# Found 6 and 8 year old film, could this possibly be developed? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [March 31, 2012, 1:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/found-6-and-8-year-old-film-could-this-possibly-be-developed/617343 "2012-03-31T01:29:49Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Terraplane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/74df32/32.png) [@Terraplane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terraplane)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2012, 1:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/found-6-and-8-year-old-film-could-this-possibly-be-developed/617343/1 "2012-03-31T01:29:49Z")
Digging around in a closet I found a couple old disposable cameras. One has an expiration date of 2004 and the other has a date of 2006. Is there any chance these might still yield half decent pictures or should I just toss them? They’ve been in my closet, normal apartment climate control with A/C in the summer and heat in the winter. If there’s a chance at all I’m willing to give it a shot but if it’s pointless I guess I’ll throw them in the bin. ---
**Author:** ![Nawth\_Chucka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/c57346/32.png) [@Nawth\_Chucka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nawth_Chucka)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2012, 1:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/found-6-and-8-year-old-film-could-this-possibly-be-developed/617343/2 "2012-03-31T01:37:10Z")
Yep, go for it! ---
**Author:** ![zombywoof](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/9e8a1a/32.png) [@zombywoof](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zombywoof)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2012, 1:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/found-6-and-8-year-old-film-could-this-possibly-be-developed/617343/3 "2012-03-31T01:37:51Z")
No guarantees but as long as they haven’t been exposed to excessive heat I’d go for it. ---
**Author:** ![jjimm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba8739/32.png) [@jjimm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jjimm)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2012, 1:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/found-6-and-8-year-old-film-could-this-possibly-be-developed/617343/4 "2012-03-31T01:38:56Z")
Anecdote: my ex-wife’s colleague, in her late twenties, found an old film which she thought had been from a vacation. She had it developed and was amazed to find that it was pictures of her First Communion. ETA: and I had one of those disposable cameras developed five years after I got married, and found that the pictures were of someone else’s wedding. I knew a load of the people in the pics, so I can guess whose wedding it was, but I have no idea how I ended up with it. ---
**Author:** ![Terraplane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/74df32/32.png) [@Terraplane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terraplane)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2012, 2:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/found-6-and-8-year-old-film-could-this-possibly-be-developed/617343/5 "2012-03-31T02:02:56Z")
Kickass. I have no idea what’s on one of them, though I’d sure like to find out, but the other is from an awesome river tubing trip with some friends that I don’t really see anymore. I’ll keep my fingers crossed and drop them off soon. ---
**Author:** ![Finagle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/b19c9b/32.png) [@Finagle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Finagle)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2012, 4:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/found-6-and-8-year-old-film-could-this-possibly-be-developed/617343/6 "2012-03-31T04:52:57Z")
Worst case is that you’ll have some color balance issues. The various dyes in the film emulsions age at a different rate. So what’ll probably happen is that you’ll get recognizable images, but maybe with a reddish cast. If that happens, you can probably compensate in the printing, or just scan the pictures and do some Photoshop work. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2012, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/found-6-and-8-year-old-film-could-this-possibly-be-developed/617343/7 "2012-03-31T19:49:44Z")
> [@](#): > > ETA: and I had one of those disposable cameras developed five years after I got married, and found that the pictures were of someone else’s wedding. I knew a load of the people in the pics, so I can guess whose wedding it was, but I have no idea how I ended up with it. I’ve been to weddings where disposable cameras were given out as party favors, one to each table at the reception. Might your friend have done that, and you ended up with your table’s camera? ---
**Author:** ![Huerta88](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/82dd89/32.png) [@Huerta88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Huerta88)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2012, 8:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/found-6-and-8-year-old-film-could-this-possibly-be-developed/617343/8 "2012-03-31T20:15:58Z")
It would be quite surprising if the film were **not** capable of being developed, putting aside the types of extreme physical trauma people mention. The most prominent extreme aged undeveloped film that yields images involve multiple instances of people coming across undeveloped film from the WWII era (soldiers’ snapshots and I think in one or two cases personal photos from people in Hitler’s circle). Many images have been recovered after 60+ years. [http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?f=45&t=153344](http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?f=45&t=153344) ---
**Author:** ![panache45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/panache45/32/64_2.png) [@panache45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panache45)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2012, 12:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/found-6-and-8-year-old-film-could-this-possibly-be-developed/617343/9 "2012-04-01T00:38:37Z")
Several years ago I found an old roll of 35mm film, and had it developed. It turned out to be, among other things, pictures of a very young kitten . . . that had recently died at the age of 20! There were some color and contrast issues, but nothing that couldn’t be fixed with Photoshop. ---
**Author:** ![Terry\_Kennedy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c57346/32.png) [@Terry\_Kennedy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terry_Kennedy)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2012, 1:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/found-6-and-8-year-old-film-could-this-possibly-be-developed/617343/10 "2012-04-01T01:33:07Z")
> [@Terraplane](#): > > One has an expiration date of 2004 and the other has a date of 2006. Is there any chance these might still yield half decent pictures or should I just toss them? They’ve been in my closet, normal apartment climate control with A/C in the summer and heat in the winter. Anything that recent should still be capable of being processed with stock chemistry, probably “wherever photos are developed”. With older film types, you can run into problems becase the chemistry needed for processing it is no longer available. The classic example of this is Kodachrome, though there are some other types where the original chemistry is no longer sold, though alternate processes sometimes exist. This is true of some old Agfa and BASF film stock. Some of these can be processed as B&W, with varying degrees of success. The first thing that will usually happen when processing expired film (note - this means processing film that is now expired, but where the photos were taken before expiration - the other thing has a somewhat different set of issues) is that the colors will shift, often toward red/orange. If the pictures may be significant to you, you can send the film to a specialty processor. Here’s a couple: [http://www.filmrescue.com](http://www.filmrescue.com) > **[3KING ⭐️ Link Tải 3King Cho Iphone | APK | 3KING Tặng 30k](https://candybox.london/)** > > 3King – Điểm cá cược được người chơi đánh giá hàng đầu với trải nghiệm game bài đổi thưởng trực tuyến hiện đại,, đội ngũ chăm sóc khách hàng chuyên nghiệp và cam kết minh bạch trong mọi giao dịch. People who find this thread in the future may find the [FRI FAQ](http://www.filmrescue.com/faq/) useful, particularly the list of obsolete film types and the success rates they’ve achieved when processing them. ---
**Author:** ![Nawth\_Chucka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/c57346/32.png) [@Nawth\_Chucka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nawth_Chucka)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2012, 2:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/found-6-and-8-year-old-film-could-this-possibly-be-developed/617343/11 "2012-04-01T02:19:10Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > I’ve been to weddings where disposable cameras were given out as party favors, one to each table at the reception. Might your friend have done that, and you ended up with your table’s camera? One per table as a favor to a half dozen people or more to share? More likely it was one for the table to take pictures of themselves and leave it for the couple to develop. That may explain what happened to one camera we had at our reception tables that never came back to us, someone (probably drunk, almost certainly Air Force) thought it was a wedding favor. ---
**Author:** ![An\_Gadai](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d6d6ee/32.png) [@An\_Gadai](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/An_Gadai)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2012, 2:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/found-6-and-8-year-old-film-could-this-possibly-be-developed/617343/12 "2012-04-01T02:36:26Z")
Yeah I’ve regularly got old rolls of film developed. Stuff from the '80s I’ve found lying around the house. Sometimes you’ll only get a few photos that will develop right and sometimes pics are faded but I’ve never got nothing for my trouble. ---
**Author:** ![EdwardLost](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/bbe5ce/32.png) [@EdwardLost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EdwardLost)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2012, 4:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/found-6-and-8-year-old-film-could-this-possibly-be-developed/617343/13 "2012-04-01T04:04:59Z")
I had one developed after 11 years. Came out fine.