Who we are? I mean film fotographers.

<p>Actually this inspired by the posting regarding a magazine targeting specifically film photography. Obviously we are not main stream photography people. Sooner or latter we going to be same type of hobbyists like plastic model tank assemblers or American Civil War impersonnators. What it would mean for us in the nearest future? Special film order? Specialty stores and mail-order catalogues? Would price for film be as high as the price for the WWII replica uniform? Jus suggestions....</p>

<p>As for who we are? Just folks who appreciate the look of film and maybe enjoy keeping the faith.</p>

<p>I think if the the big film companies can no longer make a go of it somebody in China or the Czech Republic will still make the stuff. Color film never made B&W film go way. Digital won't make film go away either.</p>

<p>Matter of fact outside of the labs and specialized pro printers B&W film photography has always been the realm of hobbyists and enthusiasts. It was never a mainstream pastime. I'm 55 years of age and am the only one I know (or have ever known) that that has a darkroom and makes sliver prints.</p>

<p>Start a membership club where you can buy large amounts of film in bulk and pay for storage, then everyone gets a share and whoever doesn't want their film size or type can trade it with other members. In that case whether or not film becomes rarer you can get film for cheaper. If there's a big enough order you could even get specialty batches of rarer formats or films. From there start your own film brand.</p>

<p>That's all you gotta do.. ;)</p>

<p>"We, film photographers" Who are we?</p>

<p>We are all gentlemen and scholars, a judge of fine whiskey, very handsome, can eyeball exposure (or at least bracket like crazy), can work out reproduction ratios for macro photos in our head, and can reload our SLR's on a dead run.</p>

<p>Anything else you wanted to know?</p>

<p>The most interesting people you have ever known. (Just to stick with the theme above).</p>

<p>For me, I'm not a film photographer. Instead, I'm a film camera photographer. I'm interested in the film cameras, not the fact that they happen to require film to produce images. I'll be perfectly happy if the film goes extinct but there's a digital imaging device in the shape of film cassettes or 120 rolls that I can put into my film cameras, like what they attempted to do several years ago. Talking about that, maybe the technology has advance enough for that concept to be practical now.</p>

<p>To follow up to my own post, deep down inside, I'm a mechanic, not a chemist.</p>

<p>Earler this month I traveled on a large cruise ship. I used film cameras. The only other people I saw using film were a guy about 65 with a Pentax K1000 and an guy about 80 using a Leica RF. I collect and use film cameras so I hope film and processing will be available for a while longer. This morning three wild turkeys wandered into my front yard. I grabbed my Pentax K-x and shot with the 18-55. We're in that odd situation where as the price of film and processing goes up, volume goes down and the cycle is going in the wrong direction. I used to think that color print film would be here the longest. Now I think b&w will be here longer. I hope that over time film sales will bottom out and then go up slowly if new hobbyists take an interest. </p>

<p>Yefei, so right! My film cameras have loads of character. They are expressions of camera design art. Not so my DSLR. It's a lump, a black box that puts forth a data stream that must be interpreted by a computer chip to form an image. When that computer goes belly up then it's just a paperweight and being made of light weight plastic it's not even a good paper weight.</p>

<p>I'm a photographer who uses film, which is different from a 'film photographer'. I have no specific allegiance to film, and when the advantages of digital outweigh those of film, I'll use digital.</p>

<p>There are probably a lot of people here who are like me. I don't do this for a living. I work slow and only make a couple of thousand exposures a year. I have a few good film cameras that I like to use. Paraphrased, there's no reason to change.</p>

<p>We're old farts! :P</p>

<p>I do it because I enjoy the less automated process, I like the look of film, I admire the mechanics and engineering behind older cameras, with a bit of nostalgia thrown in, including my weird fondness of the smell of the chemicals.</p>

<p>But I shoot digital more because of convenience, low light capabilities, and the fact that I'm far better in the digital darkroom than I ever was in the analog one (you know, dodging and burning and the like - never really got very good at that).</p>

<p>Who am I? <em>I am Spartacus</em></p>

<p>I hate when someone predicts an ugly future, com'on, reenactors? I can see me know, hunched over a 500c/m VF, not because it's a waist level finder, it's because I'm all hunched over. And as young kids pass with a nano 4/3 22 meg camera, I can't even hear them snicker...</p>

<p>I guess I'm with John, but I've left no cheap whiskey unexplored either, kind of like shooting "Beautiful Seagull Film" from Yank Mai Chane, China.</p>

<p>I think I need an ice cream cone.</p>

<p>Whoever can invent a digital film insert for a camera will be my hero. That way we can use our film cameras forever. </p>

<p>...I'm honestly not quite sure...but using mechanical cameras and developing prints seems to give me a sense of satisfaction similar to using a fountain pen to lay down an expressive line upon stationery writing longhand letters to friends and family. Or the tactile delight I feel winding a precision mechanical watch to keep time upon my wrist. And the joy I experience gliding silently along the glass-like surface of the water in a cherry ribbed canoe. Or even smoking cigars conversing with friends or playing a game of chess. So while I'm not sure how those things are related, they all bring me joy.</p>

<p>I'm with Dave SIms. Film is good but there is nothing magical in it. Film cameras are good but they can be annoying. Digital is good but there is nothing special about it either. When film goes, it goes. Thanks for the good times, it was fun. There is no point to worry, whine or muse about it. Heck, most of us will disappear before film does. When my eyes start to go and my ideas and inspiration dry up. <em>Then</em> I'll worry. In the mean time, load me a roll, or shove in a CF card and hand me a camera. Life is short and I have pictures to make before I go.</p>

<p>You've got it right, Louis. And I do enjoy your pictures. Hope you make many more before you go.</p>

<p>We are mostly people too cheap to make the financial investments in digital equipment, and too mentally lazy to learn how to do it.</p>

<p>Film photographers come from all walks of life. Different purposes, goals and aspirations. I am just a guy with a camera. </p>

<p>I'm getting a kick out of using a 1959 Brownie Hawkeye and getting more interesting shots than some do with thousands of dollars worth of stuff. I also LOVE the finisse of my new 1937 Voigtlander Bessa.</p>

<p>Kent in SD</p>

<p>I spent the decade of the 1950s yearning for and never having a good camera. I lost interest in photography out of sheer frustration. Years later when I turned to photography again, I bought all sorts of 1950s cameras in addition to a Minolta XG-7. I mostly shot with the then-new Minolta. The others were salves.<br>

I can now buy film equipment that I could never have afforded in various decades past, or even now if digital had not come along. It's really interesting to see what top-level equipment is like. The equipment is so good that it will keep me satisfied for the rest of my llife, or as long as film is around. <br>

I have a Nikon F90x, a Leica M3, a Rolleiflex 3.5F, a MInox ML----you get the idea. What a pleasure to shoot with such machines!</p>

<p> </p>

<p>Who I am is someone who sees absolutey no need to change equipment. (I have a good scanner, though, and I think this is critical for my particular purposes, and now the industry is taking this option away for those who don't already have one.) I love the elegance, mechanical design, relative simplicity and longevity of the equipment, and the process; I like a physical "hard copy"; and, I appreciate the variety and incredible results that various modern films reliably produce.</p>

<p>I see so much "follow the crowd" thinking, in general, along with materialism, and the seeming need for instant gratification. There's so much b.s.: the veneration of sports figures who are often really drug-enhanced fakes; Sarah Palin and simplistic politics; the dangerous popularity of things like pitbulls despite seeing the consequences virtually every day; corporate "leaders" that enrich themselves so outrageously while simultaneously shipping industry and jobs to a nation where exploitation of people and environment is a-ok. Etc.</p>

<p>With the level of equipment consciousness today, I can't help but think that it's at least somewhat related to the rest, or, maybe a by-product of it... More and more, I think that as we get increasingly technologically sophisticated, somehow we are going in the other direction with our critical thinking... Jmho.</p>

<p>I do consider myself the odd one out most of the time when I see street photographers with their DSLRs. Chance meeting with another film photographer are still rare for me; I was taking a snapshot of some street musicians in Dublin with my Rolleicord, when I stood up my "spider-sense" told me I was being observed. Sure enough, I saw a young fellow (20-ish) wearing a combat jacket with a Polish flag patch on his arm. In his hands was a Eastern European TLR, our eyes locked for a second. We nodded and went our way.<br>

Oh dear, I'm already a re-enactor. It does bring me in contact with former film users a lot though.</p>

<p>Why do I do it? I like the look of film, I like classic cameras from the 1940s and older. I can combine them with my Living History hobby. I like the taste of a good whiskey (or cheap one) and I've been known to smoke a cigar from time to time.</p>

<p> </p>

<p>I am a photographer who is interested mainly in having a nearly permanent image to work with, not one that may rot away on a hard drive and be unusable later on.</p>

<p>Yes, I love film, but seriously, that's mostly what it's about for me: permanence.</p>

I have to agree with pretty much everything being presented here! I do think film will outlast me. I love handling the old machines and while to properly use them I should make pictures, but I'm sort of happy snapping the shutter and exercising them from time to time. I Sometimes I get some great pictures, sometimes and then I love showing people the camera I used! But that's hardly anything than showing off.. I like film, I do my own B&W because I like it, I can and it's economical.

I remember one post here where a colleague mused over the longterm prospects of ilm and realized, that B&W may outlast color...I realized that too when speculating the scene in 20 years! I hate doomsayers, I'll do it as long as I can, and they can pry my (conventional/mechanical) camera from my cold dead.. etc, but when it's over it's over! I suspect someone will eventually market a focal plane sensor thin enough to place across the 25mm FP or 120 plane. The computer storage device will fit in the film chamber. The technology is there, it just has be economically interesting for someone to do it.

 

HHMMhh will it ever be???