Darkroom317 Loc: Mishawaka, IN

It really isn't that difficult. http://www.freestylephoto.biz/

saichiez Loc: Beautiful Central Oregon

If you question your decision, change forums. UHH quite clearly does not support film, and you appear to be quite fond of your F5, which is a fantastic camera and still commanding excellent prices in the film camera market.

As mentioned, Apug is a great forum for people who have found digital disappointing, frustrating, and more.

Another forum where you will consistently see your decision repeated is a traditional film forum with a bit of digital sprinkled in is www.rangefinderforum.com

It's certainly not dedicated to rangefinder camera's but I believe it is a higher percentage of film over digital.

Nevada Chuck

Are you within walking distence of the lake, or do you need to break out the horse-and-buggy rig to get you there. After pondering your posting, I have concluded that you are either a member of the Amish community, or a good old-fashioned Luddite.

saichiez Loc: Beautiful Central Oregon

Well UP It, this is confusing. Did you mean developer or a lab that processes film (a film processor)

Neither are problems if the OP sticks to 35mm film. I live away from the big cities and I am less than a half hour away from a number of film processors who still do film processing. Medium Format and Large format have to be sent about 140 miles away to a professional processing lab, and guess what. They just remodeled their lab less than 5 years ago.

If you are talking about chemicals, do you know that you can develop film in instant coffee? It's called a Caffenol process. You buy your chemicals at the local grocery store and/or a swimming pool supply business.

Here is a table for Caffenol formulas from a web site called, of all things, digitaltruth.com.

http://www.digitaltruth.com/data/caffenol.php

The OP may find this site interesting as it seems devoted to film and film chemistry and film emulsions.

For that matter, as one other poster linked, chemistry supply for film processing is alive and well from a number of sources.

marcomarks Loc: Ft. Myers, FL

Sounds like you're suffering from a self-induced mental brick wall in opposition to technological change. Everything your film SLR has on it is also on the digital SLR. It actually works exactly the same. ISO is ASA in disguise. The basics of using both kinds of cameras are identical. Adjust settings, compose, focus, shoot.

Nobody twists your arm into using the newfangled array of features, you are just letting the buttons and menus interfere with your head although you can completely ignore them and shoot in full manual, aperture priority, shutter priority, or "program" if you desire.

If you live in the woods and have all the time in the world, your time would be best spent sitting in your most comfortable chair, with the dSLR beside you on a table, and reading the operation manual from cover to cover while fingering the camera buttons as you go.

You will be spending nothing but time to do so and you'll quickly learn that the array of features are optional, not required. With time you'll see how advantageous some of the features like auto white balance or multi-segment exposure metering or a variety of focus methods can be, but you are never forced to use them.

Sticking with film in the digital era is like hanging onto Beta Hi-Fi video tapes and player when Beta Hi-Fi is gone and you can't replace the tapes as they break. Film is practically gone and most 35mm cameras (except their lenses) will soon be $5 boat anchors barely worthy of shelf or closet space because there will be no film to put in them. It's time to expend some effort to read and understand.

Black & White TV is gone. 78-speed records are gone. Cars with crank handles to start them are gone. You can barely find a car with crank window handles anymore. You likely fish with a reel on your rod and not just pull on the string manually. DOS is replaced by ever-growing and ever-advancing Windows OS systems. The abacus was replaced by slide rules and finally calculators. Phones with a spin dial on top were replace by push buttons. You survived all of this and much more so you can survive transitioning to digital from film too! :wink:

Sgt. Maj. Loc: Maryland

I also use Diafine to push my film. I can still find D76.

rebride

Try a little Borax in that D76.

reindeer Loc: London U.K.

Am I the only one who thinks that DSLR colours do not look as real or rich as in colour slide film, especially those made by Fuji? In digital color looks rubberish, or plastic in some cases while in slides it was GLORIOUS!

Ched49 Loc: Pittsburgh, Pa.

Once you get the hang of digital...you'll never look back.

Sgt. Maj. Loc: Maryland

I mixed my own developers using ascorbic acid (vitamin C ) and the results were great. I've tried a number of different formulas with Ansco 17 developer.

Right, it's Diafine or two-bath D76.

saichiez Loc: Beautiful Central Oregon

The "WINK" saved you, but I say:

AT LAST SOMEONE WHO WRITES LONGER POSTS THAN I DO, AND NEARLY AS FULL OF "BS".

I submit that you have let a misplaced love of all things technological "mess" with your brain. You appear to be a "tech-head" from the Get Go.

I have a lady friend who has a T-shirt on which is emblazoned "You Say B_TCH Like That's a Bad Thing".

I say that your post strikes me as the opposite of that. "You Say Adopt Technology Like That's a Good Thing".

You are definitely not Amish. We can rule that out without a doubt.

You're not altogether wrong, but you are also not right for everyone.

A good day for me is getting up in the morning and lighting a wood fire under my metal bathtub, taking a long luxurious soak using soap I rendered from carcasses of cows. Brewing a pot of coffee in a metal blue enamel coffee pot on a wood stove, while listening to a tube analog radio for my news.

After a freshly rolled cigarette (yeah, you know....Whacky Tabacky grown in my shed with them bright lights) I go out to the driveway, take the side curtains of my car, if it's a sunny day, set the throttle and choke manually, crank the crank twice to a healthy start, get in and drive the 25 rural miles along roads lined with Poplars, to my place of work.

Along the way, it's a casual drive, and I have enough time, if I see a photo opportunity to stop, set up my old wood tripod, open and adjust my Rochester 8X10 tailboard camera and pop one or two film holders in, pull the dark slides, pull the cap from in front of my lens set at f64, and hold open long enough for another great image capture.

Then, I get back in the car after loading my gear, and head off for........

But hey, you get the idea.

Technology ain't really all that great. It's just another way of doing things. And.... it's truly doubtful if it adds quality to my life.

call me if you can reach me.... No facebook page, No Smart Phone, no iPad or other tablet.....

What am I posting on. I've dictated this on an old battery powered dick-tator machine and a lady down the road is posting it for me.

I'm out fishing!!

"WINK"



:wink:

marcomarks Loc: Ft. Myers, FL

Congratulations on being part of the .00001% of the U.S. who enjoys living like we're a third world country in the 1930s. If it makes you happy, then that's what really counts. I personally like to make use of technology to be more productive, produce better quality output, get somewhere faster, and save time I can use for something else like my wife and child.

My wife is from a decidedly very poor agricultural part of the Philippines and even she enjoyed leaving her clothes washing with rocks in a stream, cooking on a wood stove, listening to a cranked AM radio, and visiting relatives in other communities who had electricity, a microwave oven, an electric washing machine, and a TV with 3 channels picked out of the thin air. She stood with her sister in the hot sun working in the fields and would wave at jetliners flying overhead hoping to one day experience what it would be like to fly in one. While Jeepneys and kickstart motorcycles with sidecars and no windows were the common means of transportation, the big treat was riding in an air conditioned bus for a few centavos more per trip.

I understand there is peace and quiet to be had with your lifestyle but most people of the U.S. today couldn't stand it. Your style requires a certain mindset that people just don't have. I grew up in the 50s and my grand parents boiled coffee on a coal stove, popped popcorn in the fireplace, and opened cans with a sharp knife, canned food for the winter, etc. but that's because there wasn't any other way. Now there is. I learned those ways too but my parents bought a percolator, an electric corn popper, an upright freezer, and God forbid - an electric can opener and dish washer. Now I have advanced myself and have a drip coffee maker, a hot air blower corn popper, and a microwave oven. Many cans now have pop tops but my old can opener still prevails.

People worldwide, and especially at our borders, are standing in line and many times dying while trying to leave your lifestyle so they can advance themselves in some small way. The grass somehow always seems greener on the other side of the fence. In some ways I envy your ability to live the simple life but in other ways I don't. Somewhere in between would be good for me actually. :cry:

stan0301 Loc: Colorado

I think the thing you will find to be the game killer is the fact that film is going to vanish--
Stan

Darkroom317 Loc: Mishawaka, IN

Yet, there are no indications that it will in the near future. As for me I am both a technophile and a luddite. I still can't figure out it works but it does.

Eveline

I can understand your dilemma. I've worked in film (fine art photography) for 20 years. I still miss my darkroom and am in the process of building myself another one. I have manly switched over to digital and do enjoy PP and the creative control of digital photos. However, there was something magic about watching a print appear in the tray that I miss. I also find I miss the quality of a good black and white silver print. I also enjoy some of the old techniques, such as pinholes and Diana camera film results. We can simulate them with PP, but again, it's not quite the same. Digital is just different. There's pluses to both methods. So, I straddle the fence and do both. Digital has a steep learning curve, but I am sure it will be worthwhile in the end. I don't see anything wrong with doing both. We keep up, but we also keep alive the past.