What a Year of Shooting with Film Taught Me

At the end of 2021, I made a photography-themed New Year’s Resolution. I wanted to start using film and completely manual vintage cameras. This resolution would help me overcome a crutch I had become aware of. I felt that I had grown dependent on camera technology. Conveniently, I already owned an old Minolta SRT202 and a Pentax 6x7, but I had not really made much effort to use them yet (mostly because I had no idea what I was doing or how to meter for proper exposure.)

After going through Nick Carver’s “Master Manual Metering for Film” course (which I’ve hyperlinked), it changed everything for me! Without sounding too gushy, Mr. Carver’s teaching style is exactly what I needed. He has an amazing ability to dive deeply into a subject, give you a load of information but keep it entertaining and clear enough that you retain it. I honestly learned more about photography from this course than I ever had from watching hundreds of hours of YouTube videos on the subject.

Using his metering method changed the way I approached film photography and showed me how much potential it really offered. It even improved my digital photography, but we’ll get into that a little later.

So, let’s go through my list of lessons learned while shooting with film throughout 2022.

1. film will not rescue a bad photo

I’m hitting it heavy first because this smacked me in the face over and over and over again throughout the entire year.

Just because you are using film does not mean you don’t have to think about composition, subject, lighting, etc. - all the things that make a “good” photo.

There is a major influx of film photographers. It’s considered trendy. Unfortunately, there are many who are only jumping on the bandwagon because the filmic look is “in” right now. With it’s popularity, there is a danger in using that style as a crutch since “everything looks cooler with film” (I’ve literally heard someone claim that.)

I personally feel that, in my subjective opinion, too many photographers are taking photos with their film cameras that they would never even think of taking with their digital camera because the film renders it in a unique and stylistic way. They use film as a blanket to hide a bad photo.

The image above is one I captured in late December 2022 on Fuji FP-3000B peel apart instant film. It has a distinct style. If I had been using my Fujifilm GFX 50S II (my main digital camera), I would have never taken this photo. It’s off-balance, cluttered, and honestly just… blah. No matter how “stylistic” this type of film is, the photo was not rescued.

This image, on the other hand, I would have 100% taken with my digital camera. The simple subject surrounded by smooth water with a faintly seen submerged log and a gentle gradient as the light reflects on the water is just ideal. I love this photo, and it falls exactly in line with the type of photography that excites me. The fact that it was taken on old expired peel apart film only enhances the photo in my opinion.

2. Film will open your eyes to new compositions

This lesson walks hand-in-hand with the previous one. While film will not rescue a bad photo, it will definitely open your eyes to new compositions and subjects that you may not have thought of photographing beforehand.

There’s something about the vintage “look” to film (maybe it’s nostalgia?) that makes us want to experiment with photographing random subject we normally pass over - fire hydrants, road signs, light posts, etc. And maybe you can blame trend setters on Instagram, but there are a few photos I’ve taken this year that I would not have thought to take if it were not for film.

The images above are shot on CineStill 800T using my Pentax 6x7 and a 165mm lens. I would never have even found myself downtown taking photos like these if I had only had my digital camera. It’s only because I had a roll of CineStill (which renders neon lights in a super cool way) that I even made the drive into a busy city environment. The entire experience was so fun and so inspiring that I want to create more images just like them!

This lesson has had such a major impact on my photography that lately, instead of calling myself a “landscape photographer,” I’ve started just calling myself simply a “photographer.” (Who likes labels anyway?) So I’m not type-cast into only one niche and I can freely experiment with urban, landscape, historic, architecture, etc. photography. Check my Analog Photography gallery to see more of what I’m talking about.

3. Your technical knowledge will increase

It took nearly all of 2022 for me to realize this lesson. In combination with going through an actual photography course (thank you Nick Carver!), the process of being forced away from the digital handicap and into a completely manual approach, I learned more about what goes into photography and what is actually happening when you click the shutter and expose an image. I learned how changing the parameters of the camera affect each other, how to balance them no matter what my meter is telling me, and how to use them to achieve the “look” I want out of a scene.

There is a balancing act between the aspects of the photo capturing process (aperture, shutter speed, ISO, etc.) that I’ve written about at length in a previous entry. Using a fully manual camera with film has helped me learn so much about harnessing the power of these parameters. The skill of borrowing stops from one parameter to use in a different parameter has become such a part of my photography process that I even use this approach in my digital photography. If I like the exposure of a scene at f/8.0 and 1/60 of a second on ISO 400, then I will be able to open the aperture to f/2.8 (three stops lighter) and speed up the shutter to 1/500 of a second (three stops darker) with the same ISO 400 film to achieve the same exposure but give it a different “look.”

That understanding of how photography works will always improve your ability to photograph a scene in new and interesting ways.

4. Film will Improved your “Eye”

One major drawback to film photography, compared to digital, is that you have a limited number of photos you can take before you fill up a roll of film. Having a much smaller number of exposures available made me far more careful about every single composition. If I wasn’t really convinced of a photo while looking through the camera, I would move on. In my exclusively digital days, I would just snap a bunch of photos on my 128gb cards that could hold hundreds of RAW files, not even considering what it looked like or if there was a better way to compose it. Film taught me not to waste an exposure on a mediocre composition.

Compare one of my last photos of 2021 to one of my last photos of 2022.

Now, obviously, I’ve taken a lot of photos between 2021 and 2022 that have contributed to my overall artistic improvement, but I will give credit to the pursuit of film photography accelerating my education faster than if I had continued with only digital photography. (PS- this is the same hillside just from a different angle.)

It all boils down to being more selective with each photo. Because there is a greater limitation to how many photos fit on a roll and each exposure costs a certain amount to purchase, develop, and scan, it really forced me to think about whether or not each image was really worth taking. I passed up a lot of photos that I felt were mediocre to save that frame for a future photo that might be better. It made me more confident that if I was setting up an exposure with my film camera, I had taken the time to examine the scene and find the composition that was speaking to me the loudest. I was training my eye to see first and then seek out the photo.

This may be the most valuable lesson film photography has taught me, by the way, and it is why I will continue shooting film for as long as I pursue photography!

An advocate for education

I am an advocate of every photographer shooting with film from time to time especially if they want to accelerate their learning process and really dig deeply into the craft, learn to value each shot, and pre-visualize their photos.

I am not an advocate of jumping on the film bandwagon simply to gain popularity. I am also not an advocate of using filmic styles as a crutch to not think about composition, subject, lighting, etc. And lastly, I am definitely not an advocate of shooting film because it “needs no editing” to look good.

[WARNING: SOAP BOX RANT] Film is edited. You have to edit it when its scanned. And if you’re like me and you have to send it away to get developed and scanned, the person providing that service is editing your photo to look good when they scan it for you. Did you know the term “dodge and burn” (an editing term) comes from the film days (before computers) where photographers would “edit” their print during the enlargement process in the darkroom to achieve an edited look? Just please stop with that “film doesn’t need editing” nonsense. Maybe the negative doesn’t get edited, but if you scan, enlarge, print, etc. your negative (which you have to in order to post it to your social media pages or hang it on your bedroom wall) then there is definitely editing involved.

Sorry about that. I just had to get it out.

Get yourself a cheap film camera (doesn’t need to be medium format; 35mm is totally fine) and get some practice in. Expose a roll poorly and consider it a learning opportunity. Learn how different types of film make subjects look totally different. Experiment with shots you might normally pass up with your digital camera. Most importantly, though, shoot film because it’s a fun time and worth preserving.

-Jude