Minolta Autopak 700 and a expired cartridge of Kodak VR200

My wife and I traveled to Atlanta to see the Violent Femmes in early October. Spent the early part of the day at the Atlanta Botanical Garden. Along with the venerable Pentax Super Program loaded with my last roll of long expired Kodak Tri-X Pan bulk load film, I brought a Minolta Autopak 700 which shoots 126 film. Last time I shot 126 film was my sister's X15 when I was about 10. I got a cartridge of 126 Kodak VR200 in an auction with a bunch of photography stuff. It expired in 1986, but I decided to give it a try. I shot it at ISO 50 and used the stand development process (first time trying that) in HC 110 Dilution G (1+119) for 60 minutes. I mixed the developer with 8 ml of syrup to make 960 ml of solution. I poured off 100 ml and developed this roll and roll of color 126 film in a 4 real tank on stainless spirals (bottom and top spirals were empty). Agiitated for the first 30 seconds using slow inversions and then did two inversions at 30 minutes. The results were much worse than I had hoped. The base fog on the film was, well, what it should have been for a film that expired when I was still in high school. Some may say I should have shot it at ISO 25 to improve the exposure. I am not sure, however, that would have helped. The film was so dense throughout that I couldn't even scan it with my EPSON V600. I tried to copy the negative on a stand with an LED light and a Lumix G9, but even that didn't help much. The three images are best I could manage. It was a fun experiment, but it yielded nothing much more than the experience. The Autopak 700 is brilliant though and I am looking forward to shooting some fresh 126 (from the Film Photography Project -- filmphotographystore.com/collections/126-film/products/fpp-…) through it.

Photographer:
northernsceneinsouthernlight
Uploaded:
2024-10-18
Tags:
126 analog atlanta b/w botanical garden expired fail kodak vr200
Camera:
iphone 13 Pro Max
Film:
Kodak VR 200 (expired) 126
Lens:
Whatever is on phone...
City:
Atlanta, GA
Decade:
2020s
Year:
2024
Albums:
Atlanta Botanical Garden, October, 2024 -- Minolta Autopak 700 // Kodak VR 200 126 (expired 1986)

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