Storing old BW 4x5 negatives

My grandfather was a photographer in the early part of his career (40?s & 50?s)

for various newspapers. He passed away a few years back and I found a couple

thousand 4x5 negatives. They smell like vinegar and some are warped but most

look to be in good shape. Some say ?Kodak Saftey? and all have various notch

patterns on the top. I scanned one on my 5-year-old $50 scanner but it gave me

a crap image.

Most of the pictures seem to have historical significance so I would like to

archive them when I get a proper scanner. But I don?t think I?ll get to it for

a few years. So my question is how should I store these until I get around to

it? Currently they?re in some cardboard boxes half of the lot is in bundles

about 500 each and tied with butchers twine the other half in manila envelopes

about 5 per envelope.

 

Thanks.

Handsome

I have some suggestions for storage, but I would first try to solve the problem of the vinegar smell. They may need some type of special treatment, especially if they are Kodak film, don't say Kodak Safety on them, and are of an older vintage. I would avoid storage solutions until they are stabilized.

"They smell like vinegar and some are warped but most look to be in good shape"

 

You don't have a lot of time, read this.

 

http://www.film-to-video.com/warning.html

 

Freezing the film in a sealed moisture proof bag with some silica gel to dry it out would slow things down. That's what Bill Gates did with

the Corbis/Bettmann Film Preservation Facility, except he had a whole mountain for a freezer.

 

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/media/jan-june04/bettmann_06-10.html

 

With old stained B+W film, it is best to scan in color, then chose the channel that looks the clearest , usually the red or maybe the green, and convert that to B+W. Do i6 bit scans now and edit them later.

 

You really need to act fast if you want to save your images

By the way, the myth of film being a perfect permanent storage media is pretty well laid to rest in the corbis story.

Since no media is stable forever, the "perfect" preservation system involves multiple redundant servers in geographically separate locations with an endowment to support an IT staff in perpetuity. This is great if you are a wealthy museum. For the rest of us, there are several choices:

 

Well fixed and washed B&W images on glass plates are about as stable as photographic media gets. Even this are not permanent. The Albert Stone collection here is Rochester was nearly lost several times before a museum eventually took over its care. http://www2.libraryweb.org/orgMain.asp?storyid=921&orgid=452

 

B&W images on polyester support are close to glass in stability and they are damn near impossible to break. Disney stored B&W separation negatives of their animated classics on each coast. They probably still do in addition to digital copies.

 

Some of the newer Ektachrome films will last 200 years. (Some older products like E-64 are closer to 50 years while many E-4 and E-3 Ektachrome have significantly faded already. Kodachrome image stability is also rated at about 200 years.

 

SOME CD's are reputed to last 200 to 300 years while others last 4 to 5. With long term storage of digital media, the big question is whether there will be playback hardware. If I came across images of the Loch Ness monster on a Beta cassette I could find a place to recover the images. If it was my son's birthday party, I may not pay the price.

I separated out the ones that are shrinking and curling. They were mixed in one bundle ? I don?t think the others smell quite so pungent but I'll go thought thoes too. The bad ones have three-square marks in the corner and no writing at all.

<b>hugh crawford</b><i> By the way, the myth of film being a perfect permanent storage media is pretty well laid to rest in the corbis story.</i><p>

Not true. Only someone desperate to find something wrong with B&W film's longevity would say that.<p>

Early films were volatile, unstable. Films made for the past several decades are not.<p>

Films not properly fixed and washed are subject to serious degradation. We can't change how people once did not care but one can practice proper technique so that film will last a long, long time.<p>

Saying that B&W film is not stable is like telling the digital maven who uses his disc drive for a hockey puck that digital is unstable.

Where are you located and what newspaper did he work for? These images may be very valuable to the local historical society or others. If you don't know what you're doing, don't mess with them. If they are of interest to someone, it could be worth it to them to handle them professionally.

I am with Craig here.

 

And let me add - How much do you want for the collection of negatives (being the whore I

am for historical archiving) ?

 

I would be donating the negatives to my workplace, a library with good nonprint media.

 

Not that I really need a tax deduction. :(

they sound like they're in bad shape--so proper storage at this point, would be getting

them into a colder/low humidity environment probably to try to slow down the

deterioration. this would be like a cold vault (in an archive)--or maybe even a "freezer kit"

if you can find one (some of the archival supply companies used to sell them). but I guess

it depends on how many you have and how many are in that kind of shape.

 

when an acetate negative starts to go like that--they smell & start warping up as the base

shrinks--it drags the emulsion along with it and on sheet film, it looks like a potato chip

almost--they also start to stain. it's non-reversible--you need to act fast & copy them

somehow at this point, or get them into cold/cool storage while you plan out what to do

next. there is a process of stripping the emulsion off the base & adhering it to a new

polyester base, but it's expensive, and from what I understand, doesn't always work.

 

A photo conservator would be the one to contact about this--you could (and should)

consider contacting your state or local archive, historical society, etc for advice.

 

without seeing them--and not being an archivist or a conservator myself (just a

photographer)--I think if it were me, first thing I would try to do would be to get them

into some sort of cold storage--you can spend a lot of money on enclosures, but in the

end, it's the room temp & relative humidity at play here. If you dotry to store them

somehow--separate them in the envelopes. get them out of the kraft envelopes. use some

buffered, acid/lignin free PAT envelopes--and put only neg in each. The microchamber

products have barriers that can absorb some of the byproducts of the deteriorating film,

but they're more expensive than the other products. The cheapest would be to use a good

100% cotton type office envelope if you can find one that fits--but it will have adhesive in

it and won't be as good as a PAT enclosure--and no buffering either. Avoid plastic

though--they need to breathe. put the envelopes in flip top boxes--buffered as well.

 

when you rehouse them--wear gloves when you handle them--and sort them out based

on how bad they look. then you can figure out which ones to dupe, print, scan or whatever

first. the jury's out really on how to archive them--I do some of this for a living, and at

this point in time---it would be to keep the film and either try to dupe it the old fashioned

way or scan at the highest res--which would depend really, but it would be something like

300-1000 dpi on 10 inches on the longest side--master would be an unsharpened tiff,

burn these to gold CD-Rs. There are a few tech papers on this--the Nat'l archives has one,

and the NEDCC has another. If you check with your state archive--they'll probably have

some recommendations also.

 

good luck--sounds interesting. if you're in NC, drop me a line.

Thanks for all the replies.

I think all of the photos are from southern California. Im not sure what paper he was at during the time. Ill ask my folks for when I see them over Christmas. Good idea about the historic society. Ill call around and see if they can help out.

 

I have been wearing gloves so I dont get my prints on them. Where can I order those acid free envelopes at or should I be able find them locally?

 

I want to scan the negatives with a transparency scanner vs. making prints. Though I may try to make prints of these curling ones. Out of all of them only like 30 were curling or had stains. None of them are brittle. I separated the bad ones from the others and the smell went away. Here are some pictures of the bad ones. You cant tell from the picture but the one thats curling the emulsion side has a dimple texture kinda like a golf ball.

 

http://img373.imageshack.us/img373/9528/curlingko9.jpg

http://img373.imageshack.us/img373/7511/stainedvl9.jpg

Those negatives could be quite valuable!

 

An aside - the bad ones look like they came from the days the photographers would develop,

short-fix, print them wet and put them away. No archival concerns whatsoever.

 

Very best of luck. Please keep us informed. It's an exciting project.