Going back to film...
 

After shooting mostly digital for years (and getting burnt out on my
photography) I am shifting gears and going back to shooting 120 film.
While obviously shooting digital is easier and cheaper, I'm just not
getting the results from my landscape photography like I used to. What
made me realize I want to start shooting film again was when I got some
proofs back from an old Ikoflex TLR I was given and had repaired. They
had a smooth tonal, 3D look I haven't seen in years!

It wasn't even a top shelf model (had the 3 element novar lens) but
when I saw the 5X5 proofs, I remember why I loved shooting medium format
film. I'm sure not gonna argue about why these images convinced me to
clean up my darkroom and go back to analog photography (including not
scan and print but optically printing again too) but there is something
magical about the look of an image from this medium to me. To be fair, I
was never happy with the results from 35mm film either..

I also found it interesting the local camera store told me film sales
has picked up and some of the working pro's have gone back to film for
some of their projects. I'm sure this is the point where some of the die
hard digital guys will explain that "You just don't what your doing as
digital is far superiour".. To those people, I could care less if you or
some web site has all sorts of data to "prove it".. I know what I see
and am going back to shooting 120 film :-)

Stephanie

Going back to film...
 

wrote in message
...
After shooting mostly digital for years (and getting burnt
out on my photography) I am shifting gears and going back
to shooting 120 film. While obviously shooting digital is
easier and cheaper, I'm just not getting the results from
my landscape photography like I used to. What made me
realize I want to start shooting film again was when I got
some proofs back from an old Ikoflex TLR I was given and
had repaired. They had a smooth tonal, 3D look I haven't
seen in years!

It wasn't even a top shelf model (had the 3 element novar
lens) but when I saw the 5X5 proofs, I remember why I
loved shooting medium format film. I'm sure not gonna
argue about why these images convinced me to clean up my
darkroom and go back to analog photography (including not
scan and print but optically printing again too) but there
is something magical about the look of an image from this
medium to me. To be fair, I was never happy with the
results from 35mm film either..

I also found it interesting the local camera store told
me film sales has picked up and some of the working pro's
have gone back to film for some of their projects. I'm
sure this is the point where some of the die hard digital
guys will explain that "You just don't what your doing as
digital is far superiour".. To those people, I could care
less if you or some web site has all sorts of data to
"prove it".. I know what I see and am going back to
shooting 120 film :-)

Stephanie

Welcome to the club Stephanie. While I certainly
recognize that digital, or perhaps electronic is a better
name, photography has a number of advantages, especially for
commercial photographers, I still like working with film and
printing on paper. There is still a fair variety of
materials available. Ilford, in particular, seems to have
undertaken to make sure there is an adequate supply of
traditional photographic materials and chemistry of good
quality. I still like Kodak products a lot but they seem
bound and determined to destroy what little market they have
left.
This group, the medium format group, and the darkroom
group seem to still have a bit of life in them.
The Ikoflex was a very respectible camera, well made and
with good lenses. I shoot mostly Rolleiflex's in this format
but my favorite is a Rollicord IV.


--
--
Richard Knoppow
Los Angeles, CA, USA

Going back to film...
 

wrote,on my timestamp of 27/02/2010 3:15 PM:


I also found it interesting the local camera store told me film sales
has picked up and some of the working pro's have gone back to film for
some of their projects. I'm sure this is the point where some of the die
hard digital guys will explain that "You just don't what your doing as
digital is far superiour".. To those people, I could care less if you or
some web site has all sorts of data to "prove it".. I know what I see
and am going back to shooting 120 film :-)


Stephanie, they don't really say that. All they say is they "haven't shot film
in years". Which is true and defines their knowledge of the subject to a "T".
Welcome back to film! It's a great way to make images. Don't rely on the
collective wisdom of most of the Usenet, go to the dedicated film places:
http://www.apug.com springs to mind as the best film resource on the net, where
dslr talk is simply and summarily deleted. There are many others. Just ignore
the digital noise.

Going back to film...
 

On 10-02-26 23:15 , wrote:
After shooting mostly digital for years (and getting burnt out on my
photography) I am shifting gears and going back to shooting 120 film.
While obviously shooting digital is easier and cheaper, I'm just not
getting the results from my landscape photography like I used to. What
made me realize I want to start shooting film again was when I got some
proofs back from an old Ikoflex TLR I was given and had repaired. They
had a smooth tonal, 3D look I haven't seen in years!

It wasn't even a top shelf model (had the 3 element novar lens) but when
I saw the 5X5 proofs, I remember why I loved shooting medium format
film. I'm sure not gonna argue about why these images convinced me to
clean up my darkroom and go back to analog photography (including not
scan and print but optically printing again too) but there is something
magical about the look of an image from this medium to me. To be fair, I
was never happy with the results from 35mm film either..

I also found it interesting the local camera store told me film sales
has picked up and some of the working pro's have gone back to film for
some of their projects. I'm sure this is the point where some of the die
hard digital guys will explain that "You just don't what your doing as
digital is far superiour".. To those people, I could care less if you or
some web site has all sorts of data to "prove it".. I know what I see
and am going back to shooting 120 film :-)

Good for you. My 'blad does not get the use it deserves and a lot of
film is sleeping in the freezer.

By the way, the term "analog" isn't very good. Just say film. It's not
an analog, it's an image.

(For that matter what makes a digital camera work is the very analog
sensor and bucket brigade emptying of same).

You can also use a digital camera to preview a scene before committing
it to film. On my digital I can even preview in B&W...

A major attraction of digital is that you can shoot a lot more, with no
cost, loss or penalty and of course convenience. I have a 45 minute
round trip to drop off E-6 and again to pick it up.

--
gmail originated posts are filtered due to spam.

Going back to film...
 

wrote in message ...
After shooting mostly digital for years (and getting burnt out on my
photography) I am shifting gears and going back to shooting 120 film.
While obviously shooting digital is easier and cheaper, I'm just not
getting the results from my landscape photography like I used to. What
made me realize I want to start shooting film again was when I got some
proofs back from an old Ikoflex TLR I was given and had repaired. They had
a smooth tonal, 3D look I haven't seen in years!

It wasn't even a top shelf model (had the 3 element novar lens) but when
I saw the 5X5 proofs, I remember why I loved shooting medium format film.
I'm sure not gonna argue about why these images convinced me to clean up
my darkroom and go back to analog photography (including not scan and
print but optically printing again too) but there is something magical
about the look of an image from this medium to me. To be fair, I was never
happy with the results from 35mm film either..

I also found it interesting the local camera store told me film sales has
picked up and some of the working pro's have gone back to film for some of
their projects. I'm sure this is the point where some of the die hard
digital guys will explain that "You just don't what your doing as digital
is far superiour".. To those people, I could care less if you or some web
site has all sorts of data to "prove it".. I know what I see and am going
back to shooting 120 film :-)
.
Stephanie -

Don't forget that stalwart of the silver based medium, Freestyle Sales.
http://www.freestylephoto.biz/

Going back to film...
 

Alan Browne wrote:

A major attraction of digital is that you can shoot a lot more, with no
cost, loss or penalty and of course convenience.

This is one of the reasons for me to stop shooting digital.

On the analog issue, when you shoot film and optically print it in the
darkroom, that's pretty much an analog process don't ya think? There
isn't much analog about a digital camera other than the light hitting
the sensor. After that point, it's all digital. The image is converted
to digital data before it ever leaves the sensor.

Stephanie

Going back to film...
 

Noons wrote:
wrote,on my timestamp of 27/02/2010 3:15 PM:


I also found it interesting the local camera store told me film sales
has picked up and some of the working pro's have gone back to film for
some of their projects. I'm sure this is the point where some of the
die hard digital guys will explain that "You just don't what your
doing as digital is far superiour".. To those people, I could care
less if you or some web site has all sorts of data to "prove it".. I
know what I see and am going back to shooting 120 film :-)


Stephanie, they don't really say that. All they say is they "haven't
shot film in years". Which is true and defines their knowledge of the
subject to a "T".
Welcome back to film! It's a great way to make images.

Thanks and while I think I remember how to use film, it's nice to see
others are still enjoy shooting with it :-)

Stephanie

Going back to film...
 

wrote in message ...
After shooting mostly digital for years (and getting burnt out on my
photography) I am shifting gears and going back to shooting 120 film.
While obviously shooting digital is easier and cheaper, I'm just not
getting the results from my landscape photography like I used to. What
made me realize I want to start shooting film again was when I got some
proofs back from an old Ikoflex TLR I was given and had repaired. They had
a smooth tonal, 3D look I haven't seen in years!

I would argue that digital is not easier and cheaper, especially if you
consider your time to have value, and if you look at how quickly the digital
gear becomes out-dated. Every time I put a "new & improved" roll of film in
my camera, I'm upgrading the image sensor.
I just completed a modeling session with another photographer- actually I
was the gaffer on set, but I was shooting also. In the four hour shoot, he
ran through 4 memory cards; I shot two rolls of 24 exposure 35mm film. I'm
about to go into the darkroom to develope the negs (45min); he is going to
spend the next several hours eliminating the grossly bad shots (flash
misfires, model not ready, etc), then eliminating the shots that are
similar. Tomorrow, I'll spend about six hours printing the negs, he'll spend
twice that amount of time photo-shopping the images- removing stray hairs,
cloning out the light stand legs, etc. I made sure the model looked good and
there was nothing intruding on the set before I shot. In the end, we will
both have about the same number of 'keepers'.

It wasn't even a top shelf model (had the 3 element novar lens) but when
I saw the 5X5 proofs, I remember why I loved shooting medium format film.
I'm sure not gonna argue about why these images convinced me to clean up
my darkroom and go back to analog photography (including not scan and
print but optically printing again too) but there is something magical
about the look of an image from this medium to me. To be fair, I was never
happy with the results from 35mm film either..

I shoot 35mm, 6x6, 6x7, and 4x5". There is an obvious difference in optical
prints from each, but I think that below 16x20", it's difficult for most
people to tell the difference in film format for properly exposed negs. A
tripod can make a world of difference, especially in landscape work.
Many labs these days are scanning negs for printing. If your 5x5 proofs were
printed on a scan-to-print system (generally a minilab less than 10 years
old), make some optical prints and compare them- you may be in for another
pleasant suprize.

I also found it interesting the local camera store told me film sales has
picked up and some of the working pro's have gone back to film for some of
their projects. I'm sure this is the point where some of the die hard
digital guys will explain that "You just don't what your doing as digital
is far superiour".. To those people, I could care less if you or some web
site has all sorts of data to "prove it".. I know what I see and am going
back to shooting 120 film :-)

Stephanie

Going back to film...
 

On 10-02-27 13:27 , wrote:
Alan Browne wrote:

A major attraction of digital is that you can shoot a lot more, with
no cost, loss or penalty and of course convenience.

This is one of the reasons for me to stop shooting digital.

On the analog issue, when you shoot film and optically print it in the
darkroom, that's pretty much an analog process don't ya think?

No. It's an imaging process.

You see there is no single opposite or alternate of "digital".

There
isn't much analog about a digital camera other than the light hitting
the sensor. After that point, it's all digital. The image is converted
to digital data before it ever leaves the sensor.

As I said, that's no real issue. I just mention it to illustrate the
point about what digital really is.

Anyway didn't mean to post this today as I had alreadyraised it before.
See my other, last post, on the issue of analog.

I hope you post your B&W work - even if that requires digitizing it.

--
gmail originated posts are filtered due to spam.

Going back to film...
 

wrote,on my timestamp of 28/02/2010 6:11 AM:


Stephanie, they don't really say that. All they say is they "haven't
shot film in years". Which is true and defines their knowledge of the
subject to a "T".
Welcome back to film! It's a great way to make images.

Thanks and while I think I remember how to use film, it's nice to see
others are still enjoy shooting with it :-)

you bet:
http://wizofoz2k.deviantart.com/gallery/#_browse