Haven’t blogged about it much here, but I am increasingly tempted to get back into photography, specifically 4x5 large format. Anyone familiar with the craft knows this is no small undertaking, especially when you don’t have all the equipment. I got a good deal on a monorail studio camera setup a few years ago after taking a few classes. Sadly, the classes ended with me on unemployment, and pursuing this time and money consuming hobby didn’t seem the best at the time. And so it sat—not even tested, with two lenses, 11 film holders, and I couldn’t even tell you the make of the camera w/o digging it up. Talking to a co-worker that does 4x5, and seeing large lush green pictures of foliage and waterfalls (that I know I could take myself and get a better color balance) has tempted me to think about it with some degree of seriousness. But I still have several things to sort out.
A good light meter tops the expense list at $500, but I should be grateful the model I’m looking at hasn’t gone up in price much over the last few years. That’s something, right? I’m trying to figure out cheaper ways around that, most serious photographers would probably consider sacrilege, so we’ll skip that topic for now.
The second most expensive item I’m looking into brings us to our topic today: film holders. As mentioned, I have 11 untested that look to be in good shape. That would give me 22 possible shots in one outing. As I recall, good ones run about $30 a piece, so that’s a pretty nice start. But then there’s this idea of the quickloader. Mmmm. Since I use velvia, Fuji has this device that supposedly saves a person from loading individual film slides, and hence hours of meticulous dusting of film holders in the quest against dust ruining images. Would also save the trouble of having limited number of slide holders loaded (evidently you only need one), or the bulkiness of toting around said slide holders, and of course, the fun of un-loading film for developing to start all over again. The quickloader costs around $150, give or take, but at least it’s a one-time investment. Quickload film, on the other hand, so far as I’ve looked, is around $5 a shot, vs. under $3 for the regular kind. Add developing, and I’m looking at 7.50-8.50 a shot, not including taxes and shipping. Hmm.
Now, normally doing away with the dust-war is priceless in itself because it’s so monotonous and time-consuming. But in this economy (don’t you hate how everyone says “in this economy”?), one has to wonder if perhaps the labor and angst could possibly be worth saving cumulative funds. You hear or read stories all the time about people going to great lengths to save money, “in this economy.” My contemplation today is, could it actually be worth it to save this much money, yet cause such a headache? Time is money, but if you don’t have that much money, is it worth investing the time?
Take the quickloader film holder. Might be able to get it a few bucks cheaper, but with shipping, we’ll still give it a basic average of $150.00. That means that your first 150 photos (a pretty good achievement in large format) will on average cost one more dollar apiece. We’re now approaching $9-10 per attempted photo. Vs. almost half that much (ok, $5-6) by going with film you have to load yourself.
Back to the arduous way. I’m missing my nice anti-static film brush, so that’s $20 to replace at this point. In theory I could see how long I could survive without it, if I didn’t have to load my own film. Probably need a light-safe tent or bag to load film too. I think the basic ones start out cheap, but a nicer/roomier one would probably closer to $50. Then I'd also have to test out 22 shots on those existing film-holders to guarantee they are light-safe. They may be perfectly fine, but I'd be foolish not to test them before taking a trip or significant photos. That's a little more time spent (might as well attempt somewhat nice photos in case they do turn out), and at least $100 in film & developing.
On the other hand, isn’t personal sanity priceless? Yes, I’m still leaning towards the quickloader.
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