Heartbreak of chewed-up film
During a weekend to the Hill Country, Texas, I shot a roll of 120 HP5 using a Hasselblad 500cm and a 16 magazine. A tree reflected in the river. A long flight of stone stairs. Portraits of friends. The roll was slightly harder to wind than usual, and I thought nothing of it at the time. But once I'd finished the roll and I thought I had re-wound it, I found I couldn't remove the insert form the magazine.
I investigated in the safety of a dark-bag. It took brute force to remove the insert and i found the film tightly folded on the inside. I developed it (loose, as it wouldn't load onto the developing reel) and found all the exposures were layered on the first frame. The backing paper was neatly wound on the receiving spool.
This is an unsettling problem. Usually, if I make a technical error, I have myself to blame and I learn from the mistake. But this time, it seems to be a manufacturing anomaly - either the tape wasn't holding the film to the backing paper, or the initial winding separated them.
I kept the negatives as a reminder that if something feels wrong through the camera, it should not be ignored.
