Need a professional photographers wisdom from the film days

[Black&White]

Was it common practice to change film out mid way through the roll to change ISO settings to adjust for different lighting conditions or did people carry multiply bodies? Sometimes I go out before dark when its light and continue shooting into the night. I push and pull my film. I have in the past, made a mental note of what frame I was on and carefully rewinded the film just enough to leave the film leader out so I could re-load it again later. When I re-loaded the film again, I covered the lens and advanced 2 exposures of where I left off. Never had a problem but seems a PITA! Did professional photographers carry a bag of half shot film stocks or extra camera bodies? Seems multiple bodies would be expensive and heavy to carry around!

 

[HHPhoto]

Was it common practice to change film out mid way through the roll to change ISO settings to adjust for different lighting conditions or did people carry multiply bodies? Sometimes I go out before dark when its light and continue shooting into the night. I push and pull my film. I have in the past, made a mental note of what frame I was on and carefully rewinded the film just enough to leave the film leader out so I could re-load it again later. When I re-loaded the film again, I covered the lens and advanced 2 exposures of where I left off. Never had a problem but seems a PITA! Did professional photographers carry a bag of half shot film stocks or extra camera bodies? Seems multiple bodies would be expensive and heavy to carry around!

It depends.
Some photographers used two or three bodies, some changed films midroll.
But most professional photographers used and are using fill-in flash for adjusting to different lighting and different contrast conditions. Because it is the best and most powerful tool for that, delivering perfect results. Especially modern film cameras and flashes are offering perfect results with this technique.
By using fill-in flash you can manage even the highest contrast situations.
Or you have by it the needed additional light and can avoid pushing with all its disadvantages.

In landscape photography most professionals are using polarizing and / or neutral gradual filters for adjusting to high(er) contrast scenes. By that you can avoid doing N-1 or N-2 development to manage high contrasts.

Cheers, Jan

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

Professionals usually carried multiple bodies if they were shooting 35mm. Most medium format cameras have interchangeable backs, so you can carry one body and multiple film backs, each loaded with a different film. The film backs could be changed mid roll without losing any frames.

 

[leicapixie]

In my case never possible!
Extra body for color..
I never ever bothered to "push" film.
I am a "KISS" kinda guy.
Keep it simple stupid!
I preferred one camera, one lens, spare roll in pocket..
Only weddings etc. had multiple bodies if really needed.

 

[Erik van Straten]

I agree fully with leicapixie here.


Erik.

 

[shawn]

Back in the late 80s early 90s I worked as an assistant/pack animal to a wedding photographer and did hundreds of weddings. I carried multiple F3/MD-4s with a Domke F2 stuffed full of primes. The bodies were really more about film reloads and redundancy than anything else. She tended to stick with the same lens through a roll but for something like a Horah would have two bodies for a wide angle and a mild telephoto.

All the cameras had a big flash bracket setup on them with a large rechargeable battery pack on its own strap. Not Nikon but I can't recall the brand. They were all auto flashes so basically shooting at f5.6 or f8 as a base and then opening up or not from there to change exposure. Just about everything was 100 soeed film, possibly Ektar.

I think we typically had 5 full F3/MD-4 flash setups at every gig. 2 we stashed somewhere (usually to recharge the flashes from an earlier shoot), I carried two and she had 1,.

My shoulders hurt thinking about it all.....

Shawn

 

[Charlie Lemay]

I carried 2 bodies for B&W film until I developed a technique that eliminated metering and the need for different exposures on sunny and cloudy days. With fast lenses, this works as long as there are some highlights in the frame that can be blown out without ill effect. Details are on my website, with examples. http://www.charlielemay.net/azsfiles/zonepg7.htm
Charlie

 

[steveyork]

Tri-X, pushing film, diafine -- all these can give some latitude.

 

[narsuitus]

For 35mm, I used multiple film bodies. I used three Nikon F2, two Nikon F4, five M42 screw-mounts, two Contax G1, a Leica M6, and a variety of fixed-lens cameras. It was relatively easy to keep different films in different bodies. I did not carry them all at one time. Most common for me was to have one or two bodies with Kodak Tri-X and another with an ISO 100 film.

 

[emraphoto]

Was it common practice to change film out mid way through the roll to change ISO settings to adjust for different lighting conditions or did people carry multiply bodies? Sometimes I go out before dark when its light and continue shooting into the night. I push and pull my film. I have in the past, made a mental note of what frame I was on and carefully rewinded the film just enough to leave the film leader out so I could re-load it again later. When I re-loaded the film again, I covered the lens and advanced 2 exposures of where I left off. Never had a problem but seems a PITA! Did professional photographers carry a bag of half shot film stocks or extra camera bodies? Seems multiple bodies would be expensive and heavy to carry around!

For press stuff it was not uncommon to have short rolls loaded. I also carried multiple bodies with different film stock

 

[Ko.Fe.]

Back then it was no hesitation to use flash, btw.
Here is no point to repeat something which was relevant for business schema of long gone days.

In amateur situation then film is not write off expense and one roll lasts for days with different light situations I used contrast filters as ND filters.
Film was rated @1600. Out of hotel in the morning, yellow filter. During day orange filter.
Indoors, after sunset - clear filter (I own lenses, not the business).

At some point I grow to realize what modern BW films of these days are super forgiving.
I was, still taking exposures on ISO 400 film rated @3200 in the middle of the day.
No loss in details.

In fact, years ago it was popular to write about it. I first tried it after reading about here.
I used cheap Polypan F 50 and was taking exposures with ISO from base up to 800. On same roll. It worked.

 

[das]

To maximize versatlity, I agree that having a two-body solution can be ideal if you are in a position to lug both of them. If not, I agree with folks above -- use faster film/lenses and bring a ND/contrast filter to cut down on exposure in bright conditions, and carry a flash that can be used for daylight fill.

 

[Oren Grad]

It was common to standardize on Tri-X. It was enough of a hassle to lug different bodies for different lenses without having to cross that against different film types.

 

[Vince Lupo]

When I started shooting for the Associated Press in the late 1990’s, I usually shot one of the Ektapress films - either 400 for outdoor or 800 indoors. I never used two bodies with the two different films in them because I was usually shooting in a single situation at the time, so it would either be exclusively indoor or exclusively outdoor on a given assignment. I never used black and white film for the AP because they had a C41 processor at the bureaus and they’d like to give publications the option of being able to run the photos is either colour or black and white. When I started shooting for Southern Living Magazine it was all slide film, which was (I think) Ektachrome 400 that they provided. I may have also used 100, but something tells me that I used 400 all the time. Their assignments usually had you in both indoor and outdoor situations (such as a story on a small town), so you’d be shooting a street scene one minute, then inside a shop the next. As others have mentioned, portable flash was your friend indoors, and using it for fill outside was fine even with the 400 speed film. I never felt the need for ND filters, and I don’t think I used 100 and 400 films in two different bodies. My memory is a bit cloudy on that detail, but I’m pretty sure I just stuck with one film for everything.

 

[Bob Michaels]

Was it common practice to change film out mid way through the roll to change ISO settings to adjust for different lighting conditions or did people carry multiply bodies? ......

Most experienced photographers shoot one film exclusively and learn how to use it well. Development is almost always the same as varying light conditions are on the same roll. Very few have the time to worry about changing film in the camera or filters because they are busy photographing. It is all learning how to expose the film and what you can get out of it.

here are two frames shot on the same is 400 film and developed exactly the same in HC110, both very standard.

 

[raydm6]

Most experienced photographers shoot one film exclusively and learn how to use it well. Development is almost always the same as varying light conditions are on the same roll. Very few have the time to worry about changing film in the camera or filters because they are busy photographing. It is all learning how to expose the film and what you can get out of it.

here are two frames shot on the same is 400 film and developed exactly the same in HC110, both very standard.

Bob those images are beautiful!

 

[PKR]

In my PJ days, if the lighting was so different that an increase or decrease of a stop or two wouldn't solve the problem, I simply removed the partly exposed roll and put a new one in marked for a push or pull in my D76 processing.

I used a couple of bodies, sometimes 3, two Nikons with lenses that weren't changed much and sometimes, an M body with a 35. Almost always Tri-X or sometimes Plus-X but, always the same film in all cameras so I didn't have to think about it.

I didn't use flash much except when working in color. Color for news mag work was always Ektachrome.. for quick processing.

I've been going through my stuff now that I'm retired. I found this one recently. A rare use of flash with color film at night. It was the only light available.

Vietnam Airlift, The Fall of Da Nang 1975 both cameras loaded with Ektachrome.

 

[Fraser]

When I shot film someone else was paying for my film! so if I had to change just changed would never of reloaded a film, The newspaper I worked for was mostly black and white most of the time I shot Fuji Neopan 400, winter sport Neopan 1600 and night games Tmax 3200 all developed in tmax.

 

[GarageBoy]

That's one chilling image, PKR

I remember reading that in the 90s, PJs would just stock up on Fuji Press 400/800/1600 color negative films, and purchased them by the bricks

My very amateur dad needed a 120 spool when he was out, saw a pro at this event, and figured he'd ask. The look of horror my (very frugal) father gave when the photographer opened up a new roll, pulled the film off and gave him the spool.

 

[Bolo Kukus]

Amateurs play with pushing/pulling film. Time is money to professionals and studios are set up for maximum efficiency with minimum fuss.

My time in a commercial studio in Toronto is ancient history. Our clients wanted B&W for commercial work - catalogues, newspaper adverts and weekend supplements, magazine illustrations. Color was for portraits, weddings or glam publications.

The studio work horses were Rolleiflexes. Changing a film mid-roll on a TLR would have been my idea of hell on earth. A few pros had one or two Hasselblads with extra film backs. We used a Pentax kit (one body and two lenses (50 and 105) for 'quick and nasty work' - head shots for newsletters or PR stories.

News shooters worked with one camera and sometimes had a spare. They had to shoot quickly and would not have taken the time to change film speeds.

Nobody would have changed ISO speeds on a camera or even more of a horror, change films mid-roll during a studio shoot or even in the field. Our sessions were billed in 15 minute increments and we worked like slaves to do it all with no fuss or bother . We overexposed by one-third or two-thirds of a stop, developing and printing fixed up the contrast as the clients wanted.

In those days anyone who carried two cameras and more than two lenses in the field would have been called a National Geographic shooter. Those boys (and a few girls) always had two bags with them, one for gear and the other (often bigger) for the films. Autowinders were probably invented for their use.

In the '80s media and many studios shot color negative. 35mm was used even on indoor sets. Nikons everywhere. A few Leicas. Two bodies were the norm. Again, no film speed tinkering.

Digital has changed the game. It is so easy to vary ISO speeds in a sequence, a stop under, normal, a stop over. Easier and better than faffing about with a black bag or racing off to the darkroom to snip half a roll out of the camera.

Good to know many are still into film. I shoot it now and then for the sake of old times and old memories. Always at one or two 'pegs' below ISO box speed which gives me easy to print negatives. I am with the poster who said KISS is the way to go.

If anyone out there doesn't already know - it means "Keep It Simple, Stupid".