'Never Cross the Beams' (Not Just for Ghostbusters Anymore)

WARNING: This post contains some hastily and badly explained science, if you want to skip to the fun story part, hit ctrl and the 'f' key on your keyboard at the same time and put in the word 'commencing.' That is all.

If you are a film photographer or have friends that do film photography, you will have heard the term "cross-process." If you aren't and you don't, this might sound like a painful, optional surgery. It isn't, but it's almost as fun.

Film comes mainly in two popular types: c-41 and e-6. C-41 is what the general public now is used to. It comes preloaded in disposable cameras, it's orange and it looks funny when you hold it up to the light. It also tastes like glue.

E-6 is known as slide film. If you lived in the '70s and were boring, this is what you showed pictures of your vacation on. It is transparent and the colors are true to life.

The difference lies in the process and emulsions. I'll try to explain this as briefly as I can. It needs explaining so you, the audience, can appreciate how much mixing these two films shouldn't work. That way you'll be really impressed at the end when it does.

The first step in developing both films is stopping it or fixing it--making sure that light doesn't affect the film anymore. From there everything is different and dependent on chemicals.

Film is coated in an emulsion with little chemicals in it that act like switches in three layers: red, green and blue. When red light hits the film, the chemical switches in the red layer see that light and flip over. Same for the blue light with the blue layer and green for green. Once the switches are flipped they stay pretty quiet until they hit the developing chemicals. Once there, they realize, "Oh, I'm supposed to be blue." And then they become blue. Sort of.

Remember how I said they were flipped switches? The opposite end of that switch is the opposite color of the switch. So let's say a bright green light hits the film, the green switches flip and become the EXACT OPPOSITE--dark red. This happens for every color and shade. They flip to their exact opposite on the grand color wheel.

But when you get C-41 film back, it's not just opposite color, it's all orange. That's because of an extra orange layer in the film that helps speed up and correct the chemical process. All the opposite colors are still there, just with orange painted over them. Computers can correct for the orange and give you normal looking film.

E-6 is a slightly different story. Up until the chemicals, it's pretty similar. The switches are flipped to the opposite color. But you can't show your friends photos of your trip to scenic Bethlehem, Pa. with backwards colors! The film people know this. They're here to help. So in E-6, or slide film's process, there are a whole bunch of extra steps to flip those switches back over, turn the whitest parts see through, and a whole bunch of other good stuff.

"ANDREW," I hear you say, "Shut up about the science and tell me what 'cross-processing' is!" I'm going to call you demanding and rude, but I'll forgive you this time, dear audience. Cross processing is taking either film and putting it in the other film's chemicals for developing. This usually involves taking slide film and putting it in C-41's chemicals. So all of those switches--which are supposed to be flipped back to normal to show off in your projector--STAY BACKWARDS. This is not the only effect. The film itself turns purple instead of orange and colors shift. Reds POP. Everything else becomes a dreamy green or blue. The contrast--how dark and light things are--becomes way stronger. It also makes a huge mess, but that's not for me to worry about.

COMMENCING STORY TIME!

I didn't know or care about all that science stuff the first time I ordered slide film. Which by the way is expensive! I had to sell all the gold I won back from the Somali pirates just to afford one roll! New film in one hand, an old friend from high school in the other, I went out to capture Evansville, Indiana (my hometown) in all its Wednesday morning splendor. We checked out a farmer's market-cum-garage sale and then hit the artsy district. The artsy district is a lot like the rundown and dangerous district, but the graffiti is nicer. Check out the pics and notice the dreamy blues and the popping reds. That's what cross-processing does. It quickly became my favorite way to record moments.