Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2018/07/06
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]A few days ago a friend showed me his latest acquisition: a Vest Pocket Kodak Autographic camera, which looked to be from the 1920s or so. There was a partially used roll of film inside, which he finished with some snapshots in the back yard. Visions of long-gone flappers filled the imagination, saved on the film therein. I told him I'd process the film, but as with any photographic film that old getting any discernable images was a crapshoot. I'd heard that the rule of thumb for developing old film is lose one f-stop per each decade. When I'd loaded the film onto the reel (not so easy with film that had been coiled for decades!) and sealed the tank, I took a look at the backing paper. It was decidedly more 50s-60s looking, and at the top include an exposure chart with a note that Verichrome Pan is ASA 125. That would probably peg it late 1950s and later, and the look of the backing paper reminded me of 50s/60s Kodak product. With that in mind I figured that the usual VP developing time in D-76 1:1 was about eight minutes, with each pushed stop adding about four minutes. Given five decades, that would be an additional 20 minutes, the total rounded to a half-hour. That seemed to do the trick. When I removed the film from the tank two exposures taken decades ago were perfectly clear, but the recently taken shots a vague, blurry mess. Perhaps the camera had deteriorated in the interim. The picture shows a family with clothes and hairstyles of about 1965. Why they were using a 40 year old folding camera is an answer lost to the ages. I have no idea who they were, or the occasion of the picture. http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/focusit/vest+pocket+family+1+sm.jpg.html