Shooting very expired ISO 6 Film Ferrania

I got my hands on a master roll of some really expired 35mm black and white film made by Ferrania. There really isn’t much info about this film online, so I decided to gather whatever information I have.

As far I know, this is a ISO 3—6 motion picture duplicating film, that is pretty much only sensitive to blue light. It is somewhat sharp and it has a very fine, if not non-exiting grain. The tonality is really interesting and the dynamic range seems to be surprisingly good, as the film doesn’t blow highlights easily. Shadows are deep, giving this stuff a good amount of dramatic noir.

At a glance:

35mm
Black & white
Sharp(ish)
Sensitive only to blue light
Very fine grain
Estimated sensitivity: outdoors ISO 3—6, indoors ISO 1 😳)
Vintage movie duplicating film
Expired (manyfactured at least few decades ago)
Developement times unknown

Characteristics

As far as I’m concerned, this film knocks out anything that is left of reality and transforms the scene into a rather surreal image. Great film for really creative and experimental work! There are plenty of imperfections as the emulsion is no doubt deteriorating chemically due to it’s age (or radiation damage or something). I have no idea when this was manufactured, but the graphic design and printing on the label looks perhaps a bit 1970’s or 80’s.

The film still definitely performs and delivers images, but the results are delightfully unpredictable. I think this films gives an impressionistic vibe. It can be used to envoke an atmosphere that resembles a 1920’s german expressionistic movie. Okay, I’m just throwing some fancy words around, but you get the idea. The stuff looks weird in a good way. It’s sharp, smooth and gritty at the same time. Don’t shoot this film expecting techically sound images. If you’re on the other hand looking for a dream-like aesthetics, then this is the right stuff. The emulsion is filled with unevenly occurring spots and fogging that randomly appears as light and dark areas. The outcome provides an uneven tonality and organic chemical imperfections that (sort of) reminds me of a wetplate photo too.

Developing

I don’t have much actual info about developing times, but I’ve tried this film in Rodinal (Adox Adonal) 60min full stand dev, 1+100 dilution (3ml + 297ml for a single roll in my Paterson 4 tank) at 20c. Seems to work just fine.

On this strip of developed (but unexposed) negative you can clearly see some heavy spottage.

Markings on the tin:

EM. 13687-80
CORE C2
Motion picture safety film
Made in Italy
3M

Interested?

I have about 100m of this stuff at my disposal and I’ve hand rolled it onto recycled film canister with a bulk loader. 100m is more than I could ever shoot, so if you’re interested, I’m more than happy to do a film swap and send you few rolls if you want to try this out. You can send me some other film in return.

If you happen to have more information about this film, please don’t hesitate to get in touch!

A big thank you to Mr. Lauri who kindly provided me this film.