Memories Film?

[cooltouch]

I was at a local 99cent only store the other day, and ran across this film. So I'm thinking, a dollar a roll? How bad can it be?

So I bought a couple of rolls. 24 exposures, ISO 200, made in Japan. C-41 color processing. Expiration date is 10/2011. So it's kinda short-dated, which is probably why the 99 cent store has it.

So who makes film in Japan nowadays besides Fuji? I dunno so I'm thinking maybe it's reboxed Fuji. The negatives have that typical grid of lines between the image numbers, and it says "200N" on top.

I grabbed my Nikon FE, mounted an AI 35mm f/2 Nikkor, and loaded the camera up with a roll. Took it to the Houston Botanical Gardens and burned through the roll pretty quickly. Had it developed yesterday, then I scanned the images on my Epson 4990.

The results? Somewhat surprising. I'm thinking maybe my FE's meter might be off -- I've had the camera for quite a while now, but I think I've only run a couple of rolls of B&W through it since I bought it. The images were slightly overexposed where bright sun was evident. Which means that, considering how forgiving C-41 film is to overexposure, either this film has a very narrow latitude or my FE's meter is off. Or maybe I'm just not familiar enough with its metering pattern. I'll have to get to the bottom of this separately.

Otherwise, I noticed the color was off quite a bit. There was a general brownish red cast that shouldn't have been there. But this was easy enough to get rid of in PP. I suspect this brownish-red cast may be due more to improper storage than the approaching expiry date. I can recall leaving a camera in a hot car for several hours and having my print film come out with a similar color cast.

But what really surprised me about this film was the fineness of its grain. I'm used to color negative film having pretty clumpy and course grain. Even Ektar has more grain than I'd like. But this stuff is more like a fine-grained slide film, and has grain that seems to be just as fine as Ektars. Very impressive.

Here are some shots. First, to show the color cast I was having to deal with, here is an image before and after the PP I did.

Before:


After:


A walkway at the Houston Botanical Gardens. The have these raised wooden walkways where there is a possibility of standing water. Otherwise they're gravel.



The reason for the walkway. It's a lily pond.


I spotted this little guy walking along the handrail at the lily pond. So of course I had to take more pics. Unfortunately all I had was the 35mm f/2 so no macro shots.



Here are a few more shots of the bug. 100% crops, which give you a pretty good look at the film's tight grain. The Epson 4990 was set to 4800 ppi.





There is a small "sensory" garden at the entrance to the main gardens. This is a piece of rock that was made into a water fountain.
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And next to the fountain is an old pump that appears to still be in use -- occasionally, at least.
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So all-in-all a pleasant surprise. I think I'll go visit the 99-Cent Only store again and stock up.

[Excalibur]

Well the expiry date was up in 2011 but it could be a few years old, it would be a nice surprise if it was Superia but probably Fujicolor (although I can't remember when they stopped making it, erm if they have stopped).
In the UK a similar puzzle with Tudor film going for £1, supposed to be made in Japan.

[cooltouch]

I've used print film -- Kodak as I specifically recall -- that was well past the expiry date and the colors came out correctly. So I don't think the fact that this film expires in October is the likely issue with the color shift, especially since I had a similar situation happen to me years ago with the camera in the hot car.

How is the Tudor film, btw?

I don't shoot much color print film, mostly because I don't like having to deal with the grain in the scans. But this film's grain is tight enough that it reveals the lens's sharpness very nicely. I was impressed by the texture in the piece of a log that pump is sitting on, for example.

I'm gonna have to set up my dupe rig and try duping then reversing these negs. Duping, I've found, is pretty straightforward with color print film as long as it isn't Ektar. The main advantage though is a dupe will be noticeably sharper than a scan.

[Attila]

Tudor like Fuji 200 I did like it.

[Excalibur]

[cooltouch]

Thanks for that link. Hmm . . . whereas Tudor is supposedly defunct now, the Memories still seems to be going strong. I decided to do some googling and found a little more info about it. Here's a review in which the reviewer has pretty much reached the same conclusion I have about it:

http://www.lomography.com/magazine/reviews/2009/11/18/memories-35mm-color-print-film-35mm-200-iso-user-review

Found this thread at Flickr:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/michaelraso/3891324930/

Other than those, there's not much about it on the 'net.

[Excalibur]

[cooltouch]

Pretty dang cheap for Kodak! I'll wager it's a decent film, too.

So I start doing some searches to see if I can find any other sorts of films available here in the US for cheap. Wasn't having much luck until I ran across this ad at Amazon for 36-exposure ISO 100 Fuji. $1.89 each. Now, that's a good deal. ISO 100 Fuji should have very tight grain, I'm thinking.

http://www.amazon.com/Fujifilm-Fujicolor-Color-Negative-Exposure/dp/B002802HAQ

[Lloydy]

[Scheimpflug]

[Blinx123]

Interesting.
Always nice to see inexpensive film perform that well.

All that rebranded stuff is really interesting. One can really save a buck or two.

The cheapest film I ever got was a rebranded Kodak Gold 200, btw. Bought two boxes of four rolls per box last week. Paid the grand total of 6 euros for both of them. Expiry date: Late 2013

[Excalibur]

[martinsmith99]

I have 10 rolls of Colorplus and 10 of Ferrania. I assumed the Kodak film would be awful, but this has inspired me to try it.

[cooltouch]

Thanks for the memory jog on the Colorplus. I just took a look on eBay, and quite a few folks have some with a 2013 expiry date. Looks like with most, by the time shipping charges are added in, it's about $3/roll for 36-exp rolls. Not too bad, really.

Ferrania I've never tried. Although I think I have a roll of it someone sent me, maybe Kat. It's just a plain black cartridge, says "Made in E.U.," 24 exp, ISO 100, C-41.

[Katastrofo]

Memories is a great film, I have a friend in Riverside CA that will send me
20 rolls for $20 plus $5 shipping. Some examples, and I'm sure Jussi has
many more (and better):




Konica T4/UC Hex 80-200 zoom, Epson 4490 scans

I was given several rolls of KG 200 plus HD 200, so my ISO 200 is stocked right now.

[Katastrofo]

BTW, it is this film, rebadged:

http://www.dnp.co.jp/eng/news/1204993_2501.html

DNP bought out all Konica's film and paper plants, so this is the reborn
Konica Centuria film, according to Riverside Ray (NikonCafe).

[Attila]

Wow! Konica Centuria is a good film!

[cooltouch]

Nice looking shots, Kat. I'm curious -- did yours have any color-shift issues? I'm hoping its just the batch this store got in, and if there are batch or lot numbers, I'll look for differet ones when I buy more.

[Katastrofo]

Had no color shift issues whatsoever with Memories. The one film that
really slapped me around with that problem was Ektar in 35mm, never
felt moved to try it in 120.

[cooltouch]

Oh yeah, Ektar. My Ektar prints from Costco looked fine, but when I scanned them, grays were coming out purple. Took a bit of work in PP to get the colors right.

I just got the idea to dig out from the trash the box that this roll came in and check it's date and lot number with the box for the roll I haven't shot yet. And, I'll be dinged if they aren't different. The roll I shot expired 2 months ago. The roll I have left expires in October. I didn't even think to check to see if the film was expired. Not used to buying expired stuff that doesn't say it's expired. So anyway, I think I'll head down to the 99 Cent store tomorrow and take a closer look at expiry dates and lot numbers, and hopefully stock up on some more.

I'll report back what I find.

[Excalibur]

[cooltouch]

Regarding out-of-date film, my experience has been similar. A few months back, I discovered a roll of Kodak 200 and had it developed. Looking at the photos, I could tell they were from about eight years ago. I asked the clerk at the photo counter if she had to add much color correction to get the colors to come our right and she said no, that it was fine.

So yeah, I agree about OOD film. Besides, I'm slowly working through a supply that I've had in my freezer for at least 13 years. Some print, some slide. So far it's all been fine. In fact, I had a roll of slides developed recently that I remember when I shot it -- it was back in 1986, and had been in the freezer ever since. Came out fine, no color shift at all.

But storage under adverse conditions is a different matter, and I think that's what happened to this film. Probably got stuck in a hot warehouse for months or something before the 99 Cent store bought it.

Anyway, I'm off to go buy more.

[cooltouch]

Welp, just got back from the cheap stuff store. They had a lot, probably at least 100 boxes, so I grabbed ten of 'em. Turns out the first box I picked up expired in May, but the next ten I selected all expire in October. The October boxes have only two lot numbers. So I selected some from each. We'll see if it matters. If all the boxes were improperly stored, which is what I'm guessing, then it isn't gonna matter.

Only one way to find out though. Gotta get out there and shoot some film. Problem is, right now it's so stinking hot outside, it's not much fun out there. And there's no end in sight -- at least for the next 10 days or so.

[Katastrofo]

[cooltouch]

We've been into triple digits down here in Houston for over a week now, with no end in sight. Fortunately, when it starts getting really hot like this here, "Hot and Humid Houston" becomes closer to "Hot Like Phoenix Houston" if you can call humidity in the 50% range "dry." But it really does feel dry by comparison. However, it has to typically be about 99F or so for a while before it gets that way.