Shooting Film

Being 50+ years old, my photography journey started with film. Shooting film is a comfort thing for me. It’s a return to my roots, a time from my younger years. It’s a much slower process than shooting digital. Don’t get me wrong, I love shooting digital too. It serves its purpose. Digital is kind of run and gun where you can take as many shots as you’d like because there’s no real cost doing so other than your time. With film, the amount of shots are limited to what format you’re shooting and how much film you have. Every shot costs money so I find myself being a bit more selective on what I shoot. I take more time to find the right composition. This wasn’t always true as I’d run and gun with my film too when I first started shooting it again. The transition back to film from digital was a bit of an adjustment. Getting that first roll back and seeing how most of the photos sucked was an eye opener. Paying about $34.00 for 36 photos that weren’t very good was a disappointment to say the least. Above is a shot from my first roll back in 2019.

Another cool part of shooting film is that you have no idea how the shots turned out until you get them back from the camera shop. It always feels a bit like Christmas morning. You know that feeling of excitement when you start to open your presents on Christams morning? That’s the feeling I get when I get to see my developed film for the first time.

I encourage you to pick up a film camera and give it a try. I think you’ll like it too.

An argument for home developing

I’ve been on the fence for a while now about developing my film at home. For me, it’s about being able to control my work. Over the past few months I’ve slowly started to collect the things I need to do it. I’m still not quite there but I’m close to having what I need to do it.

On the 28th of January, I sent a roll of film to Gene’s Camera in South Bend via the USPS. I always pick Priority Mail so it arrives quicker. South Bend is probably 40 miles from my house so it should have been there in two days. As of today, February 9, it is still stuck in the USPS Indy facility. It’s maddening because it is probably lost which sucks. This roll contained interior shots of Gary Roosevelt High School which was been closed since December of 2019. It was a once in a lifetime opportunity to take those photos. I‘m afraid they are gone forever.

This is the dilemma, we trust that our systems will work. Usually they do but when they fail, they fail miserably. I have always had the fear that one day a roll of film would get lost in our postal system. I think it’s finally happened…..

This singular situation has pushed me to speed up by ability of develop my film at home.

Pushing Ourselves

Winter is always a difficult time for me. I suffer from seasonal depression and Winter in my season. I find it very difficult to be motivated to do much. Short days and colder temperatures make an easy excuse to become a couch potato.

This Winter I’ve made an effort to engage life a little more than usual. Some of my motivation has come from participating in things that my local photography club has put together.

Last Saturday our club helped photograph the interior of an abandoned and historically significant high school in Gary Indiana. It was a very fun project to be part of. It rekindled my creative fire. I captured some really nice shots of the interior of Gary Roosevelt and a few comps from around the neighborhood.

This morning i headed to Washington Park in Michigan City before sunrise and captured some really good compositions. I worked on some photography skills like focus stacking while I was out shooting this morning. When i got home, I brushed up on some Photoshop skills like blending and making panos.

After lunch, I met up with some of our club members. We set up for our Winter photo exhibit at the Art Barn in Valpo.

Being around people that share the same interests definitely helps cure my seasonal depression. Now to keep that creative fire burning…….

Failure…

Failure…

Putting ourselves and our work out into the World is very intimidating. I’m probably my own worst critic when it comes to my own photographic work. I often feel my work isn’t good enough to pass as good. I think the idea of failure and the pain that comes along with it probably stops more of us from putting our work out for public consumption.

I’ve procrastinated for months, actually years about whether or not I should offer my work for others to hang in their home or other spaces.

I’ve finally come to the realization that sometimes we just have to jump off that ledge and take a chance. We might surprise ourselves. If we don’t try, we will never know if we were successful.

Not doing so, is failure…