New to 4x5 film holders

[Christopher Walrath]

Good idea. I'm gonna put this to use as well.

[bobwysiwyg]

For marking film holders I use a lead pencil (2B) and the writing is easily erased when you wish to change it.

Works great and simple, thanks for this one.

[BradS]

Post-It notes.

[Christopher Walrath]

Wee little ones.

[Reid Gray]

Just got back from hiking and camping at the Grand Canyon with my Speed Graphic and some Grafmatic backs. Very dry and dusty, but though I haven't finished developing everything yet, so far my regime of sitting in the tent and brushing the holders thoroughly, then loading in a new dark bag, seems to have improved my results even over what I normally manage here in humid New York (where admittedly I hadn't been as careful in the past, a lesson I hope I've now learned). In other words, most of it's coming out speck-free.

One little piece of advice, though I doubt anyone here's as dumb as I was about this. Because one time I forgot to wind the rear shutter to the proper speed before shooting again, I started winding it first thing ater a shot, even before I closed the dark slide or front shutter (brilliant, right?). It didn't occur to me that this curtain shutter doesn't work like the ones on 35mm (though I gather early 35mm had a similar design, so you'd have to put the lens cap on before winding). The way it works on the Speed, when you wind it you run the slit back across your negative again. So I've gotten some double exposures where the second exposure is an off-centered, motion-blurred thing that I don't remember shooting intentionally (no dust specks, though). Had me confused there for a while. Fortunately I appear to have made the mistake only a few times, and so far not on any shots I'd hate to lose. Anyway, I haven't seen this mistake mentioned anywhere, so I thought I'd bring it up.