Do you really hate digital?I started photography around1959 with a camera which took photos 1 inch square. Then instalation, kodak. Quickly onto slr. I miss the excitement of waiting for the films to be processed, and would love to go back to 35 film cameras. I'd even go back to cameras which needed no batteries, so that would rule out automatic focus. Anyone else think like this.
+1Do you really hate digital?
If you're missing the excitement of the wait, you could always set your camera on full manual, disable photo preview, use manual focus and shoot raw and make a computer your darkroom. Then if you needed them, you could have them back in a minute.
Might be close enough to make it fun for you.
I think that small cameras like the X10 that "punch above their weight" are succumbing to the phone onslaught. I had an X30, now with my son, and then an X70. That camera was discontinued very soon after it arrived, perhaps because it had everything bar an EVF that its big brothers offered.I did exactly what Slapo said. Bought a little Fujifilm X10 because it looks like an old rangefinder, has an optical viewfinder, has full manual control, shoots RAW and has respectable Fujinon glass. You can use LR or Photoshop to 'develop' the RAW which also allows you to fix wrong exposure. But it also will shoot JPG in full auto if capturing the moment is more relevant than setting up the shot. The X10 is a great camera that fits in the pocket. It's discontinued now but I'm sure there must be a similar model in the current offering.
I don't think there's anything we disagree about here, and I'm +1 on the cost and limitations of film today. On that, we had some heady times at the end of the 70's and into the 80's, when a certain Nelson Bunker Hunt had cornered the silver market, thus incidentally increasing the cost of film.55 years ago I was in the womb and there wasn't much to take pics of, lighting was terrible and everything would have had a red filter! And now I'm also in advertising but not mixing with top photographers alas.
Indeed, a photographer makes the image not the software, no argument from me there. I'm simply "+1"ing Slapo's suggestion for someone who misses the days of having a wide choice of films and the fun of developing them but balks at the price of it now. I'm certainly not a proponent of the "take a crap snap and fix it in post" school of photography! It's more important to have an eye for composition and spotting great images before they're taken than to have such and such a camera/lens/film/paper whatever. I used to shoot medium format monochrome and develop it myself 35 years ago but now I can't even be bothered to carry the X10 anymore because it means downloading to my laptop and nobody ever seeing the pictures. A phone takes lesser images for sure, but you can take them, edit, share or show/view them all on a thing in your pocket so in that much I totally agree with you.
You make an interesting point about filters. In my film days, I was, for a while, seduced by filters, and had a number of Wratten and Cokin filters, mainly for use in landscape photography. They were useful, but an extra thing to lug around and think about, and eventually I decided that the right speed film, plus A and S settings, were sufficient for my own needs. I think most of what they do can now be achieved in PP, but I'm still wedded to the idea that I want to achieve a particular result in-camera and with the minimum of tinkering thereafter. Nowadays, it's mostly denoising, sharpening and sorting out the vignetting that always happens if I use an APS-C lens on a FF camera, which is a new challenge for me, as I never had a format mix before.I spent my formative years working in the film finishing industry, prior to moving into IT. I devoted a lot of time to film photography in the late 70's and 80's and i have to disagree a little with some of the points about the "simplicity / purity" of film.
I say this because i knew back then many keen photographers who would spend an age using filters to get the desired effect (including yellow, green, red and UV filters for B&W). They would also spend a lot of time at the print stage (or we would) dodging and burning to get the desired output.
For that reason, my personal opinion, FWIW, is that we are in a golden age of photography or which phone cameras are one small miraculous part.
I sold all my SLR and DSLR gear some years back and just use my phone and a Sony RX-100 these days .
I think photoshop and lightroom are so much easier to use and give better results at the end. HDR gives much better results that the limited contrast range of film. The only thing missing, for me, is the ability to properly reproduce the Kodachrome colour pallete digitally to give that lovely punchy retro look - i havnt ever seen digital match it properley
Film photography is lovely and tactile as an experience, as are vinyl records, but there is no going back for me !!
Have to say i am a bit biased tho, as i spend too many years fiddling with parallel shift and tilt base enlargers trying to fix things and the ever present checking for that whiff of ammonia which meant the dev tanks had become tainted with fix and needed emptying and cleaning .....
All the above is just my thoughts - its neither right nor wrong
Have you tried pinhole on a mirrorless camera? I've been playing with it, but it's a bit complicated to get the settings just so. The upside is that a poor result can be discarded and another attempt made, with the cost being the electricity to recharge batteries.To be honest, I don’t miss film. I sold my Leica M over a decade ago and have been digital ever since. With some care and thought, even an iPhone can give very good results.
I still like to make pinholes on photo paper with converted tea tins and old boxes. That’s fun to me and easy to process because all that’s needed is a room that can be darkened and a safelight. For developing basic Rodinal can be used or even a selfmade brew from instant coffee.
No, I’ve never tried pinhole photography with a digital camera. I think the main problem is battery life and the fact that any sensor dust will show up on the files.Have you tried pinhole on a mirrorless camera? I've been playing with it, but it's a bit complicated to get the settings just so. The upside is that a poor result can be discarded and another attempt made, with the cost being the electricity to recharge batteries.
Ahhh, the mighty Zenith EIn the past I did use old camers with m42 threads that require no batteries to operate. Think old Soviet Zenit cameras. They worked great with a body cap converted to a pinhole. Because no batteries were required, I was able to put them in ‘B’ mode for as long as I wanted. I even shot pinholes handheld. I got very ‘dreamy’ results on b/w film. Great fun!
I still have my dad’s old Zenit-E with original lens. Made in 1978. Still works great.Ahhh, the mighty Zenith E
They either broke straight away, or just worked and worked for years. Fantastic bit of kit to have back in the day.
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