The case for hoarding film.

[Huss]

Same with dev at home. You've been getting a buck a roll or so out of the DF96, I've been doing xtol and the $20 I spent on developer and fixer has gotten me 40 rolls so far, including some one shot experiments, and I'm still working on the last liter.

It wasn't free to startup*. I spent on hardware (bag, flasks, storage bottles, etc...) so it's not like $10 gets me 50 rolls or anything, but that's the way it is in my head. That money is spent, and I don't think about it at all. So... Shoot another roll of that film that's near expired, dev only costs 50 cents! Arista or the short dated Acros I bought I can do a roll, almost literally, for around $5 including film cost. I know some kids who LOVE film, but seldom shoot because of the development and scanning costs. It's like spending 75 cents every time they fire the shutter. I no longer think that way.



*In truth, amortized over what I've developed it's still only $2 or $2.50 a roll even with startup costs, and that total drops toward a buck a roll or less every time I shoot more.

I got lucky and my gf bought me the dev tank, beaker, thermometer etc as a Christmas gift. Shooting B&W now has become fantastic as $1 to develop - plus it is fun doing that, plus I literally develop the film the moment I get home.
When I had a lab develop B&W, they would charge over $10/roll (only c-41 is 'affordable' to develop with them), and it would be several days wait. Plus having to go there and drop it off.

It really has become liberating taking ownership of the process.

 

[Down Under]

We in Australia are all into Safety Mode now that film is so expensive AND so difficult to get. Everyone I know who still shoots 'analog(ue)' has dipped into their hoarded/refrigerated stocks (as I'm doing), so much so that we are all now frantically scouring all the usual sources (= Ebay) for the last few remaining bargains.

A few months ago I lucked into a Melbourne site which had Ilford bulk film for sale as good prices, A$130 for FP4 and HP5 as against $150+ (or even ++!!) being charged by the bigger retail places. So I bought several rolls. A good thing I did, this site no longer has any bulk rolls left and apparently a quite long wait-list for any future stocks they are fortunate enough to be able to obtain. Friends in Singapore and Malaysia where I've found stocks of film to be still available pre-Covid, also report the same situation, no more film available in their local shops and photo processing labs are doing very little business.

Film camera sales on Ebay and in the few remaining shops selling secondhand gear have also tanked, it seems. My favorite seller in Melbourne tells me his used camera sales, even Leica Ms and LTMs, are almost nonexistent. Very few cameras on Ebay. A friend has been trying to offload several Nikon F65 kits but says he isn't getting any buyers or even any will-you-drop-your-price enquiries, a year ago things were very different for him.

Me, I'm hanging on to my film cameras, for now anyway. Using a few, keeping the rest dusted and polished. For the day when. If ever.

I'm now using up my old stocks of Kodak Panatomic-X 35mm and slowly but steadily going through the few dozen remaining Ilford XP2 120 rolls in my Rollei TLRs. Even the latter is somewhat of a problem for me now as Tetenal C41 kits in Melbourne are as rare as hen's teeth. So a double connundrum for me.

Sadly, film looks to be going the way of the dinosaurs or maybe even the Titanic. Unless of course China gears up and comes to the party, but from the way we and the USA are treating Beijing of late, they may not, and who could blame them??

So when all my hoarded film supplies are gone, what then??

Digital. It's the way we seem to be all going. End of an era, sort of thing. Quo vadis...

 

[Cholentpot]

I got lucky and my gf bought me the dev tank, beaker, thermometer etc as a Christmas gift. Shooting B&W now has become fantastic as $1 to develop - plus it is fun doing that, plus I literally develop the film the moment I get home.
When I had a lab develop B&W, they would charge over $10/roll (only c-41 is 'affordable' to develop with them), and it would be several days wait. Plus having to go there and drop it off.

It really has become liberating taking ownership of the process.

Still sticking to monobath? You got mad skills from what I see you post, shame that you stick to monobath.

We in Australia are all into Safety Mode now that film is so expensive AND so difficult to get. Everyone I know who still shoots 'analog(ue)' has dipped into their hoarded/refrigerated stocks (as I'm doing), so much so that we are all now frantically scouring all the usual sources (= Ebay) for the last few remaining bargains.

A few months ago I lucked into a Melbourne site which had Ilford bulk film for sale as good prices, A$130 for FP4 and HP5 as against $150+ (or even ++!!) being charged by the bigger retail places. So I bought several rolls. A good thing I did, this site no longer has any bulk rolls left and apparently a quite long wait-list for any future stocks they are fortunate enough to be able to obtain. Friends in Singapore and Malaysia where I've found stocks of film to be still available pre-Covid, also report the same situation, no more film available in their local shops and photo processing labs are doing very little business.

Film camera sales on Ebay and in the few remaining shops selling secondhand gear have also tanked, it seems. My favorite seller in Melbourne tells me his used camera sales, even Leica Ms and LTMs, are almost nonexistent. Very few cameras on Ebay. A friend has been trying to offload several Nikon F65 kits but says he isn't getting any buyers or even any will-you-drop-your-price enquiries, a year ago things were very different for him.

Me, I'm hanging on to my film cameras, for now anyway. Using a few, keeping the rest dusted and polished. For the day when. If ever.

I'm now using up my old stocks of Kodak Panatomic-X 35mm and slowly but steadily going through the few dozen remaining Ilford XP2 120 rolls in my Rollei TLRs. Even the latter is somewhat of a problem for me now as Tetenal C41 kits in Melbourne are as rare as hen's teeth. So a double connundrum for me.

Sadly, film looks to be going the way of the dinosaurs or maybe even the Titanic. Unless of course China gears up and comes to the party, but from the way we and the USA are treating Beijing of late, they may not, and who could blame them??

So when all my hoarded film supplies are gone, what then??

Digital. It's the way we seem to be all going. End of an era, sort of thing. Quo vadis...

True endgame? You might call me insane but hear me out.

One of us youngsters, younger than me even, that picked up the film bug will at some point develop a viable swappable full frame 35mm digital cart. Electronics are getting smaller, batteries are also getting better. Someone will eventually figure it out in a decade or two. The major push will be when Kodak finally surrenders and stops making film altogether. Just one more market pop and crash ought do it. We'll hang on for a while with ilford but the issue of fixer and developer will become the killer in the end. Color will go fairly quickly and b&w will zombie on for a long while. 35mm will be the last one standing. It'll never fully die but it will quickly go from shooting 25-50 rolls a year to maybe 10, then 5.

If I get a FF digital back for my F series camera I may have to put away film for good when my stash runs out.

Instax. I forgot about that. That'll keep 4x5 cameras running for a while along with xray film.

 

[Sirius Glass]

I buy film and freeze it until it is time to use it. When I hear that a film is about to be discontinued or has been discontinued I will buy it I am interested in it. The first time I did that was for HIE and for Kodak UltraColor 400. I should have bought more HIE. I walked into a pharmacy chain store and talked to the manager. I offered to clear off his shelf space of all the UltraColor he had. He gave me a bargain price and I am still using the 135 and 120 UltraColor. I do not hoard. I buy film to keep if from the hoarders.

 

[Moose22]

I got lucky and my gf bought me the dev tank, beaker, thermometer etc as a Christmas gift. Shooting B&W now has become fantastic as $1 to develop - plus it is fun doing that, plus I literally develop the film the moment I get home.
When I had a lab develop B&W, they would charge over $10/roll (only c-41 is 'affordable' to develop with them), and it would be several days wait. Plus having to go there and drop it off.

It really has become liberating taking ownership of the process.

Same here. Though I tend to save it until I get two or three rolls now and do it on a Friday or Saturday. I make an hour of it. Actually it's even less, and I choose an album to listen to end to end which has been fun. But an album's worth -- that's all the more time it takes including cleanup.

It DOES keep me shooting the same stock, though, as I can only do multiple rolls with the same dev time, but that's about the only limitation I've got anymore. My goal has been 2 rolls a week, mostly black and white to focus on composition and exposure experiments, so each week I just do two or three of the same film and speed and have pretty much been on that 2 a week pace all winter.

I didn't have the joy of a good exmas gift, but can say I am lucky to live in a bachelor household. Nobody complains about a freezer full of film, or when there are strips of film hanging to dry in the shower, or even something like motorcycle parts getting cleaned in the kitchen sink for that matter.

 

[Moose22]

Still sticking to monobath? You got mad skills from what I see you post, shame that you stick to monobath.

.

Why a shame?

1. It works. Huss' scans look as good as the commercial lab I use's work (Clayton 76). I suppose xtol is different, but he produces better work than I do.
2. It's fast. Like total time from load the tank to rinse is half what I spend with fixer for Tmax. My xtol is in for 8 or 10 min of dev, then time to stop, 10 min of fixer (I'm using the slow stuff, but 5 min with rapid), then washing. DF96 is like 4 minutes in the tank and then you're ready to rinse your film.

So with the monobath you can be hanging up your negatives in half an hour, chemicals back in the bottle, dev tank and reel cleaned and drying. If I had a girlfriend and places to go at night I'd totally want the extra 20 minutes my process takes me back. Not to mention, only one jug of the mixed stuff to store, only one bottle of the concentrated stuff to mix.

 

[madNbad]

Did the price go up on DoubleX 400 foot cine reels?

It's still $293.50 for 400 feet at B&H. I found a deal on 35 mm microfilm reels, bought some just in case I decide to make the switch to all 5222.

 

[Cholentpot]

Why a shame?

1. It works. Huss' scans look as good as the commercial lab I use's work (Clayton 76). I suppose xtol is different, but he produces better work than I do.
2. It's fast. Like total time from load the tank to rinse is half what I spend with fixer for Tmax. My xtol is in for 8 or 10 min of dev, then time to stop, 10 min of fixer (I'm using the slow stuff, but 5 min with rapid), then washing. DF96 is like 4 minutes in the tank and then you're ready to rinse your film.

So with the monobath you can be hanging up your negatives in half an hour, chemicals back in the bottle, dev tank and reel cleaned and drying. If I had a girlfriend and places to go at night I'd totally want the extra 20 minutes my process takes me back. Not to mention, only one jug of the mixed stuff to store, only one bottle of the concentrated stuff to mix.

Never mind. Let me tell you of a time where this thing called Humor was in vouge and accepted. There were many branches and sorts of this Humor. There was one distinct branch called 'Teasing' or 'Joshing' as time went on it got broken down into smaller and smaller subunits. As humanity evolved Humor at times was looked down upon. Humor had to develop ways of hiding in plain sight. Currently we are in one of those 'Humor Inquisition' periods. Now, you must ensconce humor in other forms. Criticism, advice and information is a safe place to hide this Humor. There was a golden era online where this was shoehorned into a subset called 'Trolling' but alas those days have sailed.

It's still $293.50 for 400 feet at B&H. I found a deal on 35 mm microfilm reels, bought some just in case I decide to make the switch to all 5222.

That's good. Thanks for the info.

 

[Moose22]

Never mind. Let me tell you of a time where this thing called Humor was in vouge and accepted. There were many branches and sorts of this Humor. There was one distinct branch called 'Teasing' or 'Joshing' as time went on it got broken down into smaller and smaller subunits. As humanity evolved Humor at times was looked down upon. Humor had to develop ways of hiding in plain sight. Currently we are in one of those 'Humor Inquisition' periods. Now, you must ensconce humor in other forms. Criticism, advice and information is a safe place to hide this Humor. There was a golden era online where this was shoehorned into a subset called 'Trolling' but alas those days have sailed.



That's good. Thanks for the info.

So you're just being a dick.

Got it.

 

[Cholentpot]

So you're just being a dick.

Got it.

Hey hey! It's 2022, we don't call people out by gender specific insults.

Find another part of the anatomy.

 

[Moose22]

Hey hey! It's 2022, we don't call people out by gender specific insults.

Find another part of the anatomy.

I thought we were going back to old school kidding around. Frankly, choosing modern PC appropriate body parts is so much effort just to toss around an unmeant insult.

Geez 2022 is a lot of work.

 

[Cholentpot]

I thought we were going back to old school kidding around. Frankly, choosing modern PC appropriate body parts is so much effort just to toss around an unmeant insult.

Geez 2022 is a lot of work.

*Hat tip*

 

[braxus]

At this point, I've probably gone overboard with what I have in my stash. Enough film to last till Im 300 years old, at the rate I go through it. Some of this film I've had for almost 20 years now. A lot of it has long since expired. So needless to say, Im pretty safe with not needing new film, even though I top up the ones Im low on and wanting more of. I have a dedicated film freezer at my place for this. Here are the pics of it as of today.

 

[Cholentpot]

I thought I was bad

 

[MattKing]

If I'd known braxus, I would have suggested an intervention!

 

[Huss]

At this point, I've probably gone overboard with what I have in my stash. Enough film to last till Im 300 years old, at the rate I go through it. Some of this film I've had for almost 20 years now. A lot of it has long since expired. So needless to say, Im pretty safe with not needing new film, even though I top up the ones Im low on and wanting more of. I have a dedicated film freezer at my place for this. Here are the pics of it as of today.

Why do you need a dedicated film freezer? You live in BC. Just use a snow bank.

 

[Huss]

We in Australia are all into Safety Mode now that film is so expensive AND so difficult to get. Everyone I know who still shoots 'analog(ue)' has dipped into their hoarded/refrigerated stocks (as I'm doing), so much so that we are all now frantically scouring all the usual sources (= Ebay) for the last few remaining bargains.

A few months ago I lucked into a Melbourne site which had Ilford bulk film for sale as good prices, A$130 for FP4 and HP5 as against $150+ (or even ++!!) being charged by the bigger retail places. So I bought several rolls. A good thing I did, this site no longer has any bulk rolls left and apparently a quite long wait-list for any future stocks they are fortunate enough to be able to obtain. Friends in Singapore and Malaysia where I've found stocks of film to be still available pre-Covid, also report the same situation, no more film available in their local shops and photo processing labs are doing very little business.

Film camera sales on Ebay and in the few remaining shops selling secondhand gear have also tanked, it seems. My favorite seller in Melbourne tells me his used camera sales, even Leica Ms and LTMs, are almost nonexistent. Very few cameras on Ebay. A friend has been trying to offload several Nikon F65 kits but says he isn't getting any buyers or even any will-you-drop-your-price enquiries, a year ago things were very different for him.

Me, I'm hanging on to my film cameras, for now anyway. Using a few, keeping the rest dusted and polished. For the day when. If ever.

I'm now using up my old stocks of Kodak Panatomic-X 35mm and slowly but steadily going through the few dozen remaining Ilford XP2 120 rolls in my Rollei TLRs. Even the latter is somewhat of a problem for me now as Tetenal C41 kits in Melbourne are as rare as hen's teeth. So a double connundrum for me.

Sadly, film looks to be going the way of the dinosaurs or maybe even the Titanic. Unless of course China gears up and comes to the party, but from the way we and the USA are treating Beijing of late, they may not, and who could blame them??

So when all my hoarded film supplies are gone, what then??

Digital. It's the way we seem to be all going. End of an era, sort of thing. Quo vadis...

If people can't buy film, they won't be buying film cameras.

Over here in the US we are lucky in the fact that film 'seems' to be easy to get hold of. I can just trot down to my local stores and get it. Or mail-order.

 

[braxus]

If I'd known braxus, I would have suggested an intervention!

Only real solution is to go on more shoots with you and Andy. My issue is I never can find anything really interesting to bother taking a roll on. I don't really love shooting just anything, like boring stuff.

 

[braxus]

Why do you need a dedicated film freezer? You live in BC. Just use a snow bank.

After all, us Canadians just live in our igloos don't we.

 

[MattKing]

Why do you need a dedicated film freezer? You live in BC. Just use a snow bank.

The palm trees in the median of the nearby main road are asking me to ask you what you are talking about?!

 

[Sirius Glass]

If I'd known braxus, I would have suggested an intervention!

No worries. When he goes, he will take it with him.

 

[braxus]

No worries. When he goes, he will take it with him.

I wouldn't be surprised if Id have grave robbers, then, trying to steal all my Panatomic X haha.

 

[Down Under]

After all, us Canadians just live in our igloos don't we.

Some of us grew up in teepees... this one escaped and now chases kangaroos and walabies out of the garden.

I wouldn't be surprised if Id have grave robbers, then, trying to steal all my Panatomic X haha.

Jolly good idea!! I will now rewrite the codicil in my will and arrange to be buried with my Panatomic-X.

This thread has kept me laughing all day, except for the post about a certain body part. Not nice...

 

[Down Under]

True endgame? You might call me insane but hear me out.

One of us youngsters, younger than me even, that picked up the film bug will at some point develop a viable swappable full frame 35mm digital cart. Electronics are getting smaller, batteries are also getting better. Someone will eventually figure it out in a decade or two. The major push will be when Kodak finally surrenders and stops making film altogether. Just one more market pop and crash ought do it. We'll hang on for a while with ilford but the issue of fixer and developer will become the killer in the end. Color will go fairly quickly and b&w will zombie on for a long while. 35mm will be the last one standing. It'll never fully die but it will quickly go from shooting 25-50 rolls a year to maybe 10, then 5.

If I get a FF digital back for my F series camera I may have to put away film for good when my stash runs out.

Instax. I forgot about that. That'll keep 4x5 cameras running for a while along with xray film.

Insane?? Most definitely not. Extremely lucid, in fact. And well written. I agree entirely with all you said.

The problem we at least down here are facing, isn't that nobody is interested in film any more, rather that we can't seem to get our hands on the darn stuff, and what little there is around costs a kidney and more.

I could not agree more that many will keep shooting film as long as it's available. I intend to be one of them, at least with my Rolleis, even if 120 becomes a dream and I'm reduced to shooting vertical telephoto portrait-like images on ancient Panatomic-X with my circa 1950 Rolleikin 35 kit.

Of course there is always the possibility that the current shortage is a mere insufficiency and/or only short-term or medium-term, and film supplies will eventually start flowing again , if the current mess in the Ukraine doesn't escalate into something global and supply systems get cut off.

A photographer friend is convinced we are entering what he calls the pre-apocalypse era. Another believes aliens from some distant universe are responsible for all these disruptions. Many of us are now not laughing as much as we did...

 

[braxus]

A photographer friend is convinced we are entering what he calls the pre-apocalypse era. Another believes aliens from some distant universe are responsible for all these disruptions. Many of us are now not laughing as much as we did...

Being a Christian myself, I honestly think its the End Times at this point. Its all coming to pass as written.