zuiko85
Veteran
Ok, Chris, you ARE cheap. But in my defense that $200 includes photo paper, which I've been using as a negative in my various cobbled together 4X5 cameras. So....I can do cheap too.
Saganich
Established
Photography should be a craft that has a balanced, sweet complexity of spirit, mind, and body producing images reflecting our humanity in the worlds we create. This can be achieved through digital, analogue, or hybrid processes and workflows, but it may be that traditional analogue process was a sweet spot and some young people are reaching back in order to extricate themselves a bit from a telepresent digital world where anything you create gets sucked into a void, co-opted for dubious consumption, or clearly suffers some palpable impermanence, for the sake of reconnecting with the local world their body occupies.
Forest_rain
Well-known
Finally someone is addressing the actual issue that young people are facing and why they are using film.
I recently gave a friend a camera, she wanted the oldest one I could find. I ended up giving her my old Contaflex. She didn't want anything to do with autofocus, sky high shutter speeds, and enjoyed manually rewinding the film. She liked walking to the film lab.
It's a sense of authenticity that young people are looking for when they are trying out film. That's why lomography has been successful in selling overpriced, dubiously performing cameras - the distorted photos and lo-fi aesthetic is the polar opposite of what modern smartphone and DSLRs represent.
That being said I'm not convinced that lomography sells anything other than overpriced novelties, which is definitely not the authenticity which young people are looking for when they are trying out film.
I recently gave a friend a camera, she wanted the oldest one I could find. I ended up giving her my old Contaflex. She didn't want anything to do with autofocus, sky high shutter speeds, and enjoyed manually rewinding the film. She liked walking to the film lab.
It's a sense of authenticity that young people are looking for when they are trying out film. That's why lomography has been successful in selling overpriced, dubiously performing cameras - the distorted photos and lo-fi aesthetic is the polar opposite of what modern smartphone and DSLRs represent.
That being said I'm not convinced that lomography sells anything other than overpriced novelties, which is definitely not the authenticity which young people are looking for when they are trying out film.
Pál_K
Cameras. I has it.
Yes: a sense of direct involvement. She winds the film, sets the shutter speed on a dedicated dial, sets the aperture on a lens ring, and focuses the lens while seeing the image change in the viewfinder. It's not the ultra-precise clinical experience you get with digital.
As I told a co-worker who was telling me how his high-tech automatic transmission can shift in a millisecond compared to my manual transmission, it's not about speed - its about being involved and engaged in the experience.
When I use 120 film in a pinhole camera or 127 film in an old Brownie, it's actually enjoyable - at least to me - winding the film and seeing the lettering and numbers in the little red window.
One of the most unexpected and enjoyable things about pack film is the whole process of pulling the tabs and separating the film.
David Hughes
David Hughes
Like big luxury cars, even when driving the thing I feel like a passenger with no say in what it does...
Regards, David
Regards, David
Out to Lunch
Ventor
David...you have to read the manual!
Archlich
Well-known
This July, realizing how fast the films are getting even more expensive, I bought 20 boxes of 3-pack Superia 400 from B&H for $13.99 each.
Why did I do that? Because the previous time I bought them, they cost $9.99 a box. That was May 2019. A 40% hike in a bit more than one year. I don't think we suddenly get to apply "modern standard" to film prices only within that relatively short period of time.
Man they're expensive! $14.99 for a roll of E100 and you'd have to get them developed (and mounted and scanned)! The more you shoot the greater the impact.
But w/e. I'm sure film shooters here are well stocked (me too). I digress.
Guth
Appreciative User
During the course of this conversation I wasn’t even aware that Kodak themselves had released a new 35mm film camera in the past year.
Forest_rain
Well-known
Are you the one who bought them out? 
I checked and those are all back ordered. I had to buy individual rolls for $18 for 3. Oh well. Seems like demand for cheap film is higher than supply these days, or the supply chain may be messed up because of the current situation as well.
I checked and those are all back ordered. I had to buy individual rolls for $18 for 3. Oh well. Seems like demand for cheap film is higher than supply these days, or the supply chain may be messed up because of the current situation as well.