New (as of 2019) airport CT scanners

foen · Dec 16, 2019

thank you guys for your thoughts but how about hesitations from security personnel for films manual checking ?

Agulliver · Dec 16, 2019

I don't think that i have used an airport with the "new" CT scanners, but I am highly sceptical of any x-ray machine giving uniform base fog to a film. Airport CT scanners introduce lines and patterns...never universal fog. Due to the nature in which x-rays are generated and focused by the CT-scanning system. The posted pictures of negatives do not look like X-ray damage at all.

As for security personnel, in the USA one has the right (in theory at least) to a hand inspection of your bag. Elsewhere generally this is not a right that travellers have. You can request a hand inspection but staff have every right to deny it. If you use those lead lined pouches to carry film in your hand luggage, the x-ray operator will see a dark, impenetrable object and will likely do another higher powered scan and/or order you to be pulled aside for a separate inspection. If you're happy to do this, it's an option but I've certainly heard of security staff who get suspicious at anything lead lined in hand baggage precisely because the x-ray operator cannot see what it is. In turn this can lead to them being suspicious of you and your motives...why are you hiding something from them?

It is true that these days some security staff aren't familiar with film photography. I've had my carry-on bag searched purely because a young security guy was suspicious that I had 6 cameras and 3 lenses in my bag, and even more so when I tried to explain that one cannot "turn on" a 1930s camera and that it doesn't have a screen. However on that occasion I was quickly "saved" by an older security guy in his 50s who took a quick look and waved me through.

Not entirely relevant to the new hand baggage scanners but I must have taken well over 200 commercial flights with film...never had an issue including with Delta 3200, Vision 200T and other interesting stocks.

cb1 · Dec 16, 2019

foen said:
thank you guys for your thoughts but how about hesitations from security personnel for films manual checking ?

I just flew to and from NYC from Dallas. Going up, I asked for hand check which they did very professionally. I had my film in a small box and they took each cartridge out and swabbed it separately. then they swabbed the two cameras I was bringing.

coming back to Dallas I saw the sign that said 800 speed or higher film had to be hand checked. Since I had 160 and 400 speed I let it ride through. When I developed the 400 at home there was no fogging on anything. I haven't send the 160 in for development yet. (color)

so, next time I'll just let it ride through with no worries.

skysh4rk · Dec 16, 2019

babil said:
Hi,

here the observations over the last 1.5 years passing by Amsterdam airport and travelling for the usually routes to China (and Japan in one case).
Same camera, same scanner (reflecta proscan), same development habits since 15 years.

View attachment 236358

Case 1
Film severely damaged, film base is darker than my usual pinkish tx400. visible damage from scanner. Passed through AMS 3d scanner upon return.

View attachment 236359

here a scan from the strip:
View attachment 236365

Case 2
Same as case 1 few months later, visible damage, dark base, bad grain, detail in shadow is lost

View attachment 236366

and a scan
View attachment 236367

Case 3
No scan in AMS, came back through CDG. TX400 as I know it. Almost clear base,
View attachment 236368

Here a scan, good contrast, no harsh grain, good shadow detail.
View attachment 236369

Case 4
Passed the scanner in AMS, darker base, lack of detail in shadows.
View attachment 236370

and scan
View attachment 236371

Case 5
Foma 200, you can see after passing AMS scanner the film base is slightly darker than what I get usually from Foma200
View attachment 236372

Looking at the scan, grain and lack of detail in the shadow is obvious.
View attachment 236373

Case 6
This is the case thad was the breakthrough in my observations. I was always suspecting the scanners in China but I was wrong. Flying to Japan and coming back through AMS (after shooting 25 films...) I realised that all the 400 ones are damaged (half of them)
The film base is darker than a normal tx400
View attachment 236374
Here a scan, detail in the shadow low and grainy.
View attachment 236376

Case 7
A case supporting my observations, I chose to go through CDG to China instead of amsterdam's. The films passed multiple times as you see through hand luggage scanners in China. All turned out in to be in very good condition. No dark film base, no flat images, no exaggerated grain in the shadows

View attachment 236375

and a scan
View attachment 236378

I passed through the AMS with 100 ASA film as well. didn't see any visible damage.
I had also a number of flights throughout Europe (not passing through AMS) without any film damage up to 400 ASA.

Do you have any similar observations?
The AMS airport management seems not to be taking this seriously,

I have travelled all over with film (e.g., Japan, Macau, Hong Kong, China, Taiwan, Malaysia, USA, Europe, etc.) in recent years and I'd never had a problem before with film and carry-on baggage scanners. Since the installation of the new scanners at Schipol airport in Amsterdam, however, my lab has commented both times I've gone through on the unusually (for me) underexposed negatives and they suspected x-ray damage.

AgX · Dec 16, 2019

Agulliver said:
X-rays don't cause uniform base fog.

Of course diffuse X-ray radiation will cause diffuse fogging.
However people are used to see banding artefacts as typical effect X-ray scanners.

mooseontheloose · Dec 16, 2019

AgX said:
Of course diffuse X-ray radiation will cause diffuse fogging.
However people are used to see banding artefacts as typical effect X-ray scanners.

That's what I was thinking too - maybe there's something about the new scanners that affects film differently than the old scanners (and lines and patterns) that we are used to.

spijker · Dec 16, 2019

I traveled through Schiphol airport (Amsterdam) in November and saw that the new generation scanners had arrived there as well. See attached (cropped) cellphone snaps. When flying out, I asked the security guy for a hand inspection of my films. He acknowledged that these new scanners are more powerful than the previous generation. The security guy was friendly and he did a swap test instead of the scanner. When I was back in Ottawa, the films had passed through 6 carry-on luggage scanners during the trip. All of the previous generation CT scanner. After development, the Delta 100 films came out "clean", no fog. In Frankfurt a/d Main and Toronto, the scanner operators looked curious/surprised at the plastic bag with the 120 rolfilms. I guess that they don't see that very often. In August my films got fogged in the new scanner of Milan Malpensa airport. So if you see a sign that laptops and liquids can stay in your carry-on luggage, you should ask for a hand inspection as I think that these scanners are NOT safe for even 100 ISO film. I learned this the hard way in Milan, see my post here. I'll do a test next summer when we're going back to northern Italy.

wiltw · Dec 16, 2019

Rich Mulvey said:
FWIW, I just finished scanning the first roll of TMax 400 that went through the new scanners at JFK this weekend, Came out fine.

Can you do a full area film scan with the edges of the film showing (i.e. outside the area of the camera frame) ? We need to see the film base...it should be clear, like film #3 in Post 70 of this thread!

BrianShaw · Dec 16, 2019

spijker said:
All of the previous generation CT scanner. After development, the Delta 100 films came out "clean", no fo

Would you please clarify... did you mean “all of the previous generation x-ray scanner”? Meaning Rapiscan, etc rather than the old Invision CT that was used for checked baggage?

spijker · Dec 16, 2019

BrianShaw said:
Would you please clarify... did you mean “all of the previous generation x-ray scanner”? Meaning Rapiscan, etc rather than the old Invision CT that was used for checked baggage?

The 6 scanners that my films did go through were carry-on luggage scanners of the type that show a 3D image on the operator screen. I don't know the brand or any other specifics of these machines. At these airports (Ottawa, Cairo (2x), Luxor, Frankfurt, Toronto), liquids and laptops had to be taken out of the bag and put in a separate tray going through the scanner. I always put my film in a different tray than the camera bag and the laptop in an attempt to get the lowest amount of radiation being beamed at the films. I never put film in my checked luggage.

AgX · Dec 16, 2019

Better than sending through the film with random exposures would be films exposed with stepwedges (maybe even added by unexposed films to be stepwedge exposed later) and comparing them with respective non-scanned films.

Maybe one of the airports would participate in such test.

lauffray · Dec 20, 2019

Thanks for the thorough investigation @babil
I'm very concerned about this. I don't think airport authorities care enough about occasional travellers with film to bother, so I'm not counting on them or their staff, even if a few happen to be friendly and will hand-inspect.

I think I'll try to develop locally before returning if one of the airports on my route has those scanners. It's really the safest bet

babil · Dec 21, 2019

Here is you see an unexposed film I had with me (bought in Japan, so it had only 2 scans) and passed through Narita normal hand luggage scanner and AMS upon arrival through CT hand luggage scanner. As comparison a TX400 that I shot in Acores couple of years ago and passed at least couple of times through normal hand luggage scanners. The film base is clear as it should be. I will write Kodak an email but I am not sure anything will change, especially for airports already that invested in new scanners...

I am pretty sure in europe you can forget hand checking. I am not aware of any regulation that gives you such right. I tried once in AMS, the answer was "the scanner is film safe, just put it through"..

babil · Dec 21, 2019

I contacted Kodak through their website form and gave them the link to this post. I asked them if they intend to do any study and confront the scanner industry.

BTW KODAK if your read these forums, 200 characters in a contact form is a little bit of a joke, only half sentences can be written...

Agulliver · Dec 21, 2019

Once again, I am unaware of any circumstances in which x-rays cause uniform fogging of film.

I am prepared to be proven wrong, however. But that doesn't look like x-ray damage. X-rays cause patterns, lines, waves...not uniform fogging. Including when used for CT scanning. CT scanning or CAT scanning isn't some magical thing, it's just an acronym for "computer assisted tomography". Yes, it requires several x-ray scans of one object for the computer to build the 3D image...but I don't see how it would result in uniform fogging like we're seeing here.

AgX · Dec 21, 2019

Agulliver said:
Once again, I am unaware of any circumstances in which x-rays cause uniform fogging of film.

I am prepared to be proven wrong, however. But that doesn't look like x-ray damage. X-rays cause patterns, lines, waves...not uniform fogging.

You still mix up, diffuse radiation, or even radiation from a point-source, with a directed beam producing a pattern.
Putting your film under a classig medical or technical X-ray device will yield similar results as when putting it under your enlarger without negative. The same for diffuse reflected X-rays and light.
That we know banding patterns as usual artefacts from luggage scanners does not necessarily exclude thar there is diffuse radiation.

NEVERTHELESS I am still not convinced that the shown samples are cases of diffuse X-radiation. That is why I hinted at experimental proof.

babil · Dec 21, 2019

AgX said:
You still mix up, diffuse radiation, or even radiation from a point-source, with a directed beam producing a pattern.
Putting your film under a classig medical or technical X-ray device will yield similar results as when putting it under your enlarger without negative. The same for diffuse reflected X-rays and light.
That we know banding patterns as usual artefacts from luggage scanners does not necessarily exclude thar there is diffuse radiation.

NEVERTHELESS I am still not convinced that the shown samples are cases of diffuse X-radiation. That is why I hinted at experimental proof.

to be honest, from the reply I received from AMS airport to my inquiry, I am not sure they will be willing to engage in any kind of field test. At least not with individuals.
The only solution is that film manufacturers conduct scientific field tests with various scanner models.

MattKing · Dec 21, 2019

babil said:
I contacted Kodak through their website form and gave them the link to this post. I asked them if they intend to do any study and confront the scanner industry.

BTW KODAK if your read these forums, 200 characters in a contact form is a little bit of a joke, only half sentences can be written...

Which Kodak did you contact? Kodak Alaris are the ones who deal with still film.
I would use the profilm@kodakalaris.com email.

babil · Dec 21, 2019

MattKing said:
Which Kodak did you contact? Kodak Alaris are the ones who deal with still film.
I would use the profilm@kodakalaris.com email.

I used the contact form here: https://www.kodakalaris.com/company/contact-us
and then I chose "professional photographers & labs".
Thanks for the email address, I will send them an email.

PBill · Dec 23, 2019

Hello everyone,
I recently bought a disposable camera with ISO400 color film, and I brought it to Amsterdam Schipol airport with the new 3D scanners that do not require removing items from your bag. I REPEATEDLY asked for a hand search and the security refused me, they called me uncooperative and told me the X-ray is safe for film. I didn’t believe them but they obviously were in a bad mood and said either I put my camera through or they throw it in the trash. So I put it through the 3D scanner. I’m going to keep shooting and then mail the film to be processed. I came across this forum because I just started researching this and there isn’t a ton of information on how these new scanners affect film. Since I haven’t sent my film through any other airports, when I get it developed in January I will post back on this forum so we can see if this one pass through the machine did damage. I don’t think most airport security give a f*ck about film anymore since it’s rare to see anyways, I hope these new scanners aren’t as destructive as some people are suggesting.

babil · Dec 23, 2019

PBill said:
Hello everyone,
I recently bought a disposable camera with ISO400 color film, and I brought it to Amsterdam Schipol airport with the new 3D scanners that do not require removing items from your bag. I REPEATEDLY asked for a hand search and the security refused me, they called me uncooperative and told me the X-ray is safe for film. I didn’t believe them but they obviously were in a bad mood and said either I put my camera through or they throw it in the trash. So I put it through the 3D scanner. I’m going to keep shooting and then mail the film to be processed. I came across this forum because I just started researching this and there isn’t a ton of information on how these new scanners affect film. Since I haven’t sent my film through any other airports, when I get it developed in January I will post back on this forum so we can see if this one pass through the machine did damage. I don’t think most airport security give a f*ck about film anymore since it’s rare to see anyways, I hope these new scanners aren’t as destructive as some people are suggesting.

It will be interesting to see the results, some pictures of the negatives and some scans of the pictures. I will post some color scans at first occasion with Fuji 400.

Arthurwg · Dec 23, 2019

Very upsetting. I'm taking an extended trip to India in January. I was planning to take lots of film but now I'm thinking forget it. In the old days I used to keep my film in lead lined bags, which usually got through security. Now that's impossible. I will be taking several internal flights in India and who knows how good or well maintained their equipment is. Probably heightened security at the moment thanks to recent troubles. I've never moved on to digital and never will.

spijker · Dec 23, 2019

This looks interesting;
https://marshield.com/nanotek/
Maybe one can make a film pouch with this material.

wiltw · Dec 23, 2019

I found the following explaination in a publication https://hps.org/publicinformation/ate/q12361.html :

"For clarity, there are two types of screening systems used in airports. First is the "checked baggage" screening system, often referred to as an explosive detection system (similar to a computed tomography [CT] scan). The other screening is for "carry-on baggage," with which most people are familiar when they go through airport security. Carry-on baggage screening is sometimes referred to as a transmission x ray, similar to a posterior-to-anterior (PA) x ray. Newer carry-on baggage screening technologies are being installed that include the same CT scanning capabilities as the explosive detection systems. Both screening technologies generate (or emit) radiation based on the kiloVolt potential (kVp) and milliamp-second (mAs) settings, as mentioned in your question. Specific details cannot be provided for security reasons.

The amount of radiation absorbed by the materials varies greatly depending on the materials in the baggage, time in the primary beam field, and surrounding materials. All of these factors affect the amount of radiation that is also scattered from the primary beam which can vary to extremes.

The operational settings for checked baggage systems differ from the traditional carry-on baggage systems. Checked baggage and the newer carry-on screening systems produce slightly higher energy x rays, which also results in higher radiation levels within the unit. Some of these systems are activated (e.g., x ray on) throughout the entire screening process to produce a detailed image of the entire baggage. Others are activated randomly throughout the screening process to produce multiple images (e.g., 2 mm–5 mm slices of the baggage) during the scanning process. In other words, while checked baggage and the newer carry-on screening systems may emit the same amount of radiation intensity during the screening, the dose delivered to the materials will vary greatly because the unit isn't always active. Traditional carry-on baggage screening systems emit lower intensity x rays and these systems also vary with the amount of time the unit is active.

The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health conducted a study to measure the amount of radiation potentially received by materials imaged from both screening technologies. Sixty-seven dosimeters were intentionally irradiated in groups of three, from one to 10 times, in "checked baggage" and traditional "carry-on baggage" machines to characterize the response of the dosimeters when directly exposed to the beam. Data from dosimeter badges passed through a traditional carry-on baggage machine showed from none to very small amounts of measurable radiation. On page 24, the study notes that the highest dose measured on a dosimeter that was passed 36 times through the machine was 4 mrem or 0.04 millisievert (mSv).

Dosimeters that were passed through the "checked baggage" system that randomly activates the x ray had highly variable doses. If the dosimeters were near the area randomly selected by the software to activate the x-ray source, a higher dose would be measured. The average dose, after 10 passes through this type of system was about 28 mrem per scan (0.28 mSv per scan).

Dosimeters that were passed through the type of "checked baggage" system that stayed active for the entire screening process had an average dose of 156 mrem per scan (1.56 mSv) per scan. The newer carry-on screening systems are expected to deliver similar doses.

Please note that these results reflect the potential dose to items passing through these screening systems as measured by a dosimeter calibrated for human measurements. Actual doses will vary depending on the materials in the checked- or carry-on baggage. Please see the NIOSH study for an assessment of potential radiation exposure to the workers who operate these systems.

John Cardarelli II, PhD, CHP, CIH, PE, RSO"

In short, the luggage CT scanners for carry-on baggage (rather than Xray) emit in a single scan about 7X as much radiation as thru the traditional Xray carry-on scanners, the intermittent-on will about 1/6 of the checked baggage scanner, but the always-on are as bad as the baggage CT system which Kodak has WARNED us to NOT subject our film to this examination.

wiltw · Dec 23, 2019

spijker said:
This looks interesting;
https://marshield.com/nanotek/
Maybe one can make a film pouch with this material.

And in your hand luggage these will guarantee you far greater time delay, because they will have you OPEN UP your luggage so they can hand examine the opaque section of your luggage, and probably use the sniffer machine to check for trace amounts of explosives chemicals!

New (as of 2019) airport CT scanners

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