Shooting one film stock...

Shooting film is fun.  Yes photography is fun but the gear is fun and with film, it adds another dimension for fun...several actually! If you want to change the "look" or "feel" of your photography you can change your camera, lens or apply some filters on your digital images.  Essentially with digital, the look and feel is dictated in post processing.  With film you have another dimension or two.

With film, you can change your camera, lens and you can post process differently to add some feel.  But you can also use different film and different developers.  This gives you a great deal of nuanced control of the final product.  So with all this going for it, why do people recommend sticking to a single film stock?  

Well here is what I have found in my ten year journey with film (not including my childhood before digital came to be the norm).  Understanding how a film will perform and being able to predict how a film will perform are two different things.  It is like renting a car, you know that if you push the accelerator the car will accelerate in the direction that the wheels are pointing. But how fast, with what delay and power is completely unknown to you until you start driving it.  Then, after 10-20 minutes you become accustomed to the "feel" of the car and can drive it in a predictable way.

With film it is the same thing....except that it takes a bit longer than 20 minutes....it takes about 20 rolls or more.  And the reason is that you need to play with it until you are familiar with it.  If you take the film and only shoot at box speed, always develop the same way and never shoot at night then you will not learn anything from your 20 rolls.  You need to take a few rolls to shoot at box speed, then push it one, two and three stops.  Then you need to pull it one, two and three stops....you need to shoot it at night, you need to make mistakes and learn what you can do to walk them back.

After your 20 rolls of well tested film stock, developed in the same developer you begin to have a feel for it.  You know what to watch out for and when to push the development time just a little to get you that extra pop in contrast.  Once this is under your belt, you have one less thing to worry about.  Now you can focus on getting to learn that new camera you just bought...or try out that home made coffee developer you have been hearing about....

But whatever you do, have fun and don't take your results so seriously.  If you are not making a living out of photography, and you enjoyed taking the picture then that is half the fun.  Even if the results are not what you intended!