While on my way back to Indy from Tennessee this weekend I really wanted to get some more of those cool cloud landscape pictures with my 35mm from out the airplane window on the flight back. There’s just one problem… I have no access to anyplace that sells 35mm film! When I finally got to downtown Nashville the night before my flight it was already past 8 pm, which is when all the pharmacies were already closed downtown.
Trying to pry the back open to get a look inside… and… Drat. I just exposed the whole roll…
Last chance. There was only one disposable camera left after my first mishap. So, first things first, I advanced all 27 exposures with my finger covering the lens to keep the film inside unexposed. Then opened the back again and tada! The roll is ready to load into any SLR.
Which is exactly what I did when I loaded it into my Pentax K1000. I was very pleased at the success of the project. I’m excited to develop this roll and see how it turns out. If all is well, it shouldn’t look any different from the others.
UPDATE
“If all is well, it shouldn’t look any different from the others.” How foolish of me…
When you read the sign the NSA has put out regarding film speed, “The X-Ray will not effect film less than 800 ISO. If you prefer a manual inspection of any undeveloped film, just ask.” You might be inclined to think, “Oh good, this 400 ISO film is safe in my bag.” A perfectly reasonable assumption to make? No, that would be a perfectly naive assumption to make.
These are excerpts from the roll I shot on the disposable film in the K1000:
If you don’t know what you are looking at, let me inform you that its what is known as X-RAY FOG.
I would highly recommend it to anyone travelling and shooting film. The short version is: HAND INSPECT ALL FILM, even all speeds lower than the 800 ISO they’ve been putting out on their signs. This Kodak page was last updated in 2003, but I just shot this in 2013. NSA, please update your signage.
Careful with taking apart those disposables. I've shocked myself on the ones with a flash before by accidentally touching the leads on the charged flash capacitor (I think?) with a screwdriver. It was quite a jolt!
I'll keep that in mind. You know, I was thinking it would be fun to do some kind of cheap camera challenge where the only flashes you could use would be from disposables. I'll keep that tucked away for later.
That is not X-Ray fog. X-ray fog appears as wavy lines. Your entire frames are fogged. More like age fog. Were the disposable cameras past their date?
It works quite well for me