Best deal in film?

[FrankS]

I've come to the end of several rolls of bulk film (Hp5 and tmax100) that I've been using over the last 2 years. I can get along with 100, 200, or 400 speed film.

What's the best deal in bulk rolls of black and white film these days? Local Henry's camera shops in Toronto area sell TMY400 for about $60 per 100ft roll, hp5 for $85! Fp4 for $75. That's my baseline.

Just the cost of shipping from Freestyle is about $30 to Canada! So that's a significant consideration..

 

[haempe]

Kentmere for me.
$36 per 100ft at freestyle.
And I like this stuff honestly.

 

[Lauffray]

Hey Frank
I live in Montreal and I frequently order from Freestyle, what I usually do is make very large orders with several other people, I recently bought 100 rolls from them, can't complain

 

[Michel154]

Hi Frank
i also live in Montreal i find that freestyle for large orders is great i personally really like LegacyPro 100 and 400
or Efke 50 100' at 60$ form B&H they have a cheap shipping option to canada

 

[al1966]

Polypan F 90m for £18 +p&p its rated at 50 but seems to print fine at 100 developed or should it be soaked in RO9 1+100. I liked it so much I bought 600m of it. You can find it on the auction site

 

[sanmich]

Frank

I use to buy Arista Premium from Freestyle, asking a relative in the US to collect the rolls and send them to me (along with other stuff).
If you use bulk rolls, I would look at the prices on Ilford film at B&H.
These are bargains when you compare them to the price of regular rolls.
I mean, they should be, right?
but it's not always the case (see arista/TX for instance)

 

[timor]

Frank.
The best deal on film I consider Eastman Double X bought directly from Kodak. It is $0.35 per foot after taxes of highest quality film :
http://store.kodak.com/store/ekcons...m/baseProductID.228296500/productID.228362600
It is a bit of hassle with rewinding it in bulk loader size rolls, but for the guy with darkroom that should be small potatoes and it's worth it.

 

[Tzelet]

The Ilford films are the bargains in my book. I know there are cheaper films out there, but I wouldn't dream of changing as long as the results are there.

 

[FrankS]

Frank.
The best deal on film I consider Eastman Double X bought directly from Kodak. It is $0.35 per foot after taxes of highest quality film :
http://store.kodak.com/store/ekcons...m/baseProductID.228296500/productID.228362600
It is a bit of hassle with rewinding it in bulk loader size rolls, but for the guy with darkroom that should be small potatoes and it's worth it.

This looks very promising Timor, thanks!

 

[BobYIL]

Do you pay any type of tax while importing from the States?

From Adorama for instance, my favorite 400 ISO:

Triple pack HP5+ 36-exp. $10.50 x 50 packs = $525.00
Shipping to Canada ........................................... $58.00
Total..................$583.00

Cost/roll of 36-exp...................... 583.00/150 = $3.88

Or ordering 100' rolls for the same quantity:

9 x $49.95 ........... $449.55
Shipping ..................$39.90
Total ..........$489.45

Cost per roll of 36-exp...................489.45/153 = $3.20 (if you have empty cassettes to reuse..)

Frankly, nowhere in Europe we can buy the HP5+ for such prices, impossible.. US citizens enjoy probably the best prices in the world..

 

[ChipMcD]

Frank.
The best deal on film I consider Eastman Double X bought directly from Kodak. It is $0.35 per foot after taxes of highest quality film :
http://store.kodak.com/store/ekcons...m/baseProductID.228296500/productID.228362600
It is a bit of hassle with rewinding it in bulk loader size rolls, but for the guy with darkroom that should be small potatoes and it's worth it.

Double X is great. i shoot a lot of it. It does have kind of old school grain though.

 

[R.MacDonald]

I picked up a roll of Orwo N74 (400 speed) recently. They also have another film that is 100 speed as well. They also sell it in 100ft lengths which makes life a little easier.

http://www.orwona.com/orwo-n74-plus-negative-film-asa-400-35mm-100-ft/

 

[timor]

Double X is great. i shoot a lot of it. It does have kind of old school grain though.

It is a random grain emulsion like TX (close cousin). The effects of different developers are pronouced very well with this film, so far my favored is a home made Edwal 10.

 

[paulfish4570]

it is nice to know adorama still has that special on triple-pack hp5 ...

 

[jordanstarr]

Frank...as a fellow Canuk, I share your predicament...not much choice for us. However, I must say, yesterday I just bought 3 bulk rolls of Tri-x at Henrys recently for $52.99 (cheaper than at B&H) and I called myself a student and got 10% off, which came to $161 for 300 feet of film (or 60 rolls (less than $3/roll). That's about as cheap as it gets. I actually considered going right back and buying about $1000 worth of it, seeing as how prices will be going up and potential discontinuing may be looming. Henry's also isn't bad for medium format film -they're pretty on par with the rest of the world. But for paper and single rolls of 35mm, it's terrible.

When I was in NYC, bulk rolls of FP4 and bricks of Tri-x were the best deal for me from B&H. If ordering from B&H, it's always handy to just do one massive order to get it out of the way and even split it with someone to save on the shipping. You will pay tax at the border though. I got lucky once on a $400 order and it slipped through customs without taxes, but that was once in 10 years.

 

[taskoni]

The Ilford films are the bargains in my book. I know there are cheaper films out there, but I wouldn't dream of changing as long as the results are there.

Seconded for the same reasons 🙂

I personally would never buy film just to save in a long run - I like my own shots too much to cry in the dark room while enlarging.
When I'll start doing cheap films I'll go digital...

 

[Noll]

+1 for Arista premium 100 and 400 from freestyle.

 

[timor]

I actually considered going right back and buying about $1000 worth of it, seeing as how prices will be going up and potential discontinuing may be looming. Henry's also isn't bad for medium format film -they're pretty on par with the rest of the world. But for paper and single rolls of 35mm, it's terrible.

I hope they will have that much TX in Ontario. Actually they have the best price of TX bulk in the whole world.
With medium is not that easy, I am waiting 6 weeks for my 20 rolls of TX and still nothing.

 

[FrankS]

How do Double X and Tri X compare?

 

[dcsang]

Hmmmm.... perhaps, Francis, we can get a big order going for Freestyle in the future - there's plenty of us in the GTA that can probably get together and order and thereby save on shipping/handling.....

Cheers,
Davey 🙂