Is there really a strong interest in film photography?

[Photowithfries]

As someone who promotes printing, I would say that scanning is not an issue for me. I just like a hardcopy to display! I myself am afraid that digital editing and printing is more than I want to tackle just now, but whatever gets the print on the wall is good!

 

[Photowithfries]

Staples on the wall are kinda weird...

 

[Photowithfries]

And polluting the bay even more.

 

[Photowithfries]

And polluting the bay even more.

Eggs-acktly!

 

[Photowithfries]

Well, I guess you really showed him.

You did cover your Hass for the storm I hope. Thats the one thing it is'nt great for... the passing of water...

 

[Agulliver]

My comment was tongue in cheek. Some people think they are being authentic by adopting yesterday's technology, and go on and on about it, but forget there was technology from the day before yesterday, and the day before that, so all those claims of authenticity sort of ring hollow to me.



I ran a ultra high-end audio website for many years. I went to trade shows and reviewed equipment, and listened to many million dollar systems, some of which were centered around vinyl. I heard more than my fill of arguments about whether vinyl or CD (or SACD or DVD-A or hi-res digital or etc.) was better. Then there were the reel-to-reel guys. I am not sure which is worse: the film vs. digital debate or the vinyl vs. digital debate. I do know that some people are passionate about their choice.



People enjoy doing different things. I say do whatever way you want, and then show me your photographs. Telling me film is better than digital (or vice versa) and then showing me a bunch of crappy photos is not very convincing.

Difficult to tell if it was tongue in cheek because I know people who use some truly obscure formats, but again more because they find it fun than because they think they are better or more authentic. Eh, what do I know with by B&W EIAJ 1/2 inch VTR....I don't even own an Edison phonograph.

The CD vs vinyl debate ultimately hinged, I think, on what you can't hear when you listen to a well mastered CD.....there is an absence of hiss or other analogue noise. Some people find this property very attractive, whereas I find something has been sucked out. Also I think I miss the upper harmonics because I *can* enjoy 24/96 digital audio, it feels the same as vinyl even if it sounds subtly different. I am blessed with exceptional hearing, I've even been the subject of a study because of it (could hear to over 30kHz as a child and still top out at 21kHz as II approach 50). There's no doubt that with analogue, the medium and machines colour the sound. Having said all that, in an idea world....reel to reel all the way. I don't think it's ever been matched, but it *is* a bitch to keep a RTR machine running properly and in spec. Whereas a CD player, whack the CD in the draw and hit "play". If you liked how it sounded when you bought it, you'll still like it 10 years later assuming it hasn't expired. Whereas your analogue tape recorder will need maintenance and at least one service in that time, your turntable will need a new stylus or two and a belt if it's belt drive.

Which interestingly brings me to photography again, and why box cameras and later Instamatic and other point & shoot cameras with cartridge film or motorised loading were so popular.....most people don't want to faff around. Kodak hit on convenience as a selling point very early on and ran with it....from the first film cameras to the wildly popular box cameras, 126 and 110 Instamatics, even APS was partly an attempt to make more features readily available to people with little or no interest in learning about cameras.

What about today though....are the same people who "discovered" vinyl or even cassettes as youngsters in recent years now discovering film? Or is it a different group of people? Film is certainly not mainstream right now, but could it become so again? I think we need a reliable supply of C41 film at a reasonable price in order for that to happen. I hear it's still possible to buy Fujifilm branded film at Wal-Mart in the USA, but throughout Europe no major store is selling it. I wonder if one will take the gamble if C41 film supply stabilises?

 

[mtnbkr]

About ten years ago I was off roading in Moab and taking photographs with my Hasselblad and a younger old fart came up to me and told me that his son's new camera could beat the pants off my camera. I looked at him and said "You must be so proud to yourself that your son can spend so much money to get so little." He just stormed off. He wanted to rain on my parade and I just peed on him. Oh well.

I've never had anyone come up to me and make comments like that either pro or against film or digital. If anything, people comment on my film cameras because they think it's an interesting thing to be doing these days, an anachronism. My daughters claim I have the male equivalent of RBF, so maybe that chases away the ones who would be inclined to start something.

Chris

 

[faberryman]

Difficult to tell if it was tongue in cheek because I know people who use some truly obscure formats, but again more because they find it fun than because they think they are better or more authentic. Eh, what do I know with by B&W EIAJ 1/2 inch VTR....I don't even own an Edison phonograph.

The CD vs vinyl debate ultimately hinged, I think, on what you can't hear when you listen to a well mastered CD.....there is an absence of hiss or other analogue noise. Some people find this property very attractive, whereas I find something has been sucked out. Also I think I miss the upper harmonics because I *can* enjoy 24/96 digital audio, it feels the same as vinyl even if it sounds subtly different. I am blessed with exceptional hearing, I've even been the subject of a study because of it (could hear to over 30kHz as a child and still top out at 21kHz as II approach 50). There's no doubt that with analogue, the medium and machines colour the sound. Having said all that, in an idea world....reel to reel all the way. I don't think it's ever been matched, but it *is* a bitch to keep a RTR machine running properly and in spec. Whereas a CD player, whack the CD in the draw and hit "play". If you liked how it sounded when you bought it, you'll still like it 10 years later assuming it hasn't expired. Whereas your analogue tape recorder will need maintenance and at least one service in that time, your turntable will need a new stylus or two and a belt if it's belt drive.

Your reasons in favor of RTR and LPs are duly noted.

Which interestingly brings me to photography again, and why box cameras and later Instamatic and other point & shoot cameras with cartridge film or motorised loading were so popular.....most people don't want to faff around. Kodak hit on convenience as a selling point very early on and ran with it....from the first film cameras to the wildly popular box cameras, 126 and 110 Instamatics, even APS was partly an attempt to make more features readily available to people with little or no interest in learning about cameras.

Most people then and now have no interest in the technical aspects of photography, so the simpler the process the better. Hence the Instamatic and the iPhone.

What about today though....are the same people who "discovered" vinyl or even cassettes as youngsters in recent years now discovering film? Or is it a different group of people? Film is certainly not mainstream right now, but could it become so again? I think we need a reliable supply of C41 film at a reasonable price in order for that to happen. I hear it's still possible to buy Fujifilm branded film at Wal-Mart in the USA, but throughout Europe no major store is selling it. I wonder if one will take the gamble if C41 film supply stabilises?

I think there is overlap in the segment of the population interested in vinyl and the segment of the population interested in film. I also think there is overlap in the reasons given for their preferences.

Whether vinyl and/or film is mainstream turns on your definition of mainstream. I think you mentioned you could buy LPs in your grocery store. The grocery stores I frequent do not sell LPs.

I no longer shoot color film, so I am ambivalent about a continuing reliable source of C41 films and processing. Same goes for E6. I do shoot black and white film, and process and print it in my darkroom, so I do hope there is a continuing reliable source of black and white film.

I haven't been in a WalMart since COVID so I don't know if color film is currently available there. I don't even know if color film was available in Wal-Mart before COVID. I never went over to the film aisle to look. I think I may have seen a disposable film camera on the pegboard in my pharmacy a while back. I was there last week and there weren't any.

The one camera store in town closed during COVID. I didn't shop there much because they didn't carry the stuff I wanted, and when they did, it was frequently out of stock. So it was pretty much a waste of time to drive over there. Their prices were the same as online prices so that wasn't a factor.

 

[VinceInMT]

The most expensive thing about darkrooms, especially these days, is the dedicated space needed.

I suppose it depends on what one considers “expensive” and where one chooses to live. A garage could be considered an “expensive” place to just park a car. My oldest is currently getting ready to buy a house and they run about $1,600/square foot where he is looking. That might be ”expensive” but relative to income it’s no worse than the $30/square foot I paid for mine when compared to our relative income levels.

Like I said on another thread, I wanted a lifestyle change about 30 years ago and one of those changes was for a space, in the house, for a good sized, dedicated darkroom. I made made a career change and moved 1,250 miles to achieve all that and more.

It’s all about choices.

 

[VinceInMT]

What if some artistically oriented photographers have thought about Film and Digital photography as being two separate mediums? Painting and printmaking are in similar relation….

Ah, yes, but you are forgetting about the apparent human need to set up a pecking order to bolster their self esteem.

When I started taking classes toward a BFA 7 years ago, I was really a newbie when it can to the world of Fine Arts. One of the questions I asked my professors was, considering that we find a hierarchy (pecking order) in most human endeavors, what is it in the arts. The general agreement was that on top of the heap are oil paintings and bronzes. Everything flows downhill from there. Textiles are way near the bottom. My preferred medium, aside from photography, is drawing and I asked one of the professors where that landed and she said that’s what painters paint over. Pretty funny.

Yes, there seems to be a need by some to denigrate the choices of others be it film vs. digital, analog vs. digital recording, etc. It’s what we do.

 

[argentic]

99,9% of people buy trout in a shop. Does that mean nobody is interested in fly-fishing any more?

 

[faberryman]

99,9% of people buy trout in a shop. Does that mean nobody is interested in fly-fishing any more?

My brother-in-law likes to go fly-fishing, but where he goes fly-fishing it is catch and release only, so if he wants to eat trout he has to buy them at the store. So if he is lucky and catches a trout, he will take a photo of it with his phone so his family and friends will believe him when he says he actually caught a trout and it was a pretty big one. I told him he needed to get a Nikonos so he could take a picture of his trout with film, because it is not really that hard to Photoshop a big trout. There are probably photos of trout as big as a whale on Instagram.

 

[Sirius Glass]

I've never had anyone come up to me and make comments like that either pro or against film or digital. If anything, people comment on my film cameras because they think it's an interesting thing to be doing these days, an anachronism. My daughters claim I have the male equivalent of RBF, so maybe that chases away the ones who would be inclined to start something.

Chris

Nice term, note to self add to vocabulary

Note that I said it was ten years ago. The guy slunk off and the people around me laughed.

 

[Sirius Glass]

I suppose it depends on what one considers “expensive” and where one chooses to live. A garage could be considered an “expensive” place to just park a car. My oldest is currently getting ready to buy a house and they run about $1,600/square foot where he is looking. That might be ”expensive” but relative to income it’s no worse than the $30/square foot I paid for mine when compared to our relative income levels.

Like I said on another thread, I wanted a lifestyle change about 30 years ago and one of those changes was for a space, in the house, for a good sized, dedicated darkroom. I made made a career change and moved 1,250 miles to achieve all that and more.

It’s all about choices.

Expensive in that space that could be put to other use is occupied by the darkroom. Others in the household might want that space for other things. It is a Zero Sum Game.

 

[VinceInMT]

Expensive in that space that could be put to other use is occupied by the darkroom. Others in the household might want that space for other things. It is a Zero Sum Game.

Nobody wanted my darkroom space since it is an unwindowed room in the basement. Plus, the place felt like a mansion since we went from house that was less that 900 square feet to one over 2,600. And it cost 1/3 of the house I sold. I am a big proponent of relocating to get what one wants. Of course, the house I am in is the 23rd address I've had in life so I've never felt tied to any piece of geography.

 

[MattKing]

Nobody wanted my darkroom space since it is an unwindowed room in the basement.

No teenage boys?

 

[VinceInMT]

Your reasons in favor of RTR and LPs are duly noted.

8-tracks, let’s not forget them. I have many and many players/recorders (along with 20-some reel-to-reel machines.). I am definitely stuck in the past and never feel a need to justify it to anyone.

 

[VinceInMT]

No teenage boys?

I had 2 boys and taught them both how to develop film and print. It didn’t really take. However, I also shared my other hobbies, interests, and passions with them and some of those did take. I taught the oldest how to program a computer when he was 12 and he is now a software engineer for a very well know tech company (Think of the Garden of Eden and a type of fruit) and the other adopted my gearhead ways is a automotive tech working for a company that is developing self-driving semi-truck and cars.

 

[Sirius Glass]

Nobody wanted my darkroom space since it is an unwindowed room in the basement. Plus, the place felt like a mansion since we went from house that was less that 900 square feet to one over 2,600. And it cost 1/3 of the house I sold. I am a big proponent of relocating to get what one wants. Of course, the house I am in is the 23rd address I've had in life so I've never felt tied to any piece of geography.

I had the room as a single parent when my two daughter finished college and moved out.

 

[snusmumriken]

99,9% of people buy trout in a shop. Does that mean nobody is interested in fly-fishing any more?

I like to go fly-fishing. I started with carbon fibre, but now I use a 1930s cane rod with a silk line. I also use a steel-frame bicycle. And of course film cameras. I love the aesthetics of all three, and their limitations define the game. I don't know what this says about me, but I'm happy.

 

[Cholentpot]

I like to go fly-fishing. I started with carbon fibre, but now I use a 1930s cane rod with a silk line. I also use a steel-frame bicycle. And of course film cameras. I love the aesthetics of all three, and their limitations define the game. I don't know what this says about me, but I'm happy.
View attachment 309196

I just got a late 80's Panasonic. Same style bike, rides like a dream.

 

[Helge]

I like to go fly-fishing. I started with carbon fibre, but now I use a 1930s cane rod with a silk line. I also use a steel-frame bicycle. And of course film cameras. I love the aesthetics of all three, and their limitations define the game. I don't know what this says about me, but I'm happy.
View attachment 309196

Gears‽ How gauche!

 

[Tadeusz123]

I like to go fly-fishing. I started with carbon fibre, but now I use a 1930s cane rod with a silk line. I also use a steel-frame bicycle. And of course film cameras. I love the aesthetics of all three, and their limitations define the game. I don't know what this says about me, but I'm happy.
View attachment 309196

Wonderful bike!
I think there is a definite crossover between various 'anachronistic' hobbies - steel bikes, typewriters, film photography, etc. This past weekend, I passed a college student riding a 70s Schwinn Continental with a Rolleiflex slung over his shoulder. I used to get the appeal of the lean, mean, carbon machines, but find that I am significantly happier on a relaxed Raleigh 3 speed or indeed, the old Schwinn I found in my college dorm years ago. Sometimes it is less about the result than it is the journey -- and looking cool while doing it!

 

[snusmumriken]

Gears‽ How gauche!

What that says about me is that my knees are eroding faster than the hills.

 

[Pieter12]

and looking cool while doing it!

And so it goes.