to the film...light energy or heat energy. You want to keep film in the cold and dark at all times. The more you do it, the better it holds up.

That said, the examples that the OP shared are almost certainly reticulation, as several people indicated. The telltale cracking of the emulsion is not something that happens with x-rays, which tend to either cause flare and light leak style effects, or increase overall base fog and grain. The reticulation is almost certainly heat shock of some sort. Most likely from warm water temps to a very cold rinse.

The only other option could be that it is just a terrible scan with lots of jpeg noise. The scan does look very bad, and it would be more useful to see the original negative to see what was actually happening.

Yes heat is another factor I suspect. It's 35 celcius here all year round and it could be higher in storage. Anyway, here's example of the negative one is normal the other one is heat or xray affected. The one on the right is difficult to work with as it lacks contrast and any attempt to bring contrast also increases grain. Certainly transport of film becomes a problem these days.

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[giannis]

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On 7/3/2021 at 8:00 PM, Stuart Richardson said:

Lack of contrast and increased grain can also be from heat, independent of x-rays.

This is true. And a reason I was left scratching my head for a couple days when I first encountered the issue. I suspected heat (warm mediterranean summer), then I suspected my dev times and temps were off. But lastly I remembered that along with that film, that i had travelled with, I also developed some old 3+years expired film that had stayed half-finished in a broken camera in such weather much longer than the fresh film I travelled with, yet didn't exhibit those effects. Only then it occurred to me to check if something's up with the new scanners at airports, and unfortunately lots of people had the same exact issue and is now well understood and widespread. And sadly not enough airport security stuff is familiar with film anymore, so getting a hand inspection in Europe is a wild bet.