I participated in a film camera swap meet last month. It was a fun time, especially since the event was packed the whole way through, and there were a lot of twentysomething film shooters. These young’uns definitely like point and shoots, and I easily sold the two that I had. But another thing also sold equally quickly: A bunch of film I was selling for $4 a roll. One buyer basically bought up the whole stock.
The thought of selling film for that price one or two years ago would seem outlandish. This was a time when film stocks were scarce everywhere, so why would I get rid of it for next to nothing? And why get rid of any film when it’s so hard to get? But this year things have stabilized. While prices aren’t 2019 cheap anymore, they’ve come down from their lofty heights (at least for negative film.)
Over the past few years, I managed to accumulate a decent stock of film, most of it in the freezer. But at about 100 rolls, it was starting to get a bit unwieldy. And there were some stocks that I realized that I would never shoot, or if I did, it was to “get rid of it.” The biggest offenders in this department were Fomapan/Arista 100 and Kentmere 100, two slowish black and white films that I got mostly due to price (still about $6 a roll). I don’t shoot much ISO 100 in black and white, and I was finding few excuses to use these rolls. If I want to shoot 100, I’ll get Fuji Acros, which I like.1 So out they went, with some other random rolls.
Truth be told, when I shoot black and white, I tend to go with the classic ISO 400 emulsions of Kodak Tri-X and Ilford HP5. If I’m feeling thrifty, I’ll get Kentmere 400. Fomapan is hot and cold with me, but I think I’ve finally got the hang of this complicated Czech film, so I have a few rolls of Fomapan 400 and 200 to play with.2 The less-grainy emulsions of Kodak TMAX 400 and Delta 400 are fine, too, but are a few bucks more than Tri-X/HP5, so I don’t get them that often–I mostly used them in the Pen because with half-frame, sharpness is a more critical concern.
With color, I lean towards the consumer stocks, as I like the look and they are cheaper than the professional emulsions. I like Kodak’s ColorPlus 200 and Ultramax 400 the best, though I’ll use Fuji if it’s available and/or cheaper. I really like Fujicolor 100 but it’s hard to find here in the US. I don’t go for the “weird” stocks often, but I do like the new Harman Phoenix when it’s used in the right circumstances, and I’ll occasionally grab a roll of Candido or Reto Amber. As for the pro stocks, I like Kodak Portra well enough, but use it sparingly due to price, and prefer 160 above 400. (800 is reserved for low-light photography, and is now cheaper than Lomography 800, somehow.) Kodak Ektar 100 never really gelled with me, no matter how much I tried. And I really like Kodak Ektachrome 100, but slide stock is very expensive to buy and process these days, so it’s reserved for special circumstances.
Most of what I said above applies to 35mm film. With 120, I cleared out all of my traditional black-and-white rolls in that four-dollar sale. I’ve just made the determination that when I shoot monochrome in medium format, it will be Ilford XP2, a chromogenic stock that can use the C-41 process, the same process that all color negative film uses. The reason behind this is two-fold: I don’t shoot a lot of 120, as my lovely Ricohflex Dia is a big and cumbersome camera, and the lab that processes my color films, The Shutterbug, can turn around C-41 in a day. Regular black-and-white gets sent out, and that can take one to two weeks. Now I do process and scan my own 35mm black and white film at home, but I’m not set up for medium format. Perhaps if I was able to process and scan black and white 120 at home, I’d shoot more with the Diacord. But I might shoot more because I feel like I need to, especially to offset the money spent on equipment. Perhaps a smaller, lighter medium format camera would help as well, but that’s not a priority right now.
I’m still willing to experiment and try new stocks when they become available, like the Ferrania P33 that I still need to shoot. And I’m okay having a few rolls of “special occasion” stock in the freezer for when I need it, like infrared black-and-white, slide film, fast color like Portra 800, or ultra-fast black and white like Delta 3200 or TMAX 3200. But I’m getting out of the habit of having a super-wide variety of stocks “just because” and am leaning towards more of a few. Because I don’t have the desire to hoard as much as I used to!
Urban Adventure League 
I’ve been thinking the same thing recently. I may consolidate to just one black and white (Ilford HP5 plus) and one colour (Kodak Portra) 35mm stock. I expose film infrequently so I’m ok with the costs.
In HP5’s defense, it’s cheaper than Tri-X!