"Now That's A REAL Camera!"

CD55 · Sep 3, 2010

I went to my cousin's 1 year old son's birthday party this past Sunday using a Canon AE-1P and a Bronica ETRS. Most of my family knows I still shoot film but I still get the occasional "You still use film!", especially when using the Canon. What's funny though is this was the first time I brought the Bronica to a family gathering since I bought it about a month ago. I had on the speedgrip and a Canon 540EZ attached to it and once they saw it, I hear someone say "Now that's a REAL camera right there!".

Christopher Walrath · Sep 3, 2010

Darned skippy!

fschifano · Sep 4, 2010

BFD. I am so sick of hearing the "You still use film?" and the "Now that's a real camera!" lines that I just ignore them. I'm even sicker of the "Can I see it on the monitor?" line, and the blank stare you get when you try to explain that there isn't any monitor when I'm using film. Sometimes I'm good natured about it, but sometimes not. Depends on the company.

photomat- · Sep 4, 2010

That's the line I hear most when out in public, I just smile and go on my merry way.

Moopheus · Sep 4, 2010

"Can you still get film for that?" (No, I'm just pretending here) and "Are you a professional?" come up a lot.

Toffle · Sep 4, 2010

fschifano said:
"Can I see it on the monitor?"

Even better is when people comment on how amazingly clear the "display" is on my 4x5, but "why is it upside down?"

Another one I get a lot... "Hmmm... Hasselblad!"

[edit] I'm generally good natured about it... most people I talk to mean well, and many of them have a film camera in a closet at home; all they need is a little encouragement to give it a shot. Here's the thing... I don't think most of them are condescending regarding digital vs. film, some of them have a real nostalgic soft spot for film.

Marc Akemann · Sep 4, 2010

I'm quite used to the "...you still use film?" conversations by now. The conversations are mostly the same from person to person and usually end rather quickly when I give my explanation on the archival issues with digital as opposed to film (for the majority of people who don't back up files). I particularly like the folks who take a look at my camera, nod knowingly, smile and walk away. Doesn't happen often, but it happens.

-Marc

CD55 · Sep 4, 2010

fschifano said:
BFD. I am so sick of hearing the "You still use film?" and the "Now that's a real camera!" lines that I just ignore them. I'm even sicker of the "Can I see it on the monitor?" line, and the blank stare you get when you try to explain that there isn't any monitor when I'm using film. Sometimes I'm good natured about it, but sometimes not. Depends on the company.

I guess if you hear enough times I can see how it will get old real quick. A lot of the guys saying it to me though were my cousins so I wasn't taking it so seriously. I know some of them still probably have their 35mm SLRs since they've all converted to digital. Maybe next time I'll ask them about what they have and see if they'll give me their camera bodies as I'm sure they're using the lenses.

Ken Nadvornick · Sep 4, 2010

I was at a junior high school track meet a while back. Had my black Nikon F2/MD2/MB1/24mm combination and a Vivitar 285HV for fill set up on a black Tilt-All under the high jump pit, remotely triggering it all with a vintage Nikon ML-1 infrared release. None of the dads were even watching the jumpers...

Most overheard comment?

"Now THAT's a REAL camera!"

Favorite overheard comment?

"I want one of those!"

Best rejoinder by me to the obvious question, made without ever directly meeting the glance of the questioner?

"Kodachrome. There is no substitute."

Ken

Worker 11811 · Sep 4, 2010

My favorite line comes after somebody asks me how I learned to work with film.

We go through the whole, "Do they still make film?" thing. Then they ask how I get it developed. I explain that I have a darkroom in my basement.

The fun really begins when they ask where I learned all this information.
I just tell them that I am an autodidact.
Then, of course, they ask, "What's an autodidact?"

I answer, "That is a person who found a dictionary and looked up the word, 'autodidact.'"

CGW · Sep 4, 2010

I was out last week shooting vintage customs and street rods at an early evening cruise nite with my Mamiya RB 67. I'm taking a meter reading when some goof with a Nikon D300s leads with the hyper-annoying "Are you still shooting film?" "Sure," sez I, "It's like getting a new sensor for every shot!"

Bill Burk · Sep 4, 2010

The words that hurt me the most... "Bill... I thought you stood for something." My friend Reed as he caught me in the mountains with a digital camera around my neck. I felt like Larry Groce's Junkfood Junkie. In a bit of karmic retaliation I left the custom light balance set to something like tungsten ruining the shots that day. He'd never seen me without a real camera with a story behind it.

Nikanon · Sep 5, 2010

The reasoning behind why people say the things they do when encountering a film camera is quite interesting. Most people seem to say something that references film being used by professional, indicating that they do not use film and therefore are not professional. I cannot say that anyone with a true passion for photography would really accept Digital. What truly passionate painters do you know that accept photoshop or some other programs substitute for true oil (or acrylic or watercolor) on canvas?. All digital has done is overstep the process that makes it a fine art, makes it of value. I believe those point and shooters using anything from a Nikon L22 up to a D3x or whatever they make now, do not have a true passion. I have noticed that there is some sort of desire in all digital photographers when encountering film to feel superior. Ill bet that digital photographers who have used film fully understand what they have given up what they really value in substitute for some other value, but it is surely not photography anymore. There is a value that cannot be enhanced by technology in a process, a process that cannot be bypassed. "You still shoot film"? Yes because I still value photography, I am not simply trying to get it done as quick and easy as possible. My only explanation for digital is that it is used by those who wish to please others. Their happiness comes not from their own achievement but from the approval of others. It is not that they created their images themselves, to the full extent of individual independent creation on a level where input = output, no more, no less, it is that the image is pleasing to others. I believe that simply the digital photographer values the viewer. While the film photographer values photography as a creative, scientific, and overall artistic medium.

sun of sand · Sep 5, 2010

i'm cool with people asking stuff and making comments
i dont really care
film is old
some of the cameras look cool compared to the plastic ones they know now

but what im really sick of
the people receiving these comments rushing online to tell us that they too have experienced it

apug is about photography
not fkn film
this site -the areas I check- is becoming more and more a film clubcult

interestingly ill be seen as an ahole while most others participating in "the" thread think of these comments as coming from aholes or they behave like aholes in responding to them

Ken Nadvornick · Sep 5, 2010

sun of sand said:
interestingly ill be seen as an ahole while most others participating in "the" thread think of these comments as coming from aholes or they behave like aholes in responding to them

Umm... no cosmic significance to this thread. In fact, no "aholes" to be found on either side of the many "REAL camera" stories. Just a lighthearted weekend thread to kill a bit of time with.

I found the stories lightly amusing, so I contributed one for everyone else's light amusement.

Guess I'm just an elitist "film clubcult" loser for doing that.

Thanks for letting me know.

Ken

j-dogg · Sep 5, 2010

I usually get the "Are you a professional / getting paid to do this? / event photographer?" The event photographer line has gotten me around cover charges in night clubs

Especially if I'm carrying 3 SLR's, usually I'll bring my DSLR and wear it around my neck but keep the good stuff in the bag, once in a while I'll wear all three. Two 35's one for black and white and one for color, lately it's been Minolta Maxxum 4/ Kodak Tmax 3200 and Nikkormat FTN/ Kodachrome KR64

cagpo · Sep 5, 2010

i just love people coming up to me once seeing my OM2n

"Does it work?"

oh of course not! its a heavy necklace!!

....

On other occasions its all postive, people asking questions about the camera, kind of like a nostalgic moment for them, funny since im 17, but they really are surprised that the film culture they grew up in is still kicking harder than ever. I especially love walking through a crowd of japanese tourists with the latest in thousand dollar dSLR's with my Yashica GSN and just getting stares.

I really dont know how to respond to the questions of "why don't you use digital" or "why do you use film still?" -- mostly because these are so subjective and hard to answer, you know, theirs just a thing that cannot be explained. I mention my love for the processes, the feel, and compare it to Vinyl vs Digital in music, another thing i can relate to. Sometimes i wish they just let it rest, one is not on top of the other.

Sometimes new technology isn't necessarily better, nor worse, its just another interpretation of the same thing. Pros and con's on each side.

I can say it easy on a forum when i think it through, but in person, im just like "GAH -- another one", some people really do chuckle about people using film, like its inferior or passed its use by date. I guess it's their loss in limiting themselves to whats on offer, but ignorance hurts me... i just get into an in depth talk of how amazing film is, to the point of me feeling like i'm trying to convert them to a new religion. Maybe i am. so much you can do right...

hugopoon · Sep 5, 2010

Sick of all those remarks. My friends saw my Zorki 4 and one went "Whoa, is that a real camera?!" I just went "No, I carry a brick with me for fun.".

Another time, in a lift, someone bent down and looked at my Zorki for a few seconds and went "Is that a film camera?"
Wasn't bothered to reply. Sick of it all.

Exeter2010 · Sep 5, 2010

When someone on the street asks me why I'm still using film, I usually say, "because this is black and white, not color", as though this could only be done with film (which, to me it CAN only be done with film). Most of the time that either shuts em up entirely, or they just say "oh...I see." and look puzzled for a minute or two, then just say "nice camera" or something.

Except for the occasional pro or "advanced amateur", who mostly seem to get it, most people don't really understand that statement even though somewhere in the back of their mind they know that their digital images could somehow be converted to B&W in whatever "Home Version" software their cousin who's a photographer told them to use. I just think it doesn't occur to your average DSLR toter/lemming.

Exeter2010 · Sep 5, 2010

Oh, and I HATE being referred to as an ENTHUSIAST! If you are walking around with your plastic little D40 and 16-580/6.8-11 or whatever, YOU are the ENTHUSIAST! THAT pisses me off more than anything!

darkosaric · Sep 5, 2010

When I took a photo of my 3 year old niece - she came and tried to look on LCD screen of my nikon F3. She was confused, look at her mom, then me, then camera again ... then my sister tried to explain that in this camera you can not see picture right now, she was confused even more... it was very funny

fschifano · Sep 5, 2010

darkosaric said:
When I took a photo of my 3 year old niece - she came and tried to look on LCD screen of my nikon F3. She was confused, look at her mom, then me, then camera again ... then my sister tried to explain that in this camera you can not see picture right now, she was confused even more... it was very funny

I agree that it can be funny, but it can also be seen as somewhat sad.

Fotoguy20d · Sep 5, 2010

I was out a few weeks ago with my 8x10 2-D and a 4x5 Speed. You'd probably believe how many times I was asked whether it was real, whether it worked, whether you could get film for it. Only once, while I was preparing the 2-D, did someone wave a Nikon DSLR in my face and tell me I should get one of "these". I didn't resist the temptation to show him my Canon DSLR sitting in the bag and tell him he should get one of those ( with apologies to all you Nikon owners out there and not wishing to get into the whole Nikon/Canon debate)

Dan

Exeter2010 · Sep 5, 2010

I tell them my wood frame 4x5 field camera makes 200 megapixel digital images. Manually. See the manual "preview screen"?

Sjixxxy · Sep 5, 2010

I just do my best to find the humor in these comments from my film photographer point of view, but never see these folks as a-hole. Even though their questions may be ridiculous to me, I never forget that they have enough genuine interest to stop and ask me about it. Being a a Grade-A introvert, they're great ice breakers for a little conversation, and the opportunity to hand out a card.

What does get to me though is when someone asks about whatever camera I have as an entry for them to just talk about the latest Digital camera they've purchased. I never understand what and of the version numbers mean and end up giving a blank silent stare.

"Now That's A REAL Camera!"

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