Analog Photography Makes a Comeback

logan2z · Oct 4, 2021

Probably nothing we don't already know, but it's nice to see additional articles confirming it ..

https://www.dw.com/en/analog-photography-makes-a-comeback/a-59373991

Pieter12 · Oct 4, 2021

This bugs me:
"For the past two years, the Stuttgart-based production company has been offering its own analog film based on Kodak cinema film under the name Silbersalz35 — and at comparatively low prices. The individual films are indeed more expensive than the entry-level models from the major manufacturers. However, they are also of better quality. Development and high-resolution scans are also included. After all, customers want to distribute the analog product digitally, mostly on social networks."

BradS · Oct 4, 2021

Thanks for this article. I especially enjoyed the photos and little description the famous hollywood types who use film on their productions.

Also...
I noticed a quote in the first part of the article that I do not quite understand and found myslef wishing that they had elaborated a bit. Maybe we can discuss it here? Here's the quote. I've underlined the perplexing part.

"Social media is very important for getting to know analog photography," says Kummerfeldt. Particularly Instagram helps people get their bearings in analog photography and find inspiration, he explains.

faberryman · Oct 4, 2021

I think Sibersalz35 is the German word for CineStill. And yes, it seems a lot of analog photographers just have their film processed and scanned, and post it online. I remember talking to some young film camera enthusiasts at Glass Key Photo in San Fransisco a couple of years ago. They were all gung-ho film, yet had never had a print made from their negatives.

unwantedfocus · Oct 4, 2021

faberryman said:
I think Sibersalz35 is German for CineStill.

It is not German for Cinestill. https://silbersalz35.com

logan2z · Oct 4, 2021

BradS said:
Also...
I noticed a quote in the first part of the article that I do not quite understand and found myslef wishing that they had elaborated a bit. Maybe we can discuss it here? Here's the quote. I've underlined the perplexing part.

"Social media is very important for getting to know analog photography," says Kummerfeldt. Particularly Instagram helps people get their bearings in analog photography and find inspiration, he explains.

I may be mistaken, but when he says 'get their bearings' I think he may mean 'become aware of and learn about'. At least that's how I read it.

faberryman · Oct 4, 2021

unwantedfocus said:
It is not German for Cinestill. https://silbersalz35.com

Yes, I know. My comment was tongue in cheek. Silbersalz35 is the same business model as CineStill - re-spool Kodak motion picture film and provide ECN-2 processing.

Pieter12 · Oct 4, 2021

faberryman said:
They were all gung-ho film, yet had never had a print made from their negatives.

Reading the article a bit more, I realize it is just a PR release from the company, Silbersalz.
Sillbersalz will destroy your negatives if you don't request them. It's all a fad for hipsters and their ilk, like the stuff the sell as Polaroid today.

BradS · Oct 4, 2021

logan2z said:
I may be mistaken, but when he says 'get their bearings' I think he may mean 'become aware of and learn about'. At least that's how I read it.

Thanks for the reply. I still do not understand though. How can instagram help (anybody do anything)?
Maybe this is totally obvious but I'm not an instagram user so I'm completely befuddled.

Pieter12 · Oct 4, 2021

BradS said:
Thanks for the reply. I still do not understand though. How can instgram help (anybody do anything)?
Maybe this is totally obvious but I'm not an instagram user so I'm completely befuddled.

It can inspire you to copy others' work. But there are some great photos posted, if you know who or what to follow, that can serve as inspiration. On the other hand, a lot of what is posted is the usual selfies and food.

Down Under · Oct 4, 2021

Pieter12 said:
It can inspire you to copy others' work. But there are some great photos posted, if you know who or what to follow, that can serve as inspiration. On the other hand, a lot of what is posted is the usual selfies and food.

Welcome to 21st century photography!! It's the way things are.

In many ways, nothing much is new or has changed here. In the '60s and '70s the Instamatic photography was the rage with the mon/dad shooters; in the '80s and '90s we had Happy Snaps (known in the prolab trade as Crappy Snaps), then in the '00s digisnaps (= digicrap). Instagram is just the latest progression in the meaningless photography syndrome, the endless bad landscapes, babies, cats, dogs, cute baby doll pouts and other people's food. The low cost and the ease of digital photography has just meant an ongoing proliferation of mostly meaningless images - I originally wrote "junk images" but I've now decided that's a bit too harsh. And Instagram is the latest platform for all this visual flotsam, as Flickr was 15 years ago and other web sites since, many of which have come and are now gone.

As for the sad proliferation of "disposable" negatives, I no longer do color processing at home - I rarely shoot color neg and never color slides due to problems with chemistry supply and cost, and I shoot almost all my color with my digital Nikons (I still do all my B&W in my home dakroom, so that at least endures). The prolab in Melbourne where I occasionally get my C41 processed, routinely makes (low-res) scans of everyone's images and sends them online. Unless you specify you want your original negs returned, off they go to the shredder - and if you want them posted, you pay extra. Which makes me feel a little sick, but it's how things are.

Change in constant. As the Buddhists say, "faeces happens".

logan2z · Oct 4, 2021

BradS said:
Thanks for the reply. I still do not understand though. How can instagram help (anybody do anything)?
Maybe this is totally obvious but I'm not an instagram user so I'm completely befuddled.

I suppose first and foremost it can help make people aware of analog photography, help people discover the work of other photographers using analog processes, help people learn how to be successful in those processes by showing them how-to videos and pointing them off to tutorials on YouTube, etc. and help make them aware of vendors selling products related to analog photography, etc.

Pieter12 · Oct 4, 2021

logan2z said:
I suppose first and foremost it can help make people aware of analog photography, help people discover the work of other photographers using analog processes, help people learn how to be successful in those processes by showing them how-to videos and pointing them off to tutorials on YouTube, etc. and help make them aware of vendors selling products related to analog photography, etc.

Sorry to sound cynical, but IG images are pretty small to be able to appreciate much. And it that requires the viewer to read the caption and the poster to mention analog either in the caption or a hashtag. Otherwise, it could just as well be a filter applied to a smartphone shot. Most IG posts are about likes and followers, not educational. Some, like Ilford or Lina Bessanova, do post videos or "stories" but they are mostly about darkroom work, not what Silbersalz is really promoting.

BradS · Oct 4, 2021

logan2z said:
I suppose first and foremost it can help make people aware of analog photography, help people discover the work of other photographers using analog processes, help people learn how to be successful in those processes by showing them how-to videos and pointing them off to tutorials on YouTube, etc. and help make them aware of vendors selling products related to analog photography, etc.

Ah, yes. That makes sense. Thanks for your patience with me.

MattKing · Oct 4, 2021

The biggest thing going for social media platform content about photography is how it fosters a (somewhat artificial) sense of community and engagement.

logan2z · Oct 4, 2021

Pieter12 said:
Sorry to sound cynical, but IG images are pretty small to be able to appreciate much. And it that requires the viewer to read the caption and the poster to mention analog either in the caption or a hashtag. Otherwise, it could just as well be a filter applied to a smartphone shot. Most IG posts are about likes and followers, not educational. Some, like Ilford or Lina Bessanova, do post videos or "stories" but they are mostly about darkroom work, not what Silbersalz is really promoting.

I'm probably in the minority (hey, I shoot film and print in the darkroom, I'm in the minority by definition!), but I often just use IG as a jumping off point to a photographer's or publisher's own web site, YouTube, or some other information posted outside of IG. IG is a great place to discover new things, but not the best place for more in-depth exploration.

For reference, I typically only follow fairly well-known photographers (not the cellphone selfie crowd), photobook publishers, companies producing analog-related products, a handful of camera dealers, and a small set of other photographers I've discovered on IG whose work I like. These are typically not the like/follower-driven folks who seem to dominate the platform.

Sirius Glass · Oct 4, 2021

I never left analog photography or even film photography either.

Pieter12 · Oct 4, 2021

Sirius Glass said:
I never left analog photography or even film photography either.

I don't believe you are the audience for the original article.

Sirius Glass · Oct 4, 2021

Pieter12 said:
I don't believe you are the audience for the original article.

You are right again.

warden · Oct 4, 2021

logan2z said:
I'm probably in the minority (hey, I shoot film and print in the darkroom, I'm in the minority by definition!), but I often just use IG as a jumping off point to a photographer's or publisher's own web site, YouTube, or some other information posted outside of IG. IG is a great place to discover new things, but not the best place for more in-depth exploration.

For reference, I typically only follow fairly well-known photographers (not the cellphone selfie crowd), photobook publishers, companies producing analog-related products, a handful of camera dealers, and a small set of other photographers I've discovered on IG whose work I like. These are typically not the like/follower-driven folks who seem to dominate the platform.

Exactly. Instagram is an excellent resource when used this way, which is how I use it too.

removed account4 · Oct 4, 2021

damned if they do and damned if they don't I guess

BradS · Oct 4, 2021

jnantz said:
damned if they do and damned if they don't I guess

Huh? What? Where?

Nodda Duma · Oct 5, 2021

BradS said:
Thanks for the reply. I still do not understand though. How can instagram help (anybody do anything)?
Maybe this is totally obvious but I'm not an instagram user so I'm completely befuddled.

It’s not a deep or mystical quote. Simply put a lot — A LOT — of film shooters post to instagram. Far more than in other traditional places such as forums, flikr, etc. So if you are inspired by viewing other peoples’ photos and want to see photos by the younger shooters of analog photography in particular (you can see a new style of photography in their shots… more intimate and greater focus on the every day) or alternative processes then that’s the place to look.

Don_ih · Oct 5, 2021

Posting to Instagram is a major part of what is driving the apparent resurgence of film photography. People are shooting film or using specific film cameras just to be able to post photos with hashtags that state as much. And the assumption is that is an inauthentic sort of thing to do when the actuality is that is just the way things are done now on a platform like Instagram. There's nothing inauthentic about using something because it's currently cool.

And there are actually a lot of very good photos on Instagram. They are mostly buried under a mountain of gawping selfies, but they're there.

However, the important thing to remember about Instagram and social media in general is that people are not simply promoting what they do, they are promoting themselves as personalities. So anything that adds character is appealing to them. In other words, Instagram isn't really about photography.

radiant · Oct 5, 2021

Our local lab told me that typical customer is young woman who wants to shoot photos on film and have files digitally on their cellphone - so they can post to instagram. Scanning and WeTransfer are really imporant part of that process.

Analog Photography Makes a Comeback

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