Old Unexposed Film Degradation

[ledbird]

I've got some old film kicking around and I hear everyone talking about how unexposed film degrades over time.

I've got two different types of "old" stuff:

1 - Fuji 8692 Reala - 800ft - 2 years old - refrigerated
2 - several Kodak stocks (color and B/W) - 1400 ft - 1 year old - not refrigerated

I'm not planning anything mission critical with this stuff, I'm just wondering what to expect, generally, from old film. Is the biggest problem just unpredictibility?

Thanks

 

[David Mullen ASC]

Sure, matching shots from different rolls will be difficult, especially if this is for print.

Mainly there's a loss of sensitivity combined with an increase in the base fog level, giving you blue-ish blacks and more grain. The most common solution is to overexpose the stocks to compensate.