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| Thread ID: 150157 | 2021-09-29 22:20:00 | What to do with an old film camera? | Tony (4941) | PC World Chat |
| Post ID | Timestamp | Content | User | ||
| 1480961 | 2021-10-16 05:18:00 | Just curious as to why people shoot film these days? Ken :) |
kenj (9738) | ||
| 1480962 | 2021-10-16 05:55:00 | Just curious as to why people shoot film these days? Ken :) It is not just to get a image out of it. It is the thought and enjoyment and the process. I guess it is like saying why paint if I could just take a photo? Why knit if I could just buy? By make bread if I could just buy? Why grow veges if I could just buy? Some people get into a darkroom to make wet prints, they also get into alternative processes how part of the process you le the print out in the sun for the UV. Film has a diff look and feel. It slows you down. With BW film you can pick different film, diff film developers, different developing recipes. The younger people prob see it as different and trendy. I guess many people might say, why take photos at all? They rather just watch TV or chit chat and drink beer and wine ..... If take photographs, take portraiture and weddings and celebrations huh ... I mean why take photographs of sunsets, sunrises, door knobs, empty corridors and shadows or photograph strangers people we don't know on the street :lol: Yes, some people have asked me why I do it. They don't get it. Some might say, why meet the same people, talk about the same things, eat the same foods. Why spend all those hours in the garage on cars. Why spend all the time on computers. Most people just need to get from A to B with something maybe that is new and trendy, and their computers works with YouTube and Facebook and their Gmail. That's the thing. I feel really conflicted. One one hand I would like to be rid of it, but on the other hand it offends me to sell it for a pittance. I looked at your links, and even $50 is a bit of an insult. Same as a smartphone, a computer. My first digital SLR without a lens was $1,500 for a entry one in 2004, today under $100. |
Nomad (952) | ||
| 1480963 | 2021-10-16 06:19:00 | Just curious, for around 15 years I did B&W, rolled my own 35mm in re-usable cassettes from 30M bulk dispenser and 6x6 film, darkroom develop & print. Then printing of 35mm colour film and slides in drums in my home made temperature bath! Quite an art back then. Especially the slides. Temperature was critical to +-.5° in both types. Then 8 years of doing video only. Since then I have never had the desire to go back to it. Do you do the "full catastrophe" or do you scan your machine developed negs and machine print? Once again, just curious! Ken :) |
kenj (9738) | ||
| 1480964 | 2021-10-16 06:39:00 | I don't have access to a darkroom at home . So I develop BW film in a changing bag or a wardrobe . I use a Paterson tank . I put the film inside it . Walk out and develop it in my bathroom . Hang to dry in garage and scan with my Nikon Coolscan . Or Epson flatbed with larger film . I have a $1,500 A3 Espon printer I got second hand for $100 which came with $100 worth of inks and papers . Slide film is so $$ here not done in some time but I send to the USA in batches of 10 rolls and more still cheaper than here . The younger lot are quite happy to use cheap plastic point and shoots and use expired film and lomo cameras . They like the unexpectedness . They also mostly get the lab to process and scan JPEGs for them which many discard the negs . The lab manager told us some of them ask them to dispose them . They just want the JPEGs to put on Instagram which they will hashtag the lab as well . So BW is more different cos diff film, diff developer, diff recipes etc . How you can push and pull the ISO ie use ISO 400 at 1600 and then adjust the developing recipe . Re: color slide film is quite digital looking huh . It's color, it can be saturated and fine grain as it can get . Slide processing is a standard process . You cannot alter the recipe . Well you can you can shoot Provia 400 at 1600 or 3200 as they say in the Fuji brochure for sports but Provia 400 is no longer available . The fastest slides are ISO 100 now . To me it is to use these cameras we love in the past that we didn't have the chance cos many have dropped in price now . We can slow down and try it now . I only got into photography in 2004 with a dSLR . So I have never developed film before, I have never shot BW film before too . To shoot a sunset landscape on slide film so it is perfectly exposed without the need to fine tune in software, how to use the spot meter and employ filters etc . It is more involved, more hands on, enjoyment from that, a challenge . Sure digital is cheaper and easier . So much stuff you can do in software, there is also the camera rear LCD . I am DOB 1978 . To like many, we only shot 2 or 3 rolls a year with uni maybe 8 rolls with a point and shoot dropped off at the pharmacy for a set of prints . Some got into a digital point and shoot from the year 2000 I didn't . So like some families it was a 2000 year film SLR on duty free overseas . Again shooting Kodak Gold and the like and dropped off at the pharmacy with the kit lens only . With those older timers who still do it now . They just like it, they shoot digital and film . Granted many of them shoot analog with BW film cos BW film still looks a bit different than digital BW . I know someone who has a darkroom in his house he doesn't have a digital camera, his wife does . Retired age . Yeah . . my barber used to process slides as well in his home but now he has moved to digital with his Olympus 4/3 the larger one not the Micro 4/3 but he is thinking about getting a M4/3 EM1 Mark II . |
Nomad (952) | ||
| 1480965 | 2021-10-16 08:13:00 | Take an old photographers advice... get into B&W wet processing, smell the chemicals, feel the chemicals on your hands, use an enlarger if they are still around, etc..... I guarantee you will love it. If you want to do film, walk away from anything digital in doing anything. You will get hooked on it. Work on getting a darkroom. Mine was an old builders shed I paid $25 for and about $100 for materials to set up. I had a young family and bugger all money then. Made up so much by cunning. For example, my red light was a peanut butter jar I had rolled red paint around inside and put a low wattage bulb through the lid. :) Film is nothing to me now. At my age digital is easier. But never as satisfying:) Ken |
kenj (9738) | ||
| 1480966 | 2021-10-16 08:45:00 | If we are doing nostalgia, I also have a Solida camera and an Ensign 320 that belonged to my father. He was a keen amateur and did a lot of his own processing. He was also in the RAF in WWII and spent his time doing processing of photo reconnaissance films. His one claim to fame (or infamy) was that he messed up one particular roll of film that turned out to be photos of the "Tirpitz" in the Norwegian fjord. It meant some poor pilot had to go and risk his life again to shoot more pictures. My father always reckoned that was why he never got promoted. The other notable feature of his RAF service was that he was the only man allowed to stand to attention on parade with one hand in his pocket! When he was a kid he broke his arm and it wasn't set properly, which meant he couldn't straighten the elbow. If he had stood as everybody else did his elbow would have dug into whoever was next to him. In peacetime I guess he would have never been accepted into the service, but they presumably needed everybody they could get. |
Tony (4941) | ||
| 1480967 | 2021-10-16 20:45:00 | I had around 20 old cameras, mainly folding types up to about 15+ years ago. One was a Kodak VPK (Vest Pocket Kodak) This was a folding bellows camera the likes of which were smuggled to the trenches in WW1. Personal cameras were forbidden in the war. It had a hinged door about 75*15mm that could be opened and a metal scribe for writing on the exposed film backing paper. This scored the film and the result was black printing on the film negatives which showed as white on the positive prints. Quite an interesting little beast. Only have 6 left now as I gave a lot to the local Camera House shop in Napier whose manager (also a Ken) had a collection on display on the top shelves. Unfortunately, Camera House closed down and I don't know where they went. :(. I have 5x35mm cameras and 1 TLR . Plus a Weston Master light meter. I love the feel, looks and engineering of the old gear. Ken :) |
kenj (9738) | ||
| 1480968 | 2021-10-16 21:05:00 | Nomad..... Sent you a Personal Message :) | kenj (9738) | ||
| 1480969 | 2021-10-16 21:16:00 | I spent many happy hours in my dark room developing & printing colour & black & white. It was a refuge from domesticity. I would probably do it now but it is far too expensive, and the chemicals don't keep. My favourite was Black & White, the subject had to be interesting. I used to buy time expired film from wholesalers. | mzee (3324) | ||
| 1480970 | 2021-10-16 21:19:00 | Happy hours is a great description. It is one of those things that can't be understood until you do it yourself! B&W chemicals weren't too bad for shelf life but colour was pretty iffy for lifespan. I had a chemist mate,who I did work for, let me have small quantities of developer at a time from his print shop machine. That was good :) Ken :) |
kenj (9738) | ||
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