using DHL/TNT for film

Depending on how much of a bulk load you have maybe you could try taking as carry-on and getting it hand checked. I did that once with a box of 100 rolls of 35mm film from Hong Kong to Hanoi back in the 90s. First I took all the film out of the cardboard packaging and put it all in a plastic shopping bag. But that was only 100 rolls.
But what about ordering direct from the film producers – Fuji, Kodak or Ilford? How do they ship to suppliers? These dark days they might be open to individuals making bulk orders as their regular wholesalers fade out.

I have thought about the handluggage option, good idea.

As for suppliers, I tried in vain to get hold of anyone from Fuji/Kodak in South Africa and they refused to deal with individuals and the suppliers themselves cannot even get stock. Kodak SA will not answer their phone to my local lab, which sums up their attitude to us pro’s.

I guess Etihad will be expecting me with a large box of assorted 120 film next week :)

I made the mistake of shipping about 60 rolls of exposed 120 film with DHL from Israel to England once. When I got home about 30% of the rolls were seriously damaged by x-rays.

It might have been an isolated incident, but I for one certainly won’t be shipping film by courier again.

Never, ever, use couriers like the above for your film.
They will screw it up with deep xrays, especially these days.
Find another way.

SA is Sunny Africa :0)

I think after most responses here, i’d rather carry it on with me than leave it to the muppets to destroy.

thanks all

i posted something pretty good before and now it’s gone.

my advice: don’t.

unless you can get some gaurentee (iffy at best) from the courier that it won’t be x-rayed entering the country, you’re pretty much in the same boat as checked luggage, which withstands high doses of radiation.

who said something about how do they get the film to suppliers? that’s genius. really, we should find that out.

In 2003, I used DHL to ship 100 roles of Tri-X from Phoenix, Arizona, USA to Romania (so it must have gone through numerous checkpoints both in the US and then in Europe before Eastern Europe) with no problems. It is not something I wanted to do and I worried about it, but it was the only way to get more film in the middle of winter deep in the Carpathians and not miss a beat of daily life in the village I was living. Ahh, the good old days of film! With digital you sometimes need an extra hard drive shipped but that just involves good bubble wrap.

And yes, what about how retailers get the film in the fist place?! I got another 100 roles of Tri-X shipped to me here in Massachusetts last week from B&H and since it was a full 100 role block, B&H sent me the box they originally received from Kodak which still had the UPS shipping label from Kodak
. . . Maybe domestic Ground UPS uses weaker x-rays than international?