It seems lately there is a renewed interest in shooting film... I hope it's not just nostalgia. I would hate to see the film medium die... it is such an amazing format. There's nothing like it. Honestly, since I've picked it up again, I've felt rejuvenated.

Film can help you carve out a great niche in the art-savvy community. But it's also important to understand how film works to understand your digital camera. I know a lot of you started your photography experience in the digital world... and that's fine! But I think dabbling in film and learning how to feel exposures will help make you a well-rounded photographer.

I'm already a well-rounded photographer. But that has more to do with my penchant for burritos.

Anyway, I hope renewed interest in film does not turn out to be a fad. I actually think my photography could go 50 percent film in the next year. I am just falling back in love with the look and feel of film. And it's fun to wait and see what you got! It makes you think. And thinking is never a bad thing.

I want to get back to doing film (I spent a ton of time in the darkroom as an undergrad at my college paper), but at this point I can't really envision a good way to have a film/digital hybrid workflow. I'd love to hear some tips in learning how to integrate film into my existing digital workflow. I must admit, I love the instant gratification of digital and hate waiting for film to develop and come via mail lol

When I think about the film/digital workflow, I think about what Joe Buissink said at a seminar in Charlotte a few months back. Marcus Bell had just finished up going over his workflow. Just talking about a portion of it took an hour. Joe stood up and said, "My post processing is dropping my film off with my guy and picking up the negatives."

Ask Jose Villa about how hard his workflow is. In fact, when did you ever hear photographers use the term "workflow" in the film world??? I love digital... But I shoot 5,000 pics now at a wedding. I'm overshooting... overediting. Where's all this time digital was supposed to save? I DO give my brides a lot more great images than I could before. But I think there's plenty of room to fit film in... if not just to slow my shooting down!

People, film is not really a hassle. You are simply diversifying your offerings...

That's true, although flashing back again to my college days I remember developing the film, doing the scanning, and color correcting for the paper, so I'm thinking it's more complicated than it actually is.

I know Jose Villa uses Richard Photo lab, are there any other good labs that do film developing/scanning?

I have a few options here... I use JW Photolab in Raleigh. And NC Tricolor still develops. It's just a matter of finding your nearest resource for processing.

I am actually just switching to digital from film...reluctantly. I will never be able to love digital like I do film. Unfortunately, for my business and budget, digital looks like it will be more cost efficient, even though I'll be adding more work for myself. I also hope that film is not eliminated, that would be a sad day!

5 months ago we had 4 rolls destroyed by a lab. you just can't back up film. although I LOVE film and will NEVER leave it. photographers who never used film are absolutly missing out on the magic of real tone and real grain. I love how I ask N.P.K.O.T.B.s about silver halide and they !

Funny, how I just shot a couple of rolls of film today. I busted out my lomography cameras and had a fun day around the pool with my 1 year old son.

I do think it's something that we should and could all revisit. Film just reminds me so much of Fine Art in College.

I can't wait to see what you can share.

I've got 9 rolls of T-Max on my desk that are waiting to be developed. They were shot in my Holga and Bronicas. I'll probably shoot a few more rolls before I have time to do it. There's a roll of Tri-X in my FM2 that I need to finish, too.

I'll take my 5 year old with me to the studio and we'll develop it together. She'll end up playing or reading, but I hope she'll always remember going up there and me showing her the steps to souping negs.

7 rolls of various C-41 films in 120 are draped across my printer, waiting for scanning.


My attraction to film is not just the different look, but I have to think about the process differently. I know there is a lot more work after the click for me. I have to develop the film or drop it at the lab, then I have to scan it. This means each individual click has a significant amount of time attached to it.


Polaroid makes me slow down partly due to the cost per click, but also because I have to pull the tab and watch the timer. Some films take 90-120 seconds to develop. This is the old style pack film that you have to pull apart. The cost per click can be anywhere from $1 to $2.50.

This past year I carried my Bronica with a Polaroid back to my both wife's family's and my family's Christmas gatherings. I had one pack of ISO 3000 B&W film for each household.


My daughter in her new Tinkerbell costume observes her cousin as he watches a movie on TV.



My wife's family. Her father on the left, our nephew and niece in the middle, my wife and her brother sit on the floor by their mother's chair to watch a video on a portable DVD player. They are on the floor because Parkinson's disease has bent their mother at her waist so that she can't look up.

I shot film for many years before switching to digital about four years ago. I've often thought about going back, but it just doesn't seem to make sense in the fact that my images would still have to be digitized to be used effectively. Website, online galleries, album designs (flushmounts), and more all require digital images.

I definitely understand how you feel, though. I shot way less and produced just as many, if not even more great images while shooting film. I paid a lot more attention!! And I truly understood everything I was doing ... especially regarding exposure control.

i've always shot film and probably always will. i shoot digitally also. i think it all depends on the job and the results you want to get.

for weddings documentary style, digital has been wonderful. i ended up liking it a whole lot more than i thought i would. but for my current artwork that i am displaying in galleries, it's film all the way. for my artwork, it's more about the process than the finished product (although the finished piece is pretty cool too!). i do everything in camera because i want to have a relationship with my surroundings and not with my computer! i attended an artists' talk at one of my current shows last night and was explaining this very thing. i think i was the only film photographer in the show.

hassel actually gave me my very favorite holga. i have every type of camera known to man (well, almost), and lately have been choosing the cheapest one of them all! but camera type, film digital... it's more about what's in your head and what will best get that vision out. don't force any tool to fit you, choose the tool that will fit you so that it comes out naturally.

that's very new age of me. i think i'll stop now.

i lied. not stopping just yet... this image is in another gallery right now, and actually won a prize. it's craig's wife (he's on this forum) from when i went up to boston to visit.

jason groupp is a member here too, right? this is his studio.




this bottom image is in the same show that craig's wife's photo is in. it didn't win an award though... that's okay, it's all good.

(one light, nyc nov. 2006)

eta: these look much better in person. scans are a bit crappy. but it'll do for my purposes...

It's so funny you mention this because Agnes is still stuck in film mode. She got her start with unforgiving slide film many years back and still "waits" for the shot.

It's like an action movie: I'm the Lieutenant in the SWAT trailer constantly telling her "Take the shot" and she's like "Negative. I'm waiting for the subject to move her head" (though she doesn't say that -- she more or less rolls her eyes or tells me "I'm the photographer, you're the assistant.")

It's so funny, some of these digital cameras work towards reproducing film looks. I remember getting rolls of Portra VC when I wanted more color. It's such a shock to think that the image was pretty much done after you shot it compared to how RAW files look kind of dull next to the film...

That's part of what I find inconvenient about film ... so much of the presentation options/necessities available to us now require the digitization of our images, so we do, in a sense, lose a lot of the wonderful qualities of film and print when needing to present our work.

Scans often do suck, when compared to the beautiful original, and once digitized, much has been lost. So what might be a solution for the film shooter? Is there really a viable solution available?

I enjoyed your thoughts on this, Erin. Especially your comment, "don't force any tool to fit you, choose the tool that will fit you so that it comes out naturally." Nothing new age about it at all.

Damon, it's funny you mention that, because I'm actually really conservative in how I shoot (perhaps a little too conservative). Having only a couple of rolls of film to shoot soccer games and such, I'd wait for the perfect shot, and always hated wasting frames. I definitely need to realize I can take more shots and hitting the delete button for any bad ones is an easy thing to do.

I don't think that's a bad thing. I actually admire how Agnes actually thinks about what's going on and doesn't just do the spray-n-pray method.

Nothing against people taking a ton of pictures at their weddings, I just think it's a funny contrast between some ex-film shooters and the people who learned on digital. Back when you had to literally pay for your mistakes it really forced photographers to be more conscientious -- though sometimes too safe -- about how they were shooting (like actually metering the subject, etc.).

Yep, I'm with you Shane. But, the genie is not going back in. Isn't it funny how we accept and embrace technolgy because we think it's going to make us more money...and free us up to spend it. There is a real danger of it eroding the nature of our craft.....I am so guilty of over post processing an image in order to create a mood or a feeling that didn't exist in the first place. Ideally...as digital matures...the way we should differentiate ourselves from the wannabe's will be with the moments we capture...not with our action sets etc. Shane....I can remember some of my old push processing formulas for high ASA....that's what shooters talked about when we got together back then. D-76 with one ounce of soduim sulfite....we sat around reeking of fixer...and bragging about how far we could push Tri-X with Edwal FG7 or Kodak HC110. I'm such a geek.....

This is what finally pushed me to switch. I pay the lab to scan all my negs, so the cost was getting ridiculous. I still intend to shoot film for personal stuff, but for the business it's going to be all digital.

Millers still does it. give 'em a shot. www.millerslab.com

Actually, I tried developing a roll of kodak uc400 a few months ago through mpix, I just had them do the developing, not the full scan CD, since I wanted to see how the preview scans came out before I decided to shell out my dollars for the full CD. This is one of the preview scans that I got (full size):



I posted on another forum and people seemed to confirm it was a bad scan and that it would need to be corrected (I don't know if mpix corrects the full size scan or not, I'm pretty sure they don't).

I might try to get prints made to see what a physical print looks like, but based on that brief experience, I was a little turned off by millers/mpix.

note: it's been years since I've done my own scanning, but I recall getting better initial quality scans.

When is someone going to come out with a film/digital 35mm hybrid? They already have digital backs for medium format.

Anyway, I think it would be cool.

Or you can really study how Jose (and others like him) does it and then use film to your advantage, create that fine art niche for yourself.
I've started to play with film again... after a 7 year hiatus, I like it and plan to include it into my coverage.

I went digital in late 1999 early 2000 to be different and have complete control over my output. But now, I have far too much to do to be dinking around with my images all the time... so film and it's low-maintainance workflow is becoming quite appealing to me again.

How's this for a film workflow:

Photograph event > send rolls to lab for processing/retouching/scanning > archive negs & upload files to ordering site > meet with client to select favorite images and send them off to LaVie to create their fine art wedding book > collect final payment.

Now here's my current digi workflow:
Photograph event > download and backup files (major benefit to digi) > edit, enhance, retouch files > archive enhanced files > upload files to ordering site > design book > edit book based on client requests > send book off to publishing > collect final payment.

I will admit that in terms of instant gratification, film is not so cool - but that is also the mystery & excitement behind it. I remember the days of getting my rolls back from the lab and nearly crapping myself w/ excitment over the images. Now I do it right away when I chimp...

There are a lot more reasons that made me decide. Another major one is that it's hard to find a lab that still uses optical printers (for proofs), they're all using using digital printers and the images don't look as sharp and the colors don't pop. I'm glad that it's still working for people like Jose and Joe, professionally it's just not for me anymore.

Getting really good scans should be as cheap as buying a $2,000-under scanner. Isn't that less than making the switch to digital. I'm not trying to discourage you... But I was at your Milk and Honey site... whoah! Could you have gotten that look with digital?

I was reading through the new issue of rangefinder this morning and came across a review of a plustek film scanner, which apparently can be had for just under $200 if you shop around

http://www.buy.com/retail/product.asp?sku=...amp;dcaid=17194

and it got me thinking about this topic again. I realize doing your own scanning takes a bit of time, but if you shoot a few rolls to supplement digital, it might be doable to integrate some film into the workflow without adding too much additional time, and it would be a little less expensive than having a lab do the scanning (well, it might actually be a wash between the time spent doing it yourself and the expense of having a lab do it).

Yuck. I can see why that turned you off, but the ones I had done at Millers were better. I know they are partly one and the same, but while I've consistently been disappointed in Mpix, Miller's continues to rock. Not sure why??

yeah that is puzzling, i've assumed they're the same. i've been happy with prints i've gotten from mpix, but that film experience wasn't so good. i have a ton of negatives from my college days that I want to have scanned, i might try and see if i can get that plustek scanner and see how my luck is with that.

I know you're not trying to discourage me, but you are making me second guess myself (thanks for the compliment

I'm going to give this digital thing a shot, and if it doesn't work out, I can always switch back to film (I'm never giving up my F100!). I suddenly feel like I'm betraying an old friend