Cheap B/W 120 Film

Gerald C Koch · Mar 16, 2017

Ouch, I haven't bought any 120 in a while. Even the 'cheap' stuff is expensive now. I heard a story on the radio a couple of days ago that people are beginning to speculate again on silver. If true it's always bad news for the price of film.

RattyMouse · Mar 17, 2017

Gerald C Koch said:
Ouch, I haven't bought any 120 in a while. Even the 'cheap' stuff is expensive now. I heard a story on the radio a couple of days ago that people are beginning to speculate again on silver. If true it's always bad news for the price of film.

A roll of Ilford HP5+ in 120 size is $4.69. Really? That's expensive? Doesnt Ilford deserve to earn a living wage to provide us with film?

Cholentpot · Mar 17, 2017

RattyMouse said:
A roll of Ilford HP5+ in 120 size is $4.69. Really? That's expensive? Doesnt Ilford deserve to earn a living wage to provide us with film?

24 exposures for around $10. Not everyone processes and prints themselves. If you want a push or pull then that gets added on in cost. Shooting two rolls of 120 can at times run you near $40 or even more.

RattyMouse · Mar 17, 2017

Cholentpot said:
24 exposures for around $10. Not everyone processes and prints themselves. If you want a push or pull then that gets added on in cost. Shooting two rolls of 120 can at times run you near $40 or even more.

That's the cost of playing with film. It is unreasonable, IMO, to expect less than $4.69/roll.

Harry Stevens · Mar 17, 2017

Well in response to the OP I would be more concernd on your choice of developer than your film type....Talk about a coffee crapshoot.

Cholentpot · Mar 17, 2017

RattyMouse said:
That's the cost of playing with film. It is unreasonable, IMO, to expect less than $4.69/roll.

Troll APUG and other places. Find expired brick of film. Rodinal and you're set. My biggest cost is fixer, have not yet brought that down to the cost of rodinal. Any suggestions?

Marcelo Paniagua · Mar 17, 2017

Caffenol? Dont expect fine grain though

Regards

Marcelo

RattyMouse · Mar 17, 2017

Cholentpot said:
Troll APUG and other places. Find expired brick of film. Rodinal and you're set. My biggest cost is fixer, have not yet brought that down to the cost of rodinal. Any suggestions?

Well that's true. Expired film is one way to bring down costs. Fixer cost? That's hardly anything. I liter of Ilford Rapid Fixer is $10!!

Arctic amateur · Mar 17, 2017

If $10-$12 for Ilford 5 l of fixer working solution is too much, there's cheaper stuff at Freestyle, less than $6 per gallon of working solution. A good option for those in the USA. Arista.EDU and Ultrafine Extreme in 120 are both about a dollar cheaper than HP5+.

HiHoSilver · Mar 17, 2017

Thomas - High praise indeed - and that image is wonderful. Do you have a preferred soup/developer/recipe for it? Any slower speed versions you've had similar luck with?

When you mention treating it like HP5 - you don't mean use same developers, times, temps do you?

'Been trying to like acros for long exposures, but so far haven't gotten the tones I get from FP4 & HP5. 'Haven't tried Rodinal yet.

howardpan · Mar 17, 2017

Cholentpot said:
Troll APUG and other places. Find expired brick of film. Rodinal and you're set. My biggest cost is fixer, have not yet brought that down to the cost of rodinal. Any suggestions?

According to Ilford's data sheet, 1L of working solution strength fixer can process up to 24 rolls of film without replenishment. Fixer can be stored in a capped bottle for about a month (half full) and up to 6 months in a full bottle. Just do a clip test before you fix to determine if the fixer is still good.

My guess is this should get your cost of fixing down to 10-20 cents per roll.

BetterSense · Mar 17, 2017

HP5 *is* my cheap film option. If anything less than $5 a roll is too much, get a different hobby.

Thomas Bertilsson · Mar 18, 2017

HiHoSilver said:
Thomas - High praise indeed - and that image is wonderful. Do you have a preferred soup/developer/recipe for it? Any slower speed versions you've had similar luck with?

When you mention treating it like HP5 - you don't mean use same developers, times, temps do you?

'Been trying to like acros for long exposures, but so far haven't gotten the tones I get from FP4 & HP5. 'Haven't tried Rodinal yet.

I have been using it with ADOX FX-39, which gives very sharp negatives and good film speed. I've also used it with Harvey's Panthermic 777, which is the other developer I currently have on hand; it's more of a fine grain developer focusing on mid-tone and highlight tonality for portrait and studio work.
It's as flexible as HP5+ is, where you'll get nice sharp negatives in acutance developers, and smoother tones in more solvent style developers.

I treat it like HP5+ in that I use the same exposure, the same developing time, and I get very similar negatives as a result. Unless I know which film is which I have to look at the negatives to be able to tell in a print.

Acros is a film very different from FP4 and HP5. Tonality wise, especially when you start to shoot high contrast scenes, will be very different, particularly in the highlights where Acros has very high contrast separation, so if you do contraction development the mid-tones can look a little bit subdued.

HiHoSilver · Mar 19, 2017

Thomas, Thank You. I see dev times on Massive. So far, no info on reciprocity from searches.

I appreciate your kind help!

Thomas Bertilsson · Mar 19, 2017

HiHoSilver said:
Thomas, Thank You. I see dev times on Massive. So far, no info on reciprocity from searches.

I appreciate your kind help!

No worries. Again, I'd start using the same reciprocity figures as HP5. I'm out of the UF Xtreme at this time, so I can't run any tests with it.

RichardJack · Mar 20, 2017

Everyone has valid points here. I started developing film in the 1960's and at my age I'm very concerned with only the best results possible. A few months back I shot some 30 year old 120 Verichrome Pan and PXP to test several backs for light leaks. It served its purpose but I happened to shoot some images that might of been keepers on it as well. Both types of film were fogged (2 backs also had leaks).
I agree wishing they would bring 220 film back. I remember buying 220 PXP pro packs for about $20.

Cheap B/W 120 Film

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