This tip might be obvious to some of you, but I thought I’d throw it out there. I always carry a fine point permanent marker with me when I’m out shooting. I use it to make a few key notes on my spent film.
Everybody has different shooting habits, so I’m just going to lay out some things that work for me. I tend to save my exposed film and develop in larger batches, so notes on each roll of film are a life saver.
Here are the main pieces of information I write on each roll.
1. Speed
If you expose your film at anything other than the listed speed, it’s vitally important that you remember the exposure index used. This will tell you or your lab how to properly develop the film for correct exposure.
2. Process
This one is more aimed at color films. I tend to do a fair amount of cross processing (and I’m getting into bleach bypass too), so it’s sort of important to know which chemical process you intended to use.
3. Date
I date all my archive sheets and I organize my digital archives by date, so having that is fairly important to me. I wouldn’t say it’s absolutely necessary, but it’s really frustrating to forget when you shot a particular roll.
What Else?
Do you write notes on your film containers after shooting? What do you write on them?
July 6th, 2010 at 8:35 am
Great tip. I carry around a small notebook in my bag so i can log my film shots. Now I think I’ll carry a fine-tip sharpie too and mark the canister as well.
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July 6th, 2010 at 8:50 am
i write something memorable for me usually one word relevant to what i was shooting and the dev adjustments for zonificationism or i forget completely and take a wild guess, actually im rubbish at this.
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July 8th, 2010 at 1:25 am
I usually only push films I develop myself but on those I’ve put stickers that I can write with a lead pencil, erase and reuse. one thing I’ve been thinking about adding is what camera I shot it with, as I have a fair amount. I can tell from the photos taken but sometimes it can be a bit tricky figuring it out.
on 120 I always write frame size. good to know if I decide to send them to make prints.
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July 9th, 2010 at 10:14 am
I don’t know if you shoot large format at all… but any tips for keeping track of what film is in which film holder?
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Tomas Webb Reply:
July 9th, 2010 at 4:17 pm
I label all my holders with a number, then use masking tape to mark on the slide which film is which. Obviously I take the tape of when I expose the sheet, but when I take it back out of the camera I put it back on. I tend to only have either one type of colour and one type of b/w with me at any one time though.
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August 3rd, 2010 at 4:32 am
I usually just write where I was. Something that will remind me what’s on the film. Then I stack all my films up and decide which are the most important to get developed.
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