Trying my hand at film
I’ve always been afraid of film photography.
Maybe it’s because I can’t see the photos right after I take them or maybe it’s just because I don’t want to embarrass myself loading the film wrong.
But I finally guilted myself into film photography and dusted off the old Nikon F at the bottom of my photo chest.
I went through about three roles of film in a week: one role of CineStill 50D and a couple rolls of Kodak Gold200. For what I was photographing, I liked the Kodak Gold better. While the CineStill was beautiful in certain situations, I don’t think the price warrants it to be an everyday roll.
I enjoyed the photos I took much more than I was expecting. I was more thoughtful about each photo and since I didn’t do any editing in Lightroom besides a bit of sharpening I was more content leaving the photos be.
This is especially true with the cocktail photo. I’ve taken plenty of cocktail photos since quarantine began but I’ve never been happy with them. Whenever I try to do a cocktail photoshoot, I tinker with the setup so much that I’m never satisfied. With this photo, I took one image on a whim because I saw some good light. I couldn’t tinker with it because I didn’t know how it turned out.
I’d like to continue using film. I think if I found a cheaper way to develop and scan images it could be viable for certain projects and assignments. Once I got over the fear of messing up and felt comfortable loading the film it was a really enjoyable process and the anticipation of getting my images back was exciting.
