# Film is Still Alive



## cgw (Mar 16, 2018)

Nice video from Take Kayo(bigheadtaco)on why film persists. Film photography seems alive and well(and growing in popularity) in Toronto and Vancouver. I can live with the slight inconvenience of no lab closer than a 45 minute drive away in exchange for stores that sell tons of film and labs that do pro-grade work quickly, consistently and affordably.

The Analogue Photography Series: Film is Still Alive


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## Christie Photo (Mar 16, 2018)

Well...  I don't know about alive and well.  Maybe there's still a pulse.

For what I do, it's just not practical.  The vast majority of my work is for advertising.  Ultimately, everything ends up digital...  whether scanned or direct capture.  There simply isn't enough gained in using film to offset the additional days added to production time.  And of course there's the added cost of production.

I was very late to move to digital, but simply had to if I wanted to continue working.

-Pete


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## 480sparky (Mar 16, 2018)

Christie Photo said:


> ...... There simply isn't enough gained in using film.......



I'm assuming you're doing a simple DSLR v. 35mm film camera  comparison. But when you add medium and large formats to the equation, things aren't so cut and dried.
There are distinct advantages using medium format that 35mm can't touch. And large format easily adds even more advantages.
Increased resolution, for one. And camera systems that don't have fixed flange-to-focal plane lenses don't suffer from coma, astigmatism, flare and soft corners caused by the addition of extra lens elements required by fixed-FFL rigs.
Then there's the movements available to many medium and large formats. Yes there's tilt/shift lenses for 35mm, but they're extremely limited compared to their lens-board mounted cousins.
Yes there are things film can do better than digital. Whether those things are an advantage to you or anyone specifically, that's a different matter.


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## pip_dog (Mar 16, 2018)

Lots of people at my university camera club are hybrid shooters, using both film and digital. The appeal to the millennial and younger generations is, I think, the novelty of doing something that can be completely divorced from digital apparatus when they themselves have grown up in a world increasingly dominated by the computerized. Holding a physical print that you made yourself or was developed in a lab is a totally different feeling than looking at your Instagram portfolio on a phone screen. Is a digital image worth less than a physical print? Depends on context, on use, and on the starting conditions of the system in which worth is determined.
I think an interesting product of the draw towards physical artifacts is the emergence of walk-in tintype studios


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## vin88 (Mar 16, 2018)

nothing wrong with 35mm.    I  would like to buy an 100 ft. roll of Fugi  color film


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## john.margetts (Mar 16, 2018)

In Lincoln, UK, there is a thriving film community. I occasionally ask my local dev lab how things are going and they tell me that their mini-lab is in daily use - not what they would have said ten years ago when it was in continual use but enough films coming to make it worthwhile to fire up daily.

As Sparky pointed out, there are advantages beyond a straight digital v 35 mm debate. To that I would add the cameras available. I use medium format cameras with leaf shutters which make a big difference to the image compared to the ubiquitous focal plane shutters of digital cameras. This means my photographs are taken with a continuously variable aperture which varies in each shot from f/∞ to the set aperture and back to f/∞ - there are implications here for DOF, bokeh, and resolution.


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## Christie Photo (Mar 16, 2018)

480sparky said:


> Yes there are things film can do better than digital. Whether those things are an advantage to you or anyone specifically, that's a different matter.



Oh yeah...  I was speaking just from my standpoint.  

I'm not a rock-star level photographer...  more of a meat and potatoes sort of guy.  Outside of slides for presentations, I never shot 35mm.  The vast majority of my work was 4x5 chrome.

Working about 60 miles south of Chicago, any pro lab was at least an hour away.  So...  if I shot a job on Monday, I'd overnight the film to the lab.  Even though normal turn-around was just 3 hours, I had another overnight back to me for Wednesday delivery.  THEN...  after making final selections of the brackets, another overnight back for scans...  getting that back to me by Monday.

So with the cost of the film and processing, along with 4 overnight shipping charges, added up quick.  And made my production time a full week.

I don't miss the added worry of the courier losing my film.  

Sure...  I miss the swings and tilts.  I had learn a bunch of Photoshop very quickly.

I dunno...  I _think _I can still see the "digital" in my portrait work too.  AND it seemed that most labs were starting to scan my negs for printing.

I finally HAD to give in and buy a digital system.

If I was doing fine art...  I'm pretty sure I'd have to set up a darkroom again.

-Pete


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## vin88 (Mar 16, 2018)

john.margetts said:


> In Lincoln, UK, there is a thriving film community. I occasionally ask my local dev lab how things are going and they tell me that their mini-lab is in daily use - not what they would have said ten years ago when it was in continual use but enough films coming to make it worthwhile to fire up daily.
> 
> As Sparky pointed out, there are advantages beyond a straight digital v 35 mm debate. To that I would add the cameras available. I use medium format cameras with leaf shutters which make a big difference to the image compared to the ubiquitous focal plane shutters of digital cameras. This means my photographs are taken with a continuously variable aperture which varies in each shot from f/∞ to the set aperture and back to f/∞ - there are implications here for DOF, bokeh, and resolution.


     there several types of shutters on vintage film cameras.   I like the Nikon metal curtain type.  vin


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## jcdeboever (Mar 17, 2018)

I shoot both. I just like the process of developing and the look of film. No darkroom yet. I guess I'm lucky in that I started late in life, when film was arguably considered dead. No years of processing that made me want to forget about it.


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## 480sparky (Mar 17, 2018)

jcdeboever said:


> I shoot both. I just like the process of developing and the look of film. No darkroom yet. I guess I'm lucky in that I started late in life, when film was arguably considered dead. No years of processing that made me want to forget about it.



I actually enjoy souping the film.  I shoot film all spring, summer and autumn then use the long, cold dark winter nights to develop it all.  Very therapeutic for me.  Same for making wet prints.


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## OldManJim (Mar 17, 2018)

jcdeboever said:


> I shoot both. I just like the process of developing and the look of film. No darkroom yet. I guess I'm lucky in that I started late in life, when film was arguably considered dead. No years of processing that made me want to forget about it.



You also benefited from the much lower prices of developing tanks, etc. Fortunately, when I dismantled my darkroom, nobody wanted any of my enlargers, tanks, jobo processors, etc., so I ended up putting everything in storage. Now I can use my Jobo to soup B&W and E-6 film, the enlarging lenses re being used for macro work, and the enlargers make good copy stands.


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## davidharmier60 (Mar 17, 2018)

Would someone like to see if any of my 90s Kodak is salvageable? Going to be a lot of aircraft that are no longer flying. 

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G890A using Tapatalk


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## Derrel (Mar 17, 2018)

After I bought the Nikon D1 used in early 2001, I did not shoot another roll of film until about 2015, when I bought some film, and new chemicals, and shot some 2.25" x 3.25" sheet film in my baby Speed Graphic, and also some 120 rollfilm in my Yashica 635 twin-lens reflex and my Bronica SQ-a medium format SLR. It was FUN shooting B&W rollfilm and souping the film in the kitchen after loading the developing tank in a changing bag.I even developed a 32 year-old roll of Kodak technical Pan film that I had kicking around in a plastic film can since the early 1980's. I still have all my film cameras...maybe I ought to use them again?



1938 miniature Speed Graphic (shoots 2.25" x 3.25" film sheets).


Yashica 635; shoots 120 rollfilm, has a 35mm conversion kit as well. Shoots "tall" frames on 35mm film. Viewfinder has scribed center area for 35mm shooting.


Nikon F2A Photomic, with its era-original, narrow, leather camera strap, lens is a 1982-era 50-135 f/3.5mm Zoom-Nikkor.


Minty 1958 Argus C3 with a gorgeous leather "everready" style case. The C3 is a camera I had when I was just a boy, in junior high school. This is a much newer, better-conditioned model. The C3 was made in the USA from 1938 to 1968, and was a true American classic camera model.


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## cgw (Mar 17, 2018)

_I still have all my film cameras...maybe I ought to use them again?_

Why not? Life's short.

DSLR-scanned 120 b&w negs--as we've discussed before--are easy and open up some interesting creative options.
Have really enjoyed the free Nik plug-ins, especially the Silver Efex Pro 2 set.Worth a look if you've not tried it yet.


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## vintagesnaps (Mar 17, 2018)

I'm a hybrid shooter and didn't know it (til recently). I didn't know it was a thing. 

I never stopped shooting film, just got a digital camera too, and vintage lenses to use with the digital and with film rangefinders. 

What's the big deal? Shoot whateverthehell you want. It does now take sending film out and it's not as inexpensive as it used to be. Otherwise, it's a somewhat different way of doing what I always did.


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## vintagesnaps (Mar 17, 2018)

David, is it color or B&W? Color could be more iffy depending on how old the film is. I don't know other than to get a roll developed and see what you get. It would be possible to have the film scanned and adjust digitally if needed. B&W is more likely to be fine years later.


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## davidharmier60 (Mar 17, 2018)

Color. Have some Fuji too.
I'm back on 6 days a week for a while. 
I guess I'll mail off a couple rolls. 

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G890A using Tapatalk


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## webestang64 (Mar 19, 2018)

Here in St. Louis......
Our labs C-41 has picked up a bit but is stable as to the number of rolls coming in, about 75-100 rolls a week. Low count weeks are still around 30-40 but we have been running "Film Amnesty" discounts for multiple rolls.

Here is a chart of my personal BW labs roll count per month. Did pick up slightly last year. Those sections with ER were a special project so I included both normal roll count and with ER's added.
Click to enlarge.


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## Grandpa Ron (Jan 17, 2019)

I put my film shooting in the same category as my wood and canvas canoe, muzzle loading shotgun, rawhide laced snow shoes, long bow and wooden arrows; all of which have been replace by higher technology. But to me they have a fun factor that technology cannot match.

Sure, I can and sometimes do snap dozens of pictures; in the time it takes me to set up, get under the cloth hood, focus, read the light meter, set shutter and aperture and release the shutter of my 1910 view camera. But all those digital pixtals are not near as rewarding as a 4x5 negative with the proper exposure.

Others just think it is a waste of time.  Oh well.


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## webestang64 (Jan 18, 2019)

Grandpa Ron said:


> But to me they have a fun factor that technology cannot match.



Same reason I still use a typewriter and make mixed cassette tapes from LP's (3 of my cars still have a cassette player in them). I also have not given up on VHS tapes.


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## vin88 (Jan 20, 2019)

It's amazing how long some of "the good old stuff" has lasted.  i have  grandma's toaster from the 30's.  my love of 35 mm cameras had evolved into loading cassetts with 12 frames of Fugi film from a 100 ft. roll.    this aloud useing several differnt cameras on a "shoot".  vin   ( please excuse the spelling as "google spell check is [out to lunch])


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