Kodak Plus-X Reversal 7276

Plus-X Reversal 7276 was Kodak's slow black-and-white reversal stock for 16mm and Super 8, the one you loaded when you wanted a positive that could go straight to a projector without an intermediate print. Kodak introduced it in 1955 and kept it in production until 2003, when the 7276 designation was replaced by the reformulated 7265. Daylight rating was EI 50, tungsten EI 40, two stops slower than the Tri-X Reversal 7278.

The attraction was tonal smoothness. Plus-X reversal in D-94 first-developer produced a projection positive with deep blacks, clean whites, and a long mid-scale that documentary and educational filmmakers leaned on for decades. Local TV news cut its teeth on it. Industrial sponsors paid for it because the prints held up under repeat showings in classrooms. Compared with Plus-X 5231, the equivalent negative stock, the reversal version reads cleaner in the highlights because the curve is built around the projected print rather than around printing to paper.

If you exposed at EI 100 you switched to D-94A for the pull. That flexibility was part of the standard 16mm workflow. Grain at box speed is fine for a 1950s formulation. Resolution is good without being technical-film territory.

For still photographers picking up a roll today, treat it as a slow panchromatic positive intended for a specific pipeline. Process at a lab that still runs D-94 or D-94A, which is a short list. Standard B&W chemistry will give you a thin negative rather than a projection-ready positive.

Formats were 16mm and Super 8. Never offered in still-camera sizes. What is left lives in dealer freezers and old camera-store basements.

Reciprocity exponent is 1.31. Zone Light Meter applies the correction past one second, so a metered 30-second reading translates to roughly 90 seconds at the negative. For interior cinematography at small apertures, where this stock often lived, that correction was routine for the working cameramen who used it.