Film: Color or B & W or both when you travel?

[j_fletcher]

Any trip up to about a week and on the same continent i live on, then just B+W film. Anything longer or further away then i'll take a digi. compact along also.

[micromontenegro]

Unless I plan to encounter something specially colorfull, it is B&W only for me. I just can't get decent C41 locally anymore- and I hate to have my memories ruined by a lab.

[scorpius73]

I leave for Rome and Florence next weekend. I'm loading Fuji Neopan 400 in one camera and Kodak 400NC/160NC in the second camera. I figure I can't go wrong.

[fixbones]

Scorpius73: Looks like a great combo to me.

I'm leaving for Egypt in 5 weeks time and will be loading TriX in one and also Fuji 400H in the other (after much contemplation). I figure i can't go wrong too........... hopefully =D

[Bob Michaels]

It seems that I differ from most in that I am usually attempting to create a meaningful body of work or a cohesive photo series. The time frames range from as short as a few weeks to as long as three years.

That means that almost always, the photos must be either exclusively b&w or exclusively color. It just does not seem to work for my taste to have b&w and color mixed in a photo series.

So once I really get started, the either b&w or color decision is fixed. For my upcoming trip, I knew I was going to carry either 50 rolls of b&w or 50 rolls of color, but not some combination. B&W won out since that is what works for me most of the time.

[ChrisPlatt]

Kodachrome, of course!

Chris

[FrankS]

When I travel, I just take pics of interesting things and scenes that I see, rather than trying to create a meaningful body of work or a cohesive photo series. (You're way ahead of me, Bob.) I shoot mainly B+W for "my" pics, and colour for family snaps and albums. Sometimes a scene demands to be shot in colour. Taking both colour and B+W means 2 cameras, and this is good insurance in case one camera happens to suffer technical difficulties while far from home.

[TomBob]

For me it depends on the time of year, in Autumn and winter i tend to shoot colour - normally Fuji Pro400H but i do trade off to other stock occasionally, and in Summer i tend to shoot more Black and white, i think mainly because I'm yet to find a good quality film that can truly replicate the colours and tones of the british summer.

I am trying to change these habits and always have colour film, mainly as i don't have access to a traditional b/w darkroom anymore

[Damaso]

The honest answer it depends. Depends on where I'm going and what I'm shooting. While I might carry both odds are I'm only shooting one or the other when it comes to film. If I have a digital then that will often do duty for color...

[bean_counter]

I usually load both; chromes in My M4-P, B&W in my IIIf.

I made the mistake of taking only my M on a trip last week; the weather was so dreary that it seemed it took forever to get through a roll of K64. Ended up shooting Tri-X @ 1250, indoors and out.

[degruyl]

For a while it was "all color, all the time", but now is both.

The last two months:
1: Mexico 1: 17 rolls of 120 C-41 (2 weeks)
2: Mexico 2: 10 rolls of 120 C-41, 2 35mm E-6, 2 120 B&W (1 week)
3: Colorado: 10 rolls 120 B&W, 5 rolls 120 E-6 (overnight, all photo)

Whatever I am doing, it is moving away from C-41.

[Mablo]

Mostly color film as I don't really do much photographing while I'm away from home but I do some sort of travel documenting. I guess you sense the difference.

[Rayt]

I prefer b/w but will only shoot it if the light is right for it. If it is harsh or flat lighting then I'll shoot color print film. For any kind of low light I shoot digital.

[robert blu]

I'm not able to concentrate on color and B&W in the same time. Untill a couple of years ago I was only shooting slides (provia, velvia). Now I mainly shoot B&W and leave my wife to shoot colors (film) for usual documentation album. In some cases I shoot color with my mob phone (I had never dream to do this!). It also depends on where we go. For next winter vacations in the alps it will be colors for sure.
robert

[KenR]

I just shoot b&w usually a mix of 100 and 400. If my wife is along on the trip she shoots with a digital p&s for the family record. Likewise, family functions are almost always documented with the digital camera. Over the years she has gone from someone who didn't know how to hold a camera to someone who now says "what do you think about putting such and such in the foreground?"

[amateriat]

For some time now, the travel "formula" for me has been easy. Cameras: entire Hexar kit (two bodies, three lenses, one or two flash units, et cetera), and Ricoh GR-1 (replaced this year with Contax Tvs). I either use the Hexars purely for color and the Contax for b/w, or (much more likely) the reverse. This tends to cut out any "media confusion" for me. The closest thing to shooting digital for me on the road is my camera phone (the "iconic" Motorola e815 at the moment, which might be mothballed for a Palm Centro...not on account of the camera, but because I like Palm's "old" PDA system, which I use on my PowerBook, and the Centro is the last smartphone Palm makes that uses that OS).


- Barrett

[pvdhaar]

On holidays, I'll take color film exclusively. There's always the option to convert to B&W, though I rarely ever see a holiday picture where I think B&W would do better. Color adds so much of the 'feel of the places' where I've been that I think it's indispensable..

[tanel]

I was in North-Norway few years ago, hiking in the mountains. I decided to take both digital and film (with b&w) camera with me. It was complete pain in the you-know-where.
I do take both with me most of the time I go out shooting but usually end up using film. It's just what I prefer.
Besides, I hate to rely on batteries and doing darkroom work fits for me better than messing around in photoshop.
Both have their advantages but I'm more pleased to see a photograph on paper than on screen. (:

[sreed2006]

I voted "Both (B & W loaded. Color on standby)" because that is what I did on my trip out of town this past weekend. I loaded the OM-1 and OM-4 Ti with BW400CN, then stuck Fuji 200 color print film in the bag just in case I used all the B&W, but never got to those rolls of color film. I left some perfectly usable digital cameras at home.

Soon it will be spring-time in central Texas, with wild flowers all over, and I'd like to try my hand at photographing the scenery with color slide film in the Rolleiflex this year. So, my vote can change.

[Mablo]

My significant other carries a small DSLR and I shoot mainly B&W.

Btw. on a recent trip I took ISO3200 film through 4 security scans and there are no signs of fogging. So this myth is busted as far as I'm concerned.

[oftheherd]

I voted both and both loaded, but that isn't always the way it is. If I have one of my 35mm kits, I will have a 6x6 or 6x7 folder, and it is usually loaded with b/w, and the 35mm with color. But I may have both the same, or only the XA, or only the Super Press, or whatever suits me at the time. But usually I have one of the 35 kits. Depending, I may have a 35 kit and the Super Press kit, but that isn't so common these days. Very rarely I may have only the Super Press kit, in which case I have backs enough to have variations as I please.

[dirojas]

Last December I went hiking to Torres del Paine (Patagonia - Chile), and I only took my M3 loaded with B&W. I love B&W, I can get it developed myself, I was simple to carry (no batteries or rain to be worried), and I guess I have seen enough pictures of the place in color. I just wanted to get something different from that landscape, which is amazing by the way.

I am going next week for a small travel, and my plan is to add my new (to me) Sigma DP2 for color, keeping the M3 loaded with B&W. So at the end its film for B&W and digital for color.

[squinza]

B&W Film and digital, if I can carry two cameras.

[JPSuisse]

Fixbones, you did a good job of including a lot of options, but I don't fit into one yet... Here's my answer:

A.) Generally, for personal stuff, 1 body for BW and 1 for color. But, the color body could be either chromes or digital.

B.) If it's a business trip, I very often just take the M8.

C.) If I'm in a minimalist mood... (?) Maybe, I just take 1 body.

@ Bob Michaels: I looked at your website and like your work. I also admire the stylistic focus. I'm just not there yet, or I feel mixing matching will still work... Not sure which yet.

Best, JP

[boklm]

I take two cameras. One with 100 or 400 ISO bw film, and an other one with 1600/3200 ISO bw film. Sometimes I load one of them with color film, but it's quite rare, it depends where I'm going.