How many film boxes do I need?

[dikaiosune01]

I'm not quite sure which section, this will go to, but the focus is on film boxes; so i'll put it here.

I'm going to be traveling soon out of the country for the first time with my LF camera. Needs some help with the organizing of film boxes.

I have 3 types of film (i'll reduce it to two, if i don't have enough boxes)
Provia 100
FP4 125
HP5 400

Generally, i shoot twice. One plus a safety - time time i hope to use the safety to modify development times when appropriate (mostly b/w)
How many boxes do I need? is there a way I can seperate it in the box? perhaps carboard? will that work? How do you do it?
1 box for provia + 1 box provia safety
1 box FP4 + 1 box FP4 safety
1 box HP5 + 1 box HP5 safety
= does this mean 6 boxes? If i don't have 6 boxes, do you have any other suggestions? Plus traveling with so many boxes is kind of bulky. Should I ditch the silver foil to save space?

I appreciate your input.

[Jeffrey Sipress]

Looks like three to me. The safety shot should be identical as the one you made moments before. Why separate them?

[Scott Walker]

I do things a bit differently I carry seven empty boxes marked N-3 to N+3 and put all types of exposed film in the appropriate box for development. I try to keep the film separated by putting Tri-x on the bottom and T-Max on top or whatever the case may be, but it does not matter because it is dead simple to sort the film in the darkroom if a few are out of place. There are occasions where I will decide that I need a safety of an image if it is remarkable and that goes in the same pile but I make sure it is far enough away from the other that it can't go into the same tray for development.

So to answer your question to me it looks like you only need two boxes. The biggest problem I can see is unless you develop one sheet of film at a time and you are sure that the film in both boxes is in the exact same order it is unlikely that you will find the duplicate negative in your back up box if you realize that negative #27 should have an extra 3 minutes in the developer.

[rguinter]

Why not try using just 1-box for each film type? Makes it much easier in the field.

How to do this you ask?

Take several sets of film cardboards (i.e., endboards) that come with each new pack of film. Notch the cardboard sets with easily identifiable notches. Place exposed film between the notched boards and rubber band together.

My guess is several sets of notched boards and enclosed (exposed) film packs can be stacked inside one large 50-sheet box.

When you open them up in the darkroom you'll know which are which by the notched boards and can easily separate them.

Never tried this but it's a thought... and would substantially cut down on mistakes in the field is my guess.

Cheers. Bob G.

[mcfactor]

What I do is have 1 or 2 boxes with multiple cardboard sleeves. I "label" the sheets with shapes that are easily identifiable with my hands, like a square for hp5, an X for fp4, etc. And this seems to work very well (as long I keep a key of what the shapes mean).

[Frank Petronio]

If you're worried about space/expense, why are you shooting chromes? Are you going to bracket your exposures or just hope you nail it each time? (Clue: Most really experienced photographers can't....)

Since I'm such a dick, I might as well also toss in my two cents and suggest that whether you shoot FP4 or HP5 doesn't really matter, especially if you haven't been shooting long enough to make a definite decision. Not many photographers shoot both, and in the end you'll probably prefer the speed of HP5 for practical reasons. If you tend to shoot static objects or portraits in bright light then FP4 may be fine.

Or... what I would do, being a lazy slob, is to just shoot color neg film, like Kodak Portra 400, and not worry so much. You can make lovely B&W conversions if you are a modern scan and inkjet guy. If you're one of those archaic darkroom guys the just bring the HP5 or Tri-X.

You can fit 30 to 40 sheets of exposed film into a typical three-part ten-sheet box once you remove all the wrappers and cards and junk. And the Kodak boxes are stronger and better made than the cheap Ilford boxes.

[kev curry]

I think your in for a big sore head....unless you can find a large pile of empty film boxes and at the same time think up a really good system to organize 3 different films all with duplicate shots of each scene my guess is that you'll quickly end up in a big confused mess.

I would listen to Frank about HP5/FP4. I cant think of why someone just starting out would want to use 2 b&w films on the same trip. What do you hope to gain by it?

Its just a personal thing but I dont see the need to use anything slower than HP5 in the landscape...its a lovely film and its speed's a real asset.

If I was on a trip shooting HP5 I would need 4 empty boxes for that film... but then I'm an ''archaic darkroom guy'' that needs to treat his negs individually.

(N has its own box) (N+1 N+1.5 share a box) (N-1 has its own box) (N-2 N-3 share a box) I separate the films that share a box with a piece of card. e.g N-2 on top N-3 on the bottom.

I cant imagine doing all this with 3 different films... and trying to keep track of duplicate exposures.

If you get your film speed and developement times nailed you can stop thinking about duplicate negs and just duplicate when you think your into something really special!

[eddie]

i would shoot like ASA films. keeps you from making metering errors.

two films. one color one B&W. one box for the color. for color i bracket but do not change development. (remember for slide film error on the side of underexposing). take two boxes for B&W so you can vary the development of you want.

3 boxes for exposed film at most IMO.