Film photography as fashion and the decline of the hipster

David A. Goldfarb · Jun 22, 2014

Like it or not, various forms of "lo-fi" film photography are a not insignificant source of the market for film right now--the Holga craze of a few years ago, Lomography, plastic cameras as accessories, Instax as a cool thing for teens and twenty-somethings who want to be "different." Of course not everyone experimenting with plastic cameras and the like is just in it to follow the fashion trend--if anything the serious photographers experimenting with chance in the making of art are defining the fashion--but still, the fashionistas constitute a market for film, keeping up demand for acetate base, coating plants, chemicals, and everything that we all need to do analogue photography. Like any fashion, it's going to change, and all those Soviet cameras that were passé in the 1980s will again become passé.

http://www.theguardian.com/fashion/2014/jun/22/end-of-the-hipster-flat-caps-and-beards?CMP=fb_gu

This will affect film photographers, even those who don't identify as "hipsters."

Just to give one example, in Honolulu, the straightforward photo shops no longer sell film, paper, or darkroom supplies. A shop that started out marketing to the Lomography crowd picked up that market, offering a fairly good selection of films, a few kinds of paper, chemicals, used cameras, cyanotype kits, becoming a supplier for photo courses at local universities, an exhibition space, and location for camera swap meets a few times a year. Will they survive the end of the hipster? I hope so.

Thoughts?

Tony Egan · Jun 22, 2014

Well, if beards and tattoos are the price I have to pay to keep film alive then I guess I'll have to keep practicing looking the other way!

I was in Foto Riesel recently (which is probably the closest thing to a pro or proto-hipster ) photo shop in Sydney. The Lomography films had their own special display shelf next to the fridge with all the "proper" film in it! I chatted to the experienced film deveopment guy and we studied the labels for a while trying to figure out which manufacturers were being re-badged. Then I bought some Tri-X. I think it is a temporary blip but it may just extend the life of some films for a little while.

pdeeh · Jun 22, 2014

I'm not sure what purpose it serves to identify other people as "hipsters"; except perhaps to allow "serious photographers" to identify themselves as "serious" in contradistinction to those silly bearded tattooed dilettantes ... it all, sadly, feeds the tendency for derision and contempt of "the others" (those that aren't "us")

it's just taking photographs. we don't need to be tribal about it

snapguy · Jun 22, 2014

Hepcats

A true Hipster is a Hepcat, an Aficionado of hot jazz and bebop. Cab Calloway was a Hipster. These latter-day fakes are Lawrence Welks, trying to become something that is not there and that they will never be. Why not call 'em George Eastmans --they push the button and somebody does the rest.

pdeeh · Jun 22, 2014

There we go, exactly what I'm saying.

Pavlov could have made a case-study from APUG.

Another thread for the ignore button ...

omaha · Jun 22, 2014

pdeeh said:
I'm not sure what purpose it serves to identify other people as "hipsters"; except perhaps to allow "serious photographers" to identify themselves as "serious" in contradistinction to those silly bearded tattooed dilettantes ... it all, sadly, feeds the tendency for derision and contempt of "the others" (those that aren't "us")

it's just taking photographs. we don't need to be tribal about it

You are right on the money, there. Its this perpetual desire to categorize and "other-ize" people that drive this.

I put this banner on my Facebook page a while back.

GRHazelton · Jun 22, 2014

I've noted that Showcase, the big bricks and mortar store here in Atlanta, has a sizable display of "hipster" cameras and film right out in the open. What most of us would call "serious" film is behind the counter, and expensive. By contrast, Wings camera, bricks and mortar and over 100 years old, caters to students and film folks and sells what I would call mainstream film, paper, chemicals, and a fine assortment of used gear, from 35mm to an 8 x 10 view camera I saw there the other day.

bsdunek · Jun 22, 2014

snapguy said:
A true Hipster is a Hepcat, an Aficionado of hot jazz and bebop. Cab Calloway was a Hipster. These latter-day fakes are Lawrence Welks, trying to become something that is not there and that they will never be. Why not call 'em George Eastmans --they push the button and somebody does the rest.

I'll agree with Cab Calloway, but let's not degrade Lawrence Welk. Who else was so cool as to have a 'bubble machine'?

PKM-25 · Jun 22, 2014

pdeeh said:
I'm not sure what purpose it serves to identify other people as "hipsters"; except perhaps to allow "serious photographers" to identify themselves as "serious" in contradistinction to those silly bearded tattooed dilettantes ... it all, sadly, feeds the tendency for derision and contempt of "the others" (those that aren't "us")

it's just taking photographs. we don't need to be tribal about it

+1!

Not only that, some of the work these young people do is far more artistic than the tightly wound up lens and film "tests" often found on this site. Before this era of photography took off, I would have never in a million years guessed the old guard would react the way they have.

AgX · Jun 22, 2014

Tony Egan said:
Well, if beards and tattoos are the price I have to pay to keep film alive then I guess I'll have to keep practicing looking the other way!

I have a beard too... Actually I thought the archetype of Apugger would be someone with a beard anyway.

bdial · Jun 22, 2014

If the shop views their reason for being as supplying a market and making a profit, then they will last as long as there is a market.
But, if the shop exists to be an extension of the owner's fashion sense then maybe they will close up when they get bored and decide to move on to other things.
So far as I can tell hipster-ism hasn't quite arrived here, but the camera shops are still selling limited supplies, and still operating their C-41 lines.
But the core market for this stuff existed prior to lomography, and will continue to exist after it fades, at least to some degree or another.
IMHO

AgX · Jun 22, 2014

Yes, I know of the importance of that market.

But... nevertheless I only came across 3 people ever that could have been people having a film camera around because it seems trendy for them.
I see this as evidence that this is (still?) a very localized fenomenon.

And yes, that fashion factor is of importance for a manufacturer.
But how predictable is the non-fashion market?

PKM-25 · Jun 22, 2014

I'm 47 years old, have been known to buy clothes to match my highly personalized Leica M3, use incredibly unorthodox marketing techniques and find great success in drawing people in that results in either new clients or new users of film, the two being of equal importance to me.

If that makes me a "Hipster" then I am all about it baby!

David Brown · Jun 22, 2014

David A. Goldfarb said:
A shop that started out marketing to the Lomography crowd picked up that market, offering a fairly good selection of films, a few kinds of paper, chemicals, used cameras, cyanotype kits, becoming a supplier for photo courses at local universities, an exhibition space, and location for camera swap meets a few times a year. Will they survive the end of the hipster? I hope so.

I'm less worried about the effect on our supply line from so-called hipsters than I am about "alternative processes". Photographers of all skill levels are abandoning silver printing for other print processes, before going on to wet plate, etc. Then, they all sit around taking nothing but head shots of each other. Perhaps this, too, is just a "fashion" and will pass.* In the meantime, they are not buying film or silver gelatin paper.

I also wouldn't put too much importance on something in The Guardian.

* I have my theories, but that's a whole other thread ...

Richard S. (rich815) · Jun 22, 2014

Lets talk about not talking about it.

dosilverhalide · Jun 22, 2014

Hey PKM, shouldn't you have the Leica hanging from your neck in that Cool pic. j

removed account4 · Jun 22, 2014

PKM-25 said:
+1!

Not only that, some of the work these young people do is far more artistic than the tightly wound up lens and film "tests" often found on this site. Before this era of photography took off, I would have never in a million years guessed the old guard would react the way they have.

+2

are you doing a crowdsourced funding for production of that leitz nose straw?

snapguy · Jun 22, 2014

bosom

Anyone who grasps the newbie "Hipster" label to his bosom, ham-handedly enough, is desperately attempting to not be yet another boring dude with a camera but a cool cat, an "other." Some dudes need to get out more.

removed account4 · Jun 22, 2014

snapguy said:
Anyone who grasps the newbie "Hipster" label to his bosom, ham-handedly enough, is desperately attempting to not be yet another boring dude with a camera but a cool cat, an "other." Some dudes need to get out more.

or maybe ... they just are tired of the same old BS so they are doing something different than their peers ...
i've been called a hipster before ( im nearly 50 ) and an outlier as well because i don't believe with the main-stream is up to and think it is tired and lame.
labels are a waste of time if you ask me ..

Chan Tran · Jun 22, 2014

I don't know what's a hipster and what's not but I don't feel so good about the state of film today.

Patrick Robert James · Jun 22, 2014

People that like film like film whether they are hipsters or not. I think fashion has given a bump to film sales, but over the long term film will slowly go down. Black and white film though will be around for a loooong time. Besides, the film doesn't care whether a person is a hipster or a "serious" photographer anyway. And what exactly is a serious photographer? There are only a few people that actually make a living shooting film at this point. There are a lot of boring pictures done by photographers who are "serious" and a lot of interesting pictures taken by "hipsters".

For anyone using the term hipster disparagingly, just remember that to a young person you are an old fart!

Truzi · Jun 22, 2014

Not related to film: am I one of the few who finds it strange that the age-old phenomenon of a particular fashion dieing/changing/evolving is newsworthy? I'm not commenting on the potential this particular group has on film consumption - I understand that part of this thread. Instead, I refer to The Guardian’s (or any news group's) general idea that any particular group falling out of fashion is news.

PKM-25 · Jun 22, 2014

Chan Tran said:
I don't know what's a hipster and what's not but I don't feel so good about the state of film today.

Really......?

With all the amazing films we have at still amazing prices?

StoneNYC · Jun 22, 2014

PKM-25 said:
I'm 47 years old, have been known to buy clothes to match my highly personalized Leica M3, use incredibly unorthodox marketing techniques and find great success in drawing people in that results in either new clients or new users of film, the two being of equal importance to me.

If that makes me a "Hipster" then I am all about it baby!

When the heck were you at 5pointz???

PKM-25 · Jun 22, 2014

StoneNYC said:
When the heck were you at 5pointz???

Book publishing workshop in Brooklyn last Fall...

Film photography as fashion and the decline of the hipster

David A. Goldfarb

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Tony Egan

pdeeh

snapguy

pdeeh

omaha

GRHazelton

bsdunek

PKM-25

AgX

bdial

AgX

PKM-25

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David Brown

Richard S. (rich815)

dosilverhalide

removed account4

snapguy

removed account4

Chan Tran

Patrick Robert James

Truzi

PKM-25

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PKM-25

Film photography as fashion and the decline of the hipster

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