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Film Holders
You can never have too many film holders, however you can have too many with you to carry easily...
While I am not a fanatic about record keeping, I do take field notes when shooting, mostly shutter settings. I have a filing cabinet full of holders recently acquired when I got back into large format.
In the past I had notched the flap of the holder to indicate a "frame number" which transfers to the edge of the film sheet when exposed:
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The holders were labeled with a Rhino labeller with a large piece where I can write notes with a sharpie pen. Denatured alcohol removes the Sharpie marks allowing re-labeling. I accidentally did not use the past coding as is shown in the example shown on the right. This is frame # 22 where round notches are 10's and V notches are 1's
Here is the notching in close up. This is holder #18 based in the current scheme. The updated notching has smaller notches.
Coding is as follows:
1's digits are a V
5's digits are a half moon
10's digits are a half square
I made some safety handles for the files using the 3D printer.
I also 3D printed a fixture to allow me to file the notches while not breaking the hinge of the holder.
I have a small assortment of film holders My collection includes 2¼x3¼, 4x5, 5x7 and 8x10 (L). You can never have too many sheet film holders (R), these are just the extras, not in use. There are about 20 4x5's in use or scattered around the darkroom. The 2¼x3¼ (I have 2) are left from a baby Linhof I once had. The 5x7 and 8x10's are used for negative reproduction in the darkroom. I have no intentions on going larger than 4x5 when it comes to cameras. I bought a case lot of old 4x5 holders and about 1/3 of them are plastic body Lisco/Riteway models, the balance are wooden. I have about a dozen wooden holders that are in good shape and are light tight. About a quarter of the 4x5's you see here are likely to need repair or be discarded. The two 2¼x3¼ holders are like new.