Lomography - this is how you inspire the younger generation into film

[AgX]

Lomography is to photography as McDonald's is to nutrition.
Overpriced plastic crap for equipment is no introduction to photography or any other craft.

The few Lomography camera owners I met so far, had no contact with film photography before that.

Lomography started when analog photography was as it height, now they even got stronger in a technically total different world.

 

[Cholentpot]

Hey!!

Leave my Holga alone.

I am not a fine artist.

I will never pay the bills with a photograph.

For me it is a hobby.

Hobbies are supposed to be fun.

Hobbies are for relaxation.

All Lomography is trying to do is to let kids have fun with film.

So relax and let people play a bit.

EDIT - Not trying to pick on you Cholentpot. Just using your post as a lead in...

I don't think my sarcasm came through.

I don't give a toot what kind of camera you use. Digital, film, box full of dirt and salt, phone, I don't care. People taking photos is awesome. People using a camera is awersomer, people using film is awesomest. In fact, the jankyer and oddballer your camera is the more respect I have. Have fun, mix Nikon lenses with Canon bodies, put 135 through a 120 camera. Abuse your negatives. No worries.

 

[tedr1]

I'd like to know how many "young first time film users" go on to decent cameras at realistic prices and film that renders naturally, and how many say "this is crap, my phone takes more realistic pictures" and abandon film for digital, thinking the overpriced stuff lomography peddles is really what film and film gear is like. Disagree if you wish, it won't change the reality which is that lomography is misleading, and all about profit to the point of selling whatever "art lens" and plastic - fantastic stuff they can turn a profit on under the guise of disseminating the wonders of film.

What he said

 

[removed account4]

i think the biggest problem with getting young people to be interested in film photography
is the people who aren't young.

what lomo is doing now is no different than what kodak did for 70+ years.
the only difference is that kodak stopped and eventually went bankrupt.

 

[wyofilm]

What he said

What he said is demonstratively wrong. Look to Lomography's own website. Not only do they offer their 'unique' films (though, some of their films are normal, rebranded standards), but also Ilford (sheet), Kodak (8mm), and Fuji (Instax). The even sell some Washi film (something I've wanted tor try.). Next, while many believe their art lenses to be evil incarnate, the lenses never the less have to mount to something. The something is a set of cameras that have canon mounts, Nikon mounts, or Pentax mounts. So, I guess tomography shooters are buying none lomo film AND own Nikons, Canons, and Pentax's. They also sell a wide selection of mount adapters of standard real-life, serious cameras. What else? Manfrotto tripods, cyanotype kits, and negative archive holders. They have their own film developing service AND how-to guides for DIY developing.

Perhaps a balanced diet, though heavy on desert!

 

[E. von Hoegh]

i think the biggest problem with getting young people to be interested in film photography
is the people who aren't young.

what lomo is doing now is no different than what kodak did for 70+ years.
the only difference is that kodak stopped and eventually went bankrupt.

Except for the fact that Kodak, with a few exceptions, sold decent products, not over-hyped rubbish, at reasonable prices and backed them up with very solid technical support.

 

[E. von Hoegh]

What he said is demonstratively wrong. Look to Lomography's own website. Not only do they offer their 'unique' films (though, some of their films are normal, rebranded standards), but also Ilford (sheet), Kodak (8mm), and Fuji (Instax). The even sell some Washi film (something I've wanted tor try.). Next, while many believe their art lenses to be evil incarnate, the lenses never the less have to mount to something. The something is a set of cameras that have canon mounts, Nikon mounts, or Pentax mounts. So, I guess tomography shooters are buying none lomo film AND own Nikons, Canons, and Pentax's. They also sell a wide selection of mount adapters of standard real-life, serious cameras. What else? Manfrotto tripods, cyanotype kits, and negative archive holders. They have their own film developing service AND how-to guides for DIY developing.

Perhaps a balanced diet, though heavy on desert!

Kindly cite factual information, from the lomography site.

 

[blockend]

Back when Lubitel, Diana, Lomo, Chinon Belami, Domiplan lenses and the rest were current products, I used to try and enthuse people in them. I did this because they took photography away from spec sheets, promoted spontaneity and were dirt cheap. No one was interested. They thought they were Commie junk, joke shop cameras or for people too poor to use anything else. What Lomography understood, and I signally failed to understand, is if you want to make something desirable you make it really expensive.

If something is objectively bad, you promote badness, frame it in exclusivity and place a big ticket on it. Miroslav Tichy understood this. If you want to be great, you need the worst camera ever. When the worst is too good, lavatory paper tubes and elastic bands are the new must have. I can supply one for £2000, the postage is on me.

 

[removed account4]

Except for the fact that Kodak, with a few exceptions, sold decent products, not over-hyped rubbish, at reasonable prices and backed them up with very solid technical support.

i don't know ...
they sold brownies ( by a lot of people's standards they are junk )
hawkeye brownies ( see above )
roll film box cameras ( see above )
110 instamatics ( see above )
126 instamatics ( see above )
disposible 35mm cameras ( see above )
disc cameras ( see above )

a lot of it was advertised and hyped way more than lomo stuff is
kodak had billboards, magazine ads, in store displays, a TON more advertising
lomo has a website ... and happy users.

regarding technical support, meh ..
i used to call the professional help line once in a while
and i hate to say this they weren't very helpful at all .. i stopped calling them in 1991.
why?
i was told to use tmax developer instead of tmaxrs developer
for tank/hanger processing of sheet film ... by their professional services division ..
there are 2 developers with nearly the same name that confuses people that work there AND customers ...
then after 10 trial sheets of film that seemed OK i used it for something important
and all the film ended up with dichroic fog .. again back to kodak i called, this time they told me
the person who originally helped me didn't exist and all my film was ruined / throw it all out ...
30 hours of work i couldn't re-do
i had to call someone else who instructed me to use kodak's own product to remove the fog.

3 strikes and they were out as far as i am concerned ...

all the cameras i mentioned were produced for very little $$ sold for quite a bit ..

maybe i am wrong?
i don't see kodak making or selling or developing any new cameras or lenses ... lomo is ...

 

[E. von Hoegh]

Back when Lubitel, Diana, Lomo, Chinon Belami, Domiplan lenses and the rest were current products, I used to try and enthuse people in them. I did this because they took photography away from spec sheets, promoted spontaneity and were dirt cheap. No one was interested. They thought they were Commie junk, joke shop cameras or for people too poor to use anything else. What Lomography understood, and I signally failed to understand, is if you want to make something desirable you make it really expensive.

If something is objectively bad, you promote badness, frame it in exclusivity and place a big ticket on it. Miroslav Tichy understood this. If you want to be great, you need the worst camera ever. When the worst is too good, lavatory paper tubes and elastic bands are the new must have. I can supply one for £2000, the postage is on me.

Also promote flaws and deficiencies as valuable assets.

 

[removed account4]

not everyone wants clinical photographs

for years lens manufactures promoted flaws and dificiences
( chromatic and spherical aberration ) as valuable assets
the whole portrait industry for decades was based on this ..
and currently 19th and early 20th century landscape and portrait lenses
cost a small fortune ... because of these flaws and deficiencies ...

im at a loss why exploiting what a lens has to offer
is a bad thing ... cameras have flaws and deficiencies too
should people who use 35mm not shoot hand held but always
on a tripod? should people who use view cameras not use camera movements?
not sure what the difference is between those things and using a lens
that has a particular "signature" ...

as wollensak used to emboss on their lens caps : let the user judge ...

 

[macfred]

i think the biggest problem with getting young people to be interested in film photography
is the people who aren't young ...

Unfortunately, however, I fear you're right, John ...

 

[fdonadio]

Are we seriously judging people based on what kind of pen they use?

Trust me, it could be worse.

 

[E. von Hoegh]

A few years ago, a friend's daughter was interested in photography, of the film kind. 8th grade I think, they have a wet darkroom at the local highschool. To give her a jump start, I took and lent her a Nikkormat and taped the aperture and shutter rings at 1/125 and f:11. A roll of 200 speed c41, a bit of instruction regarding focus and what lighting conditions to use,(and avoid) she was off and running. Her first roll had 21 out of 24 successes, if you count proper exposure and accurate focus. She was elated. She now has her own gear, including digital, she has a very good eye. So crap equipment is not always the ideal intro to picture taking.
I can teach any slightly motivated student to use a Nikon F2a F/Ftn/Nikkormat Spotmatic Canon Ftb etc. on a basic level, in 30 minutes.

 

[macfred]

My daughter (almost 15 years old) loves (film-) photography for about two years. She mostly uses my Polaroid Land 250 and the Olympus XA.
When she asked for a good and inspiring read about film based photography, I proudly presented her St. Ansel's 'holy trinity' and a few Feinininger publications from my bookshelf.
''Those are quite exhausting'', she told me - now she's happy with Kevin Meredith's (aka Lomokev) 'Hot Shots' ... I probably wanted too much at once ...

 

[wyofilm]

Kindly cite factual information, from the lomography site.

I did over multiple posts. I leave it to the reader to look at their product selection of serious-minded photography products. To make it easier, you might want to search (shop.lomography.com) Manfrotto, Nikon, canon, Pentax, Fuji, Kodak, Efka (past expiration film), and Washi (be careful does not 'render naturally'). A bit tautological, but since lomography sells them, 'lomography' photographers use them. While visiting there (lomograpy.com) check out their online magazine. When I visit their magazine I always find something of interest, usually something I won't find anywhere else. I just checked their magazine a few minutes ago and found this https://www.lomography.com/magazine/334814-the-dolomites-in-aerochrome-film. May or may not be your cup of tea, but I found it compelling. I think it is great that a new generation of photographs see the broad selection of work that the Lomography magazine puts out. While not to bash the old masters, much of the work (but not all) compiled in the mag was done by their peers. Damn cool in my book.

 

[Craig75]

pretty lazy trolling from OP

 

[guangong]

I disagree. The street photography genre is predicated on happy accidents, the coming together of disparate elements in a split second to create some kind of unity. It can be planned to a degree, where does the light fall, where's the action take place, but in the end it's fishing for a bite with long intervals of nothing for a few exciting catches. As Garry Winogrand said, everyone knows what a good photograph is supposed to look like, but they just require technique, and technique can be learnt by anyone. A great photograph on the other hand requires the ingredient of magic.

The idea of feeling a good photo is a sound one, but it doesn't require overpriced quirky cameras to roll with.

For one of my best friends, the late Louis Stettner, his pictures were not the result of “happy accidents “, but rather the results of highly trained and skillful eyes, hands and camera to produce a meaningful composition. This can also be said of several other of my friends who excelled in street photography. They did not depend on accidents since most co,posed full frame. Waiting for a “happy accident “ is like the Chinese farmer waiting for a rabbit to run into a stump because it happened once before.

 

[fdonadio]

The problem is when everybody try to fill flickr pits with their creation and pretend to be an artist or want to become an artist

Kids today have this incredible urge to be famous. I don’t know if this is really happening worldwide, but here in Brazil, there’s this “youtuber” phenomenon and some people are really getting famous (and paid) by simply recording themselves talking about random stuff or telling jokes and publishing to YouTube.

And then there’s these thousands of “me-toos” that believe it’s just that simple...

 

[baachitraka]

Kids today have this incredible urge to be famous. I don’t know if this is really happening worldwide, but here in Brazil, there’s this “youtuber” phenomenon and some people are really getting famous (and paid) by simply recording themselves talking about random stuff or telling jokes and publishing to YouTube.

And then there’s these thousands of “me-toos” that believe it’s just that simple...

Its needs skill, luck and good eye ;-) and not to forget the dedication and hard work to get what you want from any tool. But Lomo et all are simple tools and have character of its own.

 

[removed account4]

pretty lazy trolling from OP

no clue why posting film stuff teens and 20somethings are doing is trolling.

if he put a link to young people in kodachrome magazine or a kodak blog, would it be the same ?

Unfortunately, however, I fear you're right, John ...

i don't get it ..
they buy a camera ( some say expensive and overpriced camera )
they use film
they get prints made or make them themselves
they typically buy more film than the people who complain about them ...
yet people complain ... because they don't use the right kind of camera
or film or technique or ...

i know, its a real drag !

 

[Pioneer]

Well said John

 

[macfred]

I was assuming that the digital photographer was the bogeyman … -
now it has to be the film using LOMO hipster ?
O tempora, o mores !

 

[eddie]

Lomography is to photography as McDonald's is to nutrition.
Overpriced plastic crap for equipment is no introduction to photography or any other craft.

The manner in which one is introduced to photography is unimportant. What is important is that it sparks a passion which leads one to further explore the medium. How many of us started with Hasselblads or 8x10? Not many, I'd guess. Yet, I see many posters which refer to 620 Brownies, or cheap instamatics, as being their first cameras, certainly "plastic crap" compared to many cameras. Even with the limitations of those cameras, the images made spurred the posters to make photography a lifetime pursuit.
Not only that, but Holgas/Dianas can make exquisite images, in the right hands.

 

[macfred]

The manner in which one is introduced to photography is unimportant. What is important is that it sparks a passion which leads one to further explore the medium. How many of us started with Hasselblads or 8x10? Not many, I'd guess. Yet, I see many posters which refer to 620 Brownies, or cheap instamatics, as being their first cameras, certainly "plastic crap" compared to many cameras. Even with the limitations of those cameras, the images made spurred the posters to make photography a lifetime pursuit.
Not only that, but Holgas/Dianas can make exquisite images, in the right hands.

agreed !