For decades, Kodak’s Verichrome Pan film was a popular product in camera stores around the United States (but I am not sure about overseas sales). It was a medium-speed (ISO=125) panchromatic black and white film intended for box and medium format cameras. Kodak claimed that it had:
- Extremely fine grain
- Wide exposure latitude
- Very high sharpness
- High resolving power.
Over the years, Kodak sold Verichrome Pan in 120, 127, 116, 126, 616, 110, 620, and 828 formats. As far as I know, Kodak never packaged it in 35mm cassettes, even though 828 was the same width. Note that these are format designations, not width in mm. The 126 was the Instamatic cartridge that was so popular in the 1960s and 1970s. As of 1996, Kodak even sold it in long roll for Cirkut panorama cameras. It was such a flexible film, an inexperienced amateur could could load it in a crummy box camera and achieve something that a lab could print.
For unknown reasons, I never tried any Verichrome Pan in the past, and now it is too late. But upon mentioning this to a photography friend from Indiana, Jim Grey, he generously sent me a roll. The roll Jim sent expired in 12/1987. He did not know its original storage conditions, but he had kept it refrigerated.
Based on the title, you probably want to know about this mysterious snow in Mississippi. Well, it does happen once in awhile. I took pictures around town with my Hasselblad 501CM medium format camera on one of our two (yes, 2) snowstorms this year (2021). The light was soft and even, so maybe this was not a very challenging test for this film, but that is what was loaded in my A12 film holder. Because of the age and unknown storage, I decided to add extra exposure and use it at EI=64 (or half the original), meaning one ƒ-stop extra light for each frame. I used a Gossen Luna Pro Digital light meter in incident mode to measure exposure.
Here are five examples around Vicksburg. The caption will describe the location.
Needless to say, I am thrilled that a 30-year-old film still responds so well. What amazing technology. Under these conditions of soft light, the tonality of this Verichrome Pan was perfect.
Praus Productions in Rochester, New York, developed the film, and I scanned it with a Minolta Scan Multi medium format film scanner. The Silverfast Ai software did not have a Verichrome Pan profile. Instead, I used the profile for Plus-X film. Some writers on the web claim that they were almost the same emulsion but one had no anti-halation layer (?). I do not know if that is true, and I had no recent experience with Plus-X. The last time I used Plus-X may have been in Moscow in 1978 (click the link).
Thank you, 35MMC Readers, for following along on this exploration of expired film. You can see more of my explorations, mostly with film, at Urban Decay. All comments welcome. Explore your world, take many film pictures.
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Terry B on 5 Frames with Kodak Verichrome Pan Film in Snowy Mississippi – by Andrew Morang
Comment posted: 10/05/2021
Your images here certainly have a period look to them.
Comment posted: 10/05/2021
Bud Sisti on 5 Frames with Kodak Verichrome Pan Film in Snowy Mississippi – by Andrew Morang
Comment posted: 10/05/2021
Comment posted: 10/05/2021
Patrick Abe on 5 Frames with Kodak Verichrome Pan Film in Snowy Mississippi – by Andrew Morang
Comment posted: 10/05/2021
Graduating to 135 film meant moving up to Plus-X Pan in Ye Olde Leica IIIa and it's fuzzy, flare-prone 50mm f/1.5 Taylor-Hobson Xenon. The Nikon S2 had an optically fine 50mm f/1.4 Nikkor, but that was my father's camera.
Thanks for another trip down memory lane with a film of my youth, before computers, SmartPhones, and digital cameras. Waiting to see if anything came out from a roll of Verichrome Pan or Plus-X Pan was a sort-of year round Christmas-like anticipation. Polaroid? That was for rich folk or official school use. Then there was 135 Kodachrome, which added another dimension to everyday life, but that's another story...
davesurrey on 5 Frames with Kodak Verichrome Pan Film in Snowy Mississippi – by Andrew Morang
Comment posted: 10/05/2021
Looking back it must have been a flexible emulsion considering I got half decent results given my inexperience (not yet in my teens) the basic nature of the Brownie and it all being processed and printed at the local chemist's shop.
A nice bit of nostalgia. Thanks for that.
Comment posted: 10/05/2021
Rich on 5 Frames with Kodak Verichrome Pan Film in Snowy Mississippi – by Andrew Morang
Comment posted: 10/05/2021
My dad would use the VP-120 to take holiday photos with his box camera. I got a 127 Brownie in the early 60's. For me, it was C-O-L-O-R all the way! Then I took a photo course in HS, using 120 B W (Sorry, I don't remember the nitty-gritties)
--Rich
Sacha Cloutier on 5 Frames with Kodak Verichrome Pan Film in Snowy Mississippi – by Andrew Morang
Comment posted: 11/05/2021
Comment posted: 11/05/2021
Ben Garcia on 5 Frames with Kodak Verichrome Pan Film in Snowy Mississippi – by Andrew Morang
Comment posted: 11/05/2021
Kodachromeguy on 5 Frames with Kodak Verichrome Pan Film in Snowy Mississippi – by Andrew Morang
Comment posted: 11/05/2021
Jay Dann walker on 5 Frames with Kodak Verichrome Pan Film in Snowy Mississippi – by Andrew Morang
Comment posted: 18/07/2021
The beauty of Verichrome is (as Kodak so proudly trumpeted in all its adverts of that era) was you could shoot it and then process it in just about anything brewed for darkroom work, and get usable images. Many of my VP shots were published in two of the daily newspapers I did reporting and photography for in New Brunswick (in Canada, not new Jersey).
After a few years I moved on to other films - Ansco Versapan, then Plus-X, Ilford FP4 and HP5, the Agfas, and sadly much too late, Panatomic-X. I shot my last few rolls of VP in the early '90s, a rare find in a photo retail store about to close down in Melbourne, all expired but still good.
Now I shoot mostly digital Nikons, but I do go on using the Ilfords, and occasionally Agfa and Rollei films when I can buy them here in Australia. Sadly, film now costs the earth plus a kidney, which more than any other reason will most surely (so I believe) cause its demise in the not-too-distant future.
This article was a pleasant reminder of how good supermarket-retail brand films used to be. We have lost many things in the passing of time, and films are at the top of my list. Fortunately, good wine is still available and quite affordable even on my retiree's reduced income...
Comment posted: 18/07/2021
Edward Jones on 5 Frames with Kodak Verichrome Pan Film in Snowy Mississippi – by Andrew Morang
Comment posted: 22/11/2021
1. Does that mean 9 used or left?
2. How many pics could one expect from a roll?
I have been having the worst time finding this information, though a ton of technical, experienced photographer info is out there.
I would like to attempt finishing the roll and then having it processed by someone since I have no experience with developing film. I have not great hopes, but I find it very interesting.
Comment posted: 22/11/2021
Andrew Bailey on 5 Frames with Kodak Verichrome Pan Film in Snowy Mississippi – by Andrew Morang
Comment posted: 24/06/2023