.light .shadow .portra400 .cinestill .sora200
Walking on the moon just yet?
Photography is an exceptional art form. It enables humans both behind and in front of the camera to create together, combining their creativity. It requires trust, courage and curiosity. It allows authenticity, intimacy and vulnerability.
I have always been drawn towards the unique qualities of analogue film. There’s a certain magic to the process of working with film cameras, from the tactile sensation of loading and winding the film to the anticipation of waiting for the developed images to reveal themselves.
My journey as a film photographer started in 2011 in Vienna, Austria. A close friend of mine, who worked at Lomography at the time, introduced me to the world of vintage cameras, rare film stock, dusty lenses and home-built dark rooms. He even created a novel technique to develop negatives on stone, but that’s a story for another day.
In those twelve years, I have never been more confident that film will prevail in artistic photography. The rapid technological progress in the digital world, especially in post-processing, has made digital imagery more and more interchangeable.
Now, with the advent of AI-processed or AI-created images, it has even reached the point of becoming meaningless. Taking the risk here to rain on someone’s parade but I am utterly bored by pixels on a screen that have no connection to reality.
Thankfully, film is here to stay and many people around the globe are investing in it. Influential artists like Chantal Convertini switched over to film completely, film makers such as Cinestill launch new film stock, recently created film labs like Carmencita enable photographers on all continents to send their film from wherever they are and have their film rolls processed at the highest standards. This is the future of photography as an art form.
Of course, some of the most popular film cameras were built in the 70s/80s which means those cameras are 40-50 years old. With few exceptions, most camera makers have completely ceased their manufacturing and servicing of film cameras. As a film photography community, we have to face the challenge of finding and maintaining those cameras for the decades to come but it is not an easy task. Personally, I love the challenge of restoring old cameras to their former glory and putting them back to work or giving them to film community friends and family.
So, to wrap things up here, I am deeply in love with film photography and everything related to it. The subtle beauty of the way that film reacts to light and shadow produces soft, grainy textures and warm, nuanced tones. However, it would all be meaningless without the amazing people I have the pleasure to shoot and to work with creatively.
