Film is fringe

[boarini2003]

It's funny, but lately I have observed that it's "cool" or "contrary" ;-) to use mechanical cameras and film. That's how much things have changed. Film users are now a fringe group! I notice it when I walk around town on weekends, holding my Bessa or my FM2, and people stare at the camera, or ask me questions about it. "How many megapixels in film?" "What do you mean 'no batteries'?" Sometimes people ask to see it, and they love to hold it and ask questions about it. Sometimes I want to go unnoticed, and it's not me, but the camera getting the attention. And especially on weekends, I bump into quite a few that use film SLRs. Just yesterday I say a guy walking around with an old black Canon F-1. On easter I even say a couple tourists with Leicas, one had an R9, the other an M6. And like two weeks ago, I saw about 15 people using manual cameras in a single day. I saw nikon F, Olympus OM, and countless Canons. It was certainly a joy!

 

[darkkavenger]

That is nice! Where was it ?

 

[Simon Larbalestier]

It's funny, but lately I have observed that it's "cool" or "contrary" ;-) to use mechanical cameras and film. That's how much things have changed. Film users are now a fringe group!

Not wishing to be rude here:
So we are a fringe group now? is this meant to be a joke? -
what total B******S :bang:

 

[darkkavenger]

I'm being more specific : it's nice to see people with manual cameras. 🙂

 

[mike_j]

Well, maybe it's different here in rural England. No-one takes a blind bit of notice what camera you have apart from apologising for being in the way - very annoying if you are trying to get shots with people in them!.

Only reaction to a specific camera I have had was in a pub when someone asked about my Rollei 35T - he couldn't undersatnad how it worked without a battery.

 

[kully]

I agree with Mike, I see film cameras all the time. Mostly P&Ss, the expensive cameras I see are mostly digital.

I think it's people using what they're used to - you put a film in and then get prints from it. Rather than mucking about with computers and the like.

I live in a small city, I'd like to see more photographers of any sort - commonality would sure cut down on the dirty stares people taking photos get around here.

 

[jamiewakeham]

Hmm. I think, in my experience at least, the OP has a point. Digi P&S are so much standard issue, at least to my age group, that to shoot film at all marks me as a little off-the-wall. Certainly, my Zorki is useless as a stealth camera because everyone remarks on it and wants to play with it! I'd be more inconspicuous with a digicam...

Cheers
Jamie

 

[ch1]

I agree with Mike, I see film cameras all the time. Mostly P&Ss, the expensive cameras I see are mostly digital.

I think it's people using what they're used to - you put a film in and then get prints from it. Rather than mucking about with computers and the like.

I live in a small city, I'd like to see more photographers of any sort - commonality would sure cut down on the dirty stares people taking photos get around here.

Odd, I would say it is quite the opposite here in tourist-packed NYC. Seems as if almost everyone is toting a digi P&S (or even a digicamera phone). Yes, I also see more expensive dSLRs - but the archtype is a 20-something Japanese female with a small digi P&S about the size of a pack of cancer sticks.!

Yesterday I planted myself in a spot at 52nd and 6th Ave. and was shooting people (mainly cellphone users) with my F3. It was interesting that a number of people looked at the camera apprehensively at first and then "relaxed". Almost as if once they saw it was a big clunkly film camera they figured I must not be "spying" on them! 😀

 

[Simon Larbalestier]

Hmm. I think, in my experience at least, the OP has a point. Digi P&S are so much standard issue, at least to my age group, that to shoot film at all marks me as a little off-the-wall. Certainly, my Zorki is useless as a stealth camera because everyone remarks on it and wants to play with it! I'd be more inconspicuous with a digicam...

Cheers
Jamie

Maybe that's true but when i was working on my last project in Cambodia one of the people i was with, had digital P & S to make quick record shots to go with reports. That camera got a lot of attention because everyone watched behind as the person checked the images on the screen! However luckily i was ignored with my rangefinders and could concentrate making the pictures. In this context the digital P & S had a bit of novelty factor and also represented a sign of wealth as it was "new technology". I only got strange looks when i took the bottom off my camera to change films.

I'm sure this would be diiferent in more developed countries so may i am on the fringe. 🙂

 

[boarini2003]

Darkkavenger: It's in Antigua, Guatemala

Simon: No, I don't mean it as a joke. Out of all the people in my circle, nobody, I mean NOBODY uses film. Not in school, not in my family, and rarely on the street. For every film camera I see, I find 20 digital Point and shoots. Hence the use of the term "fringe."

 

[Simon Larbalestier]

OK boarini2003 i wasn't having a pop at you 🙂

perhaps we should rename this site fringefinderforum.com 😀

certainly the shift in consumer markets had forced some labs and decent old fashioned camera shops to close or become something else (i'm thinking of Jessops and Calumet here) in the UK - not to mention some respected camera manufacters. Fortunately there are still some diehard film users in Bangkok and some great used gear to be found.

 

[ch1]

Simon: No, I don't mean it as a joke. Out of all the people in my circle, nobody, I mean NOBODY uses film. Not in school, not in my family, and rarely on the street. For every film camera I see, I find 20 digital Point and shoots. Hence the use of the term "fringe."

I absolutely agree that film cameras are much less frequently seen than digis, espescially P&S's. The digi is the snapshot camera of the present era and snapshot shooters comprise the vast bulk of users. People love to see the image, both before and immediately after the shot. They cluster around the shooter after he/she takes a picture.

In fact, I'd guess that very few digi images ever get printed. People see the pic on the LCD, admire it (or not) and then erase it after awhile when the memory card gets filled!

 

[bmattock]

My take on this - two forces at work here. The first is generational, and the second is due to technology-skipping.

Generational: My nieces and nephews (who are now adults, some in the military already, no matter how much I want them to be 'kids') are unfamiliar with B&W television, phones with rotary dials, broadcast television. They've never known a world that did not have a microwave oven, MTV, and the Internet. The idea that I could not just call home on my cell phone when I was in the military, but had to stand in line to use a pay phone was amazing to them. They at least know what a film camera is - but they have never seen a 'slide show', they would not recognize a slide if you handed one to them. And they're just on the cusp of one technology change - they'll fondly remember to their kids that they remember when people took film cartridges to one-hour shops to get their photos processed, and their kids will have no idea what they're talking about.

Technology Skipping: Many parts of the world that have, for one reason or another, never had a middle-class or a photo-taking culture are now joining the digital world. And they're not waiting in line to have land-lines installed in villages that have never owned a phone so that they can make a call - they're going straight to cell phones. They won't be progressing through film to digital cameras - they are going straight to digital. Some of them will never have been exposed (you'll pardon the pun, please) to film technology at all - and why should they?

Yes, I realize that many here will post that their kids, grandkids, local urchins and waifs, etc, have all 'discovered' film and how funky cool it is and they're all setting up darkrooms and turning their backs on technology because they realize how evil it is - or whatever - but that's not the trend. Like the kids who have 'discovered' vinyl LP's - they may represent a small fraction of a percent of the market, but CD sales have not lost any ground to LP's, even if LP's have found a brief respite from oblivion. LP's are not 'back' in any meaningful sense.

What the heck. I never liked being mainstream anyway.

Best Regards,

Bill Mattocks

 

[Simon Larbalestier]

SNIP:

Technology Skipping: Many parts of the world that have, for one reason or another, never had a middle-class or a photo-taking culture are now joining the digital world. And they're not waiting in line to have land-lines installed in villages that have never owned a phone so that they can make a call - they're going straight to cell phones. Best Regards,

Bill Mattocks

sorry to edit your post Bill all the points you made are very valid and i agree with what you say - this mobile phone comment one is certainly the case in Cambodia. I've never seen so many colour screen mobile phones in a place where the kids can only go to school for half of the day and the TV (B/W) runs off a car battery. But you can sing along to favourite Khmer pop tunes downloaded as MP3 files on your mobile.

i'm way off topic now.

 

[Andy K]

When out on my bike I often cycle up to an observation deck along the seafront. Through the summer it will be busy with tourists etc. all taking pictures of the promenade and pier with their p&s cameras, some film, mostly digital... what I have noticed is that when they want a picture of themselves, although they are surrounded by other people with cameras like theirs, they will always approach the guy with a camera bag and slr or rangefinder around his neck (me) and ask for their picture taken. It happens so much I am considering charging.

 

[ClaremontPhoto]

Yes, I see technology skipping here. There is no recorded music on vinyl, just CD's and MP3's.

 

[JohnL]

No doubt they reason that if you can actually use a non-automatic camera then you are a photographic genius ...

 

[jtzordon]

I can't remember the last time I saw someone using a film camera; I don't think I've ever seen someone using a rangefinder. This in the past two and a half years of use. All I see are digital p&s.

 

[KoNickon]

Andy, I take it you mean they ask to have you take their picture with their camera. Sounds like a compliment -- the guy with the old camera knows what he's doing; ask him to take it.

 

[Hamster]

I think now is a good oppurtunity to recoup some of the lost ground in photography in the last few decades, I am in particular referring to those negative association with paparazzi and people being generally annoyed when they have a camera pointed at them.

Film RF having the form factor that they have will hopefully in future be equated as different, it is like a lot of people don;t feel so threatened when I point at them with a TLR, but using a SLR often are very intimidating.If film users are no longer being pigeonholed as as some other groups of photographer, then I think it can even be a good thing.