Who has shot weddings with film?

yogestee wrote in post #5845280
Shot many weddings using film..I would calculate how many rolls by what the client wanted and how many guests.. I would have the lab cut the negatives into strips of six.. I would number each roll chronologically and number each individual negative but only the keepers which at a wedding was about 80-90%..I would write the neg number on the back of the 6"x4" plus tag the print in an albumn..This albumn was used for reprint purposes..The happy couple would choose their enlargements from this albumn..An average albumn had anything from 200 to 400 prints..

Here was my system for numbering..

R1-001 where R1 is the first roll 001 was the first print..

The negative sheet went into into a binder where it was dated, the couple's name, contact details etc..Each binder was dated from- to..

Shooting the wedding..I would use 2 Nikon bodies and a Bronica ETRs medium format camera... If the couple required B/W I would take a 3rd Nikon body loaded with B/W either with Tri-X or FP4,,I did my own B/W printing..Metz 60CT1 and Metz 45CT1 flashes..My Nikkor 35-105mm F/3.5 was my work horse..Nikkor 50mm F/1.2 and Nikkor 85mm F/1.8 for low light,, Nikkors 20mm, 24mm, 28mm for group shots,,Nikkor 135mm F/2.8, 200mm F/2.8 for tight shots..All lenses were manual focus and I manually exposed..

I shot Kodacolor 100 and 400ISO but later Fujicolor..

Wedding photography was only my sideline..I worked in the photographic unit of a large iron and steel plant..

The wonderful thing about film you make every shot count.. Spray and pray was definitely out..

This is similar to how our wedding photographer shot our wedding and organized our images to choose from. The only bad thing was somehow the roll with the images of my wife's dress got exposed and thus ruined. As you can imagine, my wife would never recommend a film photographer, but I still find the process interesting. Besides I suppose you could have a digital shooter get a corrupt CF card just as easy as an exposed film roll.

Very true - or worse yet, while he/she was doing selective deletes in the camera, hits "delete all."

Right Cranium Imaging wrote in post #5854151
...... Besides I suppose you could have a digital shooter get a corrupt CF card just as easy as an exposed film roll.

Right Cranium Imaging wrote in post #5854151
This is similar to how our wedding photographer shot our wedding and organized our images to choose from. The only bad thing was somehow the roll with the images of my wife's dress got exposed and thus ruined. As you can imagine, my wife would never recommend a film photographer, but I still find the process interesting. Besides I suppose you could have a digital shooter get a corrupt CF card just as easy as an exposed film roll.

A problem with shooting film is you hand over your exposed rolls to a lab losing full control of the process.. I have had a few rolls ruined but only a few,,luckily those shots weren't that important.. Out of the thousands of rolls I've shot I think I only lost a handful due lab error.. I processed all my own B/W..

Now without putting the mocker on myself I have never lost a digital image due to corrupt card etc..

sapearl wrote in post #5854567
Very true - or worse yet, while he/she was doing selective deletes in the camera, hits "delete all."

But of course you can usually recover those. Unless of course you continue shooting and over-write the sectors. I'd like to think I'd have my wits about me enough to ditch that card right off in favor of a fresh one. But who am I kidding...I took zip-lock baggies to Mexico and never used 'em thus got caught out with condensation.

DocFrankenstein wrote in post #5851802
I can imagine.

What I can't figure out is whether the maintenance of the hassy was really expensive or not. Some say they never break.

Some say they need yearly CLAs, the cost of which for a system runs into thousands.

What was your experience? How much did they break? How much did you spend to keep them running?

Do you think they were worth the cost?

Sorry I didn't get back right away but the yearly maintenance (clean & adjust) was about it for me. I used 2 Hassys & rotated which was the main one for that year. The active camera had maintenance at the end of the season & served as backup the following season. In 24 years of service I personally only has 2 breakdowns & was less expensive than one yearly maintenance each. I replaced my own light seals in the magazines which saved a lot. In my opinion they were worth the cost.

Ditto what sapearl said.

On another note. I used Mamiya RB67 cameras longer than the Hasselblads & never had a breakdown.