Film Cameras

Mary Lou gave me her collection of 35mm film camera bodies, lenses, and other accesories that she had accumulated over the years. Some of the stuff was caught in a flood at her apartment in Jackson a few years ago, so it may have been junk. I've been going through all of it and doing research on what I found and decided to resurrect what I could and shoot with it along side all of the digital stuff I shoot with now.

I know, I know -- why would you want to shoot with 35mm film now when you've got digital? Well, you might be surprised.

First, these camera are really well built and a joy to use. (They just don't make them like the used to!) They're made out of metal and glass and there's hardly any plastic on them. They feel like a fine machine instead of a piece of electronics.

Second, since the cameras are very basic, they require you to know what you're doing and set just about everything manually. That means pick your aperature, shutter speed, and manual focus. It makes you think about what you're doing and click the shutter carefully.

The hassle is that you've got to deal with film processing like the old days and then add another step to get the negatives scanned so you can share online. The scanning has become the real hassle for me. I have a Canon ink jet printer/scanner that will scan 35mm negatives but it doesn't do a very good job. Good scanners are expensive and all of this takes a long time. The trick is to have your film processed by a lab who'll scan the negatives for you. If you've got a bunch of negatives laying around and want them scanned, go to Scancafe and have them do it for you. Trust me, this is one rabbit hole you don't need to go down on your own.

I'll post pictures from my little film experiments over the next few months. Andrea got us a Holga film camera last year and it's still packed away in a box somewhere. I shot a few rolls of film on it before we moved and I plan on finding it all later this month when we finally clean up the garage.


Here's a shot of Emily and Sam shot on the Pentax K1000 with Fuji Superia 400 speed film. The scene isn't lit as well as it could be and the scan came from my home scanner. I expect future attempts to yield better results.