1960s GAF Versapan Pack Film: more Mississippi and Louisiana Samples

In the previous article, I wrote about how a friend gave me a cooler full of GAF Versapan 4×5" film packs. These had been in his freezer since the 1960s. GAF stopped producing consumer film in the 1970s, so these were definitely an unusual photographic item for this day and age. The first pack was totally viable when developed in Xtol by Northeast Photographic in Maine. I used a second film pack during some outings to the Mississippi Delta and to eastern Louisiana in June of 2020, before the heat became too beastly. I exposed the film at EI = 64, which looked good on the first pack that I tested in April. Here are some examples from Vicksburg and nearby. I posted these at 2400 pixels on the long dimension, so click any picture to see the amazing detail recorded on 4×5" film.

Vicksburg

The Tomato Place, 3229 US 61 south, Vicksburg, Mississippi (90mm ƒ/6.8 Angulon lens, yellow-green filter; note some irregular development streaks)

The Tomato Place (135mm ƒ/5.6 Caltar-S II lens, yellow-green filter, ½ ƒ/22)

The Tomato Place is a friendly store with good produce and munchies. Mallory graciously lets me take photographs there. I photographed inside in 2017.

Ergon refinery, Haining Road, Vicksburg (240mm ƒ/9 G Claron lens, Nikon deep yellow filter, ⅛ ƒ/45)

Mississippi Lime, Haining Road, Vicksburg (240mm ƒ/9 G Claron lens, polarizing filter, ⅛ ƒ/32)

Louisiana

Bunge silo, LA 602 , Tallulah, Louisiana (135mm ƒ/5.6 Caltar-S II lens, yellow filter, ¼ ƒ16-22)

This tall silo is off Louisiana Route 602, where I sometimes bike. I am not sure if it is in use because the siding that leads by the facility is in disrepair. This photograph is from July 4, when a thunderstorm was pending and the sky was dramatic. I only had time for one frame and the drops began to fall. In 2 or 3 minutes, it was monsoon.

Silos off US 80, Waverly, Louisiana (90mm ƒ/6.8 Angulon lens, orange filter, ⅒ ƒ/22)

This Versapan film works well for these industrial buildings, but I need to be careful about overexposing light material, like the gravel.

Unused cotton gin, LA 568 (Lake Drive), Ferriday, Louisiana (135mm ƒ/4.5 Xenar lens, orange filter, ⅒ ƒ/22); note irregular development streak)

This was an unused cotton gin in Ferriday, Louisiana. While I was taking this picture, a gent from the agricultural machinery company across the street came over to see my camera. He said the ladies in the office were most perplexed that someone was standing out in the 35º C heat with a camera. He generously offered some cold water, a restroom, and some air conditioning. Louisianans are very accommodating.

Delhi water works (180mm ƒ/5.6 Caltar IIN lens, yellow filter, ⅛ ƒ/32)

Using 50-year-old Versapan film has been a rewarding experience. I am not sure how often I will use it because the thin material is a bit hard to handle. But I am glad to have this option. And I am amazed that 50-year-old film is still so viable. Will our digital files be readable in 50 years?

This is no. 03b of my irregular series on Abandoned Films.

Update: Click the link to see examples from 35mm Versapan (February 2021)

Testing GAF Vesapan 4×5" Film Packs in Mississippi: Useful Early 20th Century Film Technology

Graphic Film Pack Adapter. The lack of a zip code indicates that the adapter is pre-1965 or 1966 vintage.

Sealed Versapan film pack, probably late-1960s vintage.

Would You Like Some Film Packs?

A good friend here in town is an experienced and very capable photographer with over five decades of experience. Early this year (2020), his wife emailed me wondering if I would like a couple of his film packs because they wanted to make space in the freezer. I thought, film packs? I had not used one since the early 1970s. They still exist? Come to find out, a couple meant an entire cooler full, and my friend had stored them in various freezers since the late 1960s! Well, this sounded like a photographic adventure, so I graciously accepted this generous gift.

1960s-vintage GAF VersaPan and Kodak Tri-X film packs in their original foil packages

What is a Film Pack?

A film pack is a metal box which holds 16 sheets of thin-based 4×5 inch film. Each sheet is attached to a numbered black paper tab. You place the metal box in a film pack adapter. My friend gave me an adapter made by the American company Graphic (see the first photograph). The user starts the film pack by pulling and then tearing off the initial tab of black paper. Then frame no. 1 is ready to use. Focus and compose your 4×5 camera as normal, and then insert the Graphic adapter. Pull the dark slide and take exposure no. 1. Then carefully pull the tab, and that first sheet of film pulls under the rest of the stack to the back of the group.

This makes sheet no. 2 ready to use in the front of the pack. In the photographs below, I have shown the handsome red metal film pack in the adapter and well as one of the 4×5 sheets pulled partway. When you expose sheet 16, you pull the tab and you have finished the pack. You can then remove the metal from the adapter in subdued daylight. The film manufacturers warn you to not press on the exposed black paper shield because then you risk a light leak. The pack adapter is a bit thicker then a normal Fidelity or Lisco sheet film holder but should fit under the ground glass of most brands of cameras.

According to Camera-wiki, Eastman Kodak introduced the film pack in 1903. Over time, Kodak sold at least 12 film sizes, and possibly European manufacturers offered even more. My experience in the 1970s was with 2¼×3¼" film pack in an old Certo Sport camera. I do not remember how many sheets were in that pack. The most popular size may have been 4×5" because the old time press reporters could take 16 quick exposures with their Speed Graphic cameras at a news event. Then they could pop another pack in the adapter and take another 16 frames. I read somewhere that Kodak finally discontinued their 4×5" film packs around 1992, when the last technician who knew how to assemble the packs retired. By then, most of the demand was gone because press/wedding photographers were using medium format or 35mm cameras.

The film pack lingered on in modified form to hold Polaroid instant films. Fuji's Instax film is a form of film pack.

The main criticism of the film pack was that the film was thin and too flexible. Darkroom users needed to mount this flexible film on glass negative holders. With respect to scanning, in my limited experience, the film will lie in the 4×5" holder of my Epson scanner with minimal sagging. Some companies sell holders with anti-Newton glass to ensure that the film would be absolutely flat. Regular 4×5" film is on a much thicker base and does not sag. The film pack film is a slightly larger than normal 4×5, so you need to trim it to fit normal scanner film holders.

GAF VersaPan film pack rear side. The lid on the adapter is open to show the handsome metal box. The paper tabs extend out of a slot on the top.

Front side with one sheet of 4×5" film partly pulled around the pack. When the pack adapter is not in the camera, a dark slide protects this surface. 

Graphic film pack under ground glass of a Tachihara 4×5" field camera. The adapter is thicker than the standard Lisco or Fidelity 2-sided film holder.

Tachihara Field Camera

Tachihara 4×5" field camera with a 135mm ƒ/4.5 Schneider Xenar lens.

The Tachihara is a light weight Japanese wood field camera. I bought this one in 1982 from Lee Beeder Cameras of California via mail order. Fred Picker's Zone VI Newsletters inspired me to try 4×5" photography. Picker was a controversial fellow and very fond of himself, but he did a good service to the photographic world by emphasizing large format photography in the era when most photographers had switched to 35mm cameras. The 1960s and 1970s were the years when 35mm press photographers seemed so glamorous and were taking shocking photographs in war zones. Most press photographers had discarded their Speed Graphics and other large cameras a decade earlier. Picker emphasized how a large negative could make magnificent prints that were simply impossible with the small film of a 35mm camera. The newsletters were well-written, and you can find them on the Internet Archive (highly recommended). Picker eventually sold Zone VI to Calumet Photographic, and Calumet is now gone, as well. His darkroom products and cameras sell quickly on eBay.

GAF and Ansco Film

Ansco was an American company founded in 1842. The company expanded into photographic products in 1847 and invented celluloid flexible roll film. Kodak used (stole) the technology and eventually lost a 12-year patent lawsuit to Ansco. As summarized in VintageCameraLab.com, the German film company, Agfa, merged with Ansco and renamed the new operation Agfa-Ansco. Agfa-Ansco thrived after the takeover, producing cameras, films, and photographic papers. Upon America's entry in World War II, the U.S. Government seized Ansco’s operations as enemy property because of the German ownership and its complicated association with the American IG Chemical Corporation (part of the IG Farben empire). During the war, production shifted to military optics, like sextants and bomber sights, and the “Agfa-Ansco” brand reverted to just “Ansco.”

After the war, Ansco remained under U.S. Government ownership and control until 1965, at which time it sold shares to the public. Post-war, Ansco thrived, selling 2 million cameras per year at its peak, as well as selling rebranded cameras from Agfa, Ricoh, Chinon, and Minolta. In 1967, Ansco changed its name to General Aniline & Film (GAF), an old-line American company that was best known for roofing shingles but who also had a photographic products division. The GAF film factory was in Binghamton, New York. From the 1950s to the 1970s, Ansco/GAF was Eastman Kodak's largest competitor in the US market. At some stage of this complicated history, International Paper owned both GAF and Ilford. I have read that the two companies shared some film or paper technology. In 1977, GAF finally ended production of consumer films, although the manufacture of other films continued (I assume aerial photography, X-ray, and other industrial products). Ilford, of course, still exists and makes a full range of excellent films.

Ansco offered some innovative products, including color films and the first ASA 500 slide film. Most of Ansco's color products have not lasted well and have suffered severe color shifts and fading. But  photographers praised the black and white films.

I tried to find information on the web about Versapan film but found very little. This is not surprising considering that it was discontinued at least 40 years ago. A few notes said it was an excellent product, but one needs to beware that the "good old days" often sound romantically good on internet forums. A Popular Science magazine from November, 1963, contained a short paragraph describing the new film. At that time, Versapan roll film was rated at ASA (American Standards Association) 125. A 1969 US Army still photography manual listed the cut film at a speed of 100.

Needless to say, with 50-year-old film, you are not sure how it will respond. Old film tends to lose sensitivity, so for my first pack, I decided to take triple exposures at each site using EI (exposure index) = 64, 32, and 16. With a pack holding 16 sheets, this would give me five scenes with one extra frame left over from the pack.

The next challenge was developing the film. I do not have a darkroom any more and therefore could not use open trays. My Jobo 4×5 daylight kit is for regular thick-based film. After some inquiries, I sent it to Northeast Photographic in Maine, where the owner developed the Versapan in Xtol using Jobo tanks. He reported that the film looked like new. I subsequently scanned the negatives with an Epson 3200 Photo scanner at 2400 dpi and cleaned minor blobs and scratches with Photoshop CS5's heal tool (the icon that looks like a bandage).

The Mississippi Delta

During our somewhat loose virus shutdown, I drove north into the Mississippi Delta several times to get out of the house, explore, use my Tachihara camera, and test the Versapan film. I like overcast days when the sky looks ominous and rain is pending. My first test was to compare the GAF Versapan with Kodak Tri-X Professional film. In the example of an old store in Yazoo City, Mississippi, the first frame is from Tri-X while the second is Versapan. The Tri-X recorded a little more texture in the sky, but the contrast of one or the other could be adjusted during scanning. I certainly can't claim that one is "better" than the other. The Versapan is fine grain and records fine detail. Remember, this film is five decades old.

CocaCola store, West Broadway, Yazoo City, Mississippi (Tri-X 400 film, Schneider 135mm ƒ/4.5 Xenar lens)

CocaCola store, West Broadway, Yazoo City, Mississippi (Versapan film, Schneider 135mm ƒ/4.5 Xenar lens)

I drove along Levee Road west of Yazoo City and saw an interesting petroleum tank farm. The scene let me test the ability of the film to record the dark tank cars as well as the clouds. It passed with flying colors! This was a gloomy day with spitting rain on and off. I cropped the center section to show the signs on the tank cars, which are almost legible. The grain is tight.

Tank Farm, Rialto Rd., Yazoo City, Mississippi, USA (Versapan film, 180mm ƒ/5.6 Caltar IIN lens, yellow filter, ⅛ sec. ƒ/11.3)

Crop of railroad cars at 100% scale, no sharpening

The little town of Midnight had an unused cotton gin with interesting shapes and textures. Many gins are unused now because farmers have shifted to soybeans or corn.

Midnight Gin, Old US 49, Midnight, Mississippi  (Versapan film, Schneider 135mm ƒ/4.5 Xenar lens, yellow filter, ⅒ sec ƒ/22.5)

By the time I reached Holly Bluff, the sun was beginning to break through the clouds. Some old storage silos glowed in the light. I think the Versapan does very well with metal and silver objects.

Silos, MS 16 north of Holly Bluff, Mississippi (Versapan film, Schneider 90mm ƒ/6.8 Angulon lens, 1/100 sec ƒ/11)

I took this picture with a tiny 90mm ƒ/6.8 Angulon lens that I bought recently. It does not have much extra coverage for the 4×5" format, but I really like the rendering on black and white film. The filter thread is 40.5mm, for which I have a Series VI adapter and various Leitz filters.

Returning to Vicksburg, the photograph below is a bayou (creek) which flows under 61 Bypass. I used a green filter to help lighten the foliage. This is an example of a high-contrast scene where the Versapan only retained some detail in the light sky.

Bliss Creek at N. Washington Street and US 61, Vicksburg, Mississippi (Versapan film, 180mm ƒ/5.6 Caltar IIN lens, green filter, ⅛ sec ƒ/11.7)

Some Concluding Remarks

Well, this was a pleasant surprise. Using a film pack on my 4×5" camera took me back to an earlier time. I really liked the convenience of having 16 frames in one easy-to-change cartridge. I had not used this camera in a number of years, and this was the incentive I needed to exercise it again. With regular Fidelity or Lisco film holders, each one holds only 2 sheets, and I need to load them in a dark closet at night. For a long day's outing, one can easily fill a cooler with holders (I mention cooler because in summer you want to avoid excess heat.). But with three convenient and thin film packs, you have 48 sheets ready to use. The bad news: as far as I know, no one packages regular film (i.e., not instant) in film packs any more.

The second surprise: this thin-base Versapan is still viable and looks good, even after five decades storage. Traditional silver gelatin emulsion is truly an amazing chemical and optical invention, despite the disparaging troll comments from the D crowd. For most projects, I will continue to use Kodak Tri-X, but it is a nice option to have this "antique" Versapan available. I will post some more examples in the future here on Urban Decay.

Thank you for reading. I have written about Tri-X 400 roll film on the 35mmc blog before. Stay well, record your world, and always explore.

This is no. 3 of my irregular series on Abandoned Films.

Update: I wrote about 35mm Versapan film in a February 2021 article. It, too, was useable.

Heading Downtown on Foot: Drummond Street, Vicksburg (B&W film)

In early 2018 in the 35MMC photo blog, I wrote about how I was trying to be a bit more spontaneous with my photography. I wrote a short review of my little Olympus Trip 35 camera, which was was light and handy.

The Rolleiflex twin-lens reflex camera is a lot bigger then the Trip 35, but it also can be hand-held and is very convenient. I thought, why not load it with some Kodak Tri-X 400, walk downtown, and photograph whatever caught my fancy? What follows below is a walk along Drummond Street heading north, towards downtown Vicksburg. This was early 2020, before the Trump Virus semi-confined us to home. I added a few frames from other dates. In the future, I will write an article about some of the architecture along Drummond Street.

At one time, Drummond Street was lined with these magnificent oak trees. I think they were planted in the 1910s or 1920s to line the street. Over time, many have been felled as they rotted or huge limbs broke off. I do not see any present horticultural program to redecorate our streets. Maybe it is considered unnecessary, but we have a hodge-podge of trees now.

This one of the many crepe myrtle trees. These grow quickly and make pretty blossoms that last for weeks during the mid-summer. They add a nice splash of color to the scene.

Welcome Mississippi style. This 1920s cottage at 2904 Drummond was empty for several years but has been nicely restored. A gent name Mr. Moses lived here many years ago. He told me he was a refugee from a famine in Palestine.

Top Five, corner of Drummond and Bowmar Streets (Leica IIIC, 50mm ƒ/1.4 Canon lens, BW400CN film)

The Top Five gets a lot of business. It may be the only grocery store for several miles (excluding the Quick Stop a few blocks north). There is an occasional shooting here, but I now see some video cameras on the power poles pointing towards the store.

Bowmar Ave. near Drummond Street (Tri-X film, 4×5" Tachihara camera, 180 mm ƒ/5.6 Caltar IIN lens)

This is a 1988 photograph of Bowmar Ave near the intersection with Drummond. The Top Five is at the middle right. A friend lived in the apartments on the left in the 1970s. They look pretty rough now.

Continue north and at least two of the Victorian-era houses still have their original fences. The architect must have specified the length of the fence units and then assembled them when he completed the brick retaining wall. Nice workmanship.

This is a view west along Speed Street, which intersects Drummond. The concrete pattern indicates that this is original concrete street from the 1920s. Oddly, while taking this picture, I experienced one of the very rare times that someone objected to photography. A short, pugnacious, Type A white guy confronted me and ranted away for awhile. Then he left. I am sure he felt very macho, penile, and powerful for the rest of the day.

The bees liked this post box. I hope the postman saw the danger before he tried to use it. This looks like an old-fashioned box but is recent.

Letitia Street in 1997 (Agfa Scala film, Leica M3, 50mm ƒ/2 Summicron lens, yellow filter)

Cottage off Letitia Street (Tri-X, 4×5" Tachihara camera, 180mm ƒ/5.6 Caltar IIN lens) 

Letitia Street drops downhill from Drummond approximately across the street from the Vicksburg Gas & Water office. 1920s cottages and some newer warehouses line the street. The dark rectangle hulk at the left center is the long-unused Magnolia School on Bowmar Street. It has been empty for decades, status unknown.

Heading north, we reach the Quick Stop at the corner of Drummond and Belmont Streets. This gas station is usually busy.

Kansas City Southern rail line after ice storm, photograph from Monroe St. bridge (Tri-X film, 4×5" Tachihara camera, 180mm ƒ/5.6 Caltar IIN lens)

Half a block north, a bridge crosses a valley and the Kansas City Southern railroad tracks. This is an odd alignment, and I assume the railroad used a natural gully when the track was laid out well before the Civil War. Trains need to negotiate this curve slowly. Once you cross the tracks, Drummond becomes Monroe Street.

Kansas City Southern rail line, photograph from Belmont Street (Tri-X film, 4×5" Tachihara camera, 135mm ƒ/4.5 Schneider Xenar lens, green filter)

This is a view of the railroad cut from a parking lot off Belmont Street. In the 1980s, I remember there being more little cottages on the opposite slope. Kudzu has enveloped the slope, covering some gardens/farms that were once below the houses.

Cottages below West Pine Street (Tri-X 400 film, Leica M3 camera, 90mm ƒ/2.8 Tele-Elmarit lens, green filter)

This is a 1996 tele view of some of the cottages on the slope. Compare with the 2002 photograph above, where the lowest cottage has been totally enveloped with kudzu.

This is the American Legion building where some precincts vote in state and national elections.

This ends our short walk on Drummond Street. The former Vicksburg Hospital was on Monroe Street just a short distance north. I will scan some of those photographs some day (when I make time).

High Water Again: 2020 in Redwood and Eagle Lake, Mississippi

Flood Notes

Residents of the southern part of the Mississippi Delta (not the geologic delta in the Gulf of Mexico, the flat alluvial plain in west central and northwest Mississippi) remember the flood of 2019. The water rose and stayed up, month after month. Thousands of deer and other forest animals died. Crops were delayed or not planted at all. Houses were inundated for months. The Corps of Engineers closed the Steele Bayou flood gates for months, and water in the Yazoo basin rose and rose. It was a messy scene.

Comparison of 2019 and 2020 river level measured at the Vicksburg gage (from US Army Corps of Engineers at https://rivergages.mvr.usace.army.mil/

Unfortunately, 2020 saw another flood. It was shorter but still a mess for residents of the lower Delta. The plot above shows the river level measured at the Vicksburg Gage (they spell it "gage"). The 2019 high water lasted almost four months. While 2020's peak was shorter, it was almost as high at 50 ft. Note that the Corps of Engineers defines flood stage as 43.0 ft.

February 27, 2020 satellite view of lower Mississippi River valley from NASA Earth Observatory. The lower Yazoo basin is the blue region near the center of the frame.

The NASA Earth Observatory published the satellite image above on February 27, 2020. "..the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) on the NOAA-NASA Suomi NPP satellite acquired an image showing high water along the lower Mississippi, Pearl, and Pascagoula rivers, among others." The Yazoo Basin is the triangular area in the center of the frame, where the Yazoo River flows into the Mississippi.

Eagle Lake

The residents of the little town of Eagle Lake were inundated for weeks in 2019. Many of the homes and trailers became uninhabitable. In December, group of volunteers called Team Rubicion helped demolish houses at no cost to the residents. Most of the members were veterans.

Eagle Lake on a foggy morning is peaceful and scenic. You can hear the ducks and other waterfowl in the distance.

These photographs are from Shell Beach Road. The Rubicon group was efficient in helping tear down damaged structures. But a friend from Eagle Lake told me that months afterwards, the piles of debris were still there and the county had not sent any trucks to take the junk away. I am not sure of the resolution.

Redwood and Floweree Road

Floweree Road on an overcast day (Moto G5 digital file)

Floweree Road is off US 61 north of Redwood. In 2019, I took photographs of flooding on and around the area. My wife and I biked there several times. This year, I returned with my Tachihara 4×5" camera and Tri-X film. This was in April, but there were no other people about and it was not hazardous re. the virus.

These are all Tri-X frames taken with a 180mm ƒ/5.6 Caltar IIN lens with yellow or green filters. Click any picture to expand to 1600 pixels wide.

Tar shingle house, US 61 (Tri-X film, 135mm ƒ/4.5 Xenar lens, GGr filter)

This little shack is at the junction of US 61 and W. Deer Creek Road. It is faced with old-fashioned asphalt tiles (similar to roofing tiles). I have photographed it before, but this year, it looks distinctly more fragile or decayed.

The square photographs at Eagle Lake are from Kodak Panatomic-X film exposed in my Rolleiflex 3.5E camera with 75mm ƒ/3.5 Schneider Xenotar lens. I scanned the negatives with a Minolta Scan Multi film scanner. The photographs from Floweree road are from 4×5" Tri-X film, most with a 180mm Caltar lens.