35mm Film photos

o hey tyler · Oct 19, 2009

All of these shots were taken by my girlfriend, and are not my work.

However, for those of you that are looking for date ideas... Her and I went out and did a 35mm Film vs Digital nature walk (her using film, and I the digital). And we sometimes took photos of each other, and sometimes took photos of other stuff. But all in all it was a great time. If you anyone wants to see the digital stuff from my perspective I'd be happy to post that also.

1: The Giant Staircase, Harpswell, Maine.

2: Reach Road, Harpswell, Maine

3: Reach Road, Harpswell, Maine

4: Giant Staircase, Harpswell, Maine (also, old film is old as you can see)

Battou · Oct 19, 2009

How where these put on to the computer?

What film speed was used?

Now general curiousity asside, with the exception of the first, these shots look pretty "For fun shap shot". I think everyone with a camera weilding signifigant other has these by the dozen, I know my fiancée and I do, Case and point...So I think it's safe to assume that most will not find interest beyond putting a face to a name on the latter three.

The first one however is rather interesting to me, I like it.

o hey tyler · Oct 20, 2009

ISO 400 film was used. And I am assuming she took them to Walgreens and got the developed and put on a CD. She goes to art school for photography, but she doesn't have the supplies or the space to develop color film. She can do B&W at school though.

I guess I posted them more for the film side of things, since it seems to be a dying hobby. But I still love the character of film photography.

Battou · Oct 21, 2009

o hey tyler said:
ISO 400 film was used. And I am assuming she took them to Walgreens and got the developed and put on a CD. She goes to art school for photography, but she doesn't have the supplies or the space to develop color film. She can do B&W at school though.

I guess I posted them more for the film side of things, since it seems to be a dying hobby. But I still love the character of film photography.

...You are talking to one of the many full film shooters on the site, just to let you know, I can assure you it's not a dying hobby.

Now, onward and upward. A key of keeping Film alive in the digital era is digital display, that's why walgreens, Rite-Aid, Wal-Mart and the like all offer photodisks. You said she is taking Photography classes so it's safe to assume that she has a real interest in photography.

My suggestion, get either a film enabled flatbed scanner or a 35mm dedicated scanner. Walgreens photoCD's are seriously hindering her photography development and the ability to process these images for optimal digital display. I am going to assume that you can teach her how to process digitally so, Get her the ability to scan her own negitives and stop wasting money on these photoCD's processing labs offer.

Lets look at these photos again, the first thing I noticed was the film grain grain, These images are literallly grain ridden. For 400 speed film this is seriously overpopulated in my oppinion. These two images where taken with consumer grade 400mm speed Color negitive film, in other words Drugstore variety film.

Defeated by Battou - Photo Lucidity

Untitled #12 by Battou - Photo Lucidity

Now look at the grain visability compared to the walgreens scans....The difference leads me to one of several conclutions. She is underexposing by atleast one stop if not two and does not even know it, how can she be underexposing, Well cameras get old and meters loose accuracy, it happens. How can she not know, Because labs like the ones walgreens and the like use tend to compensate for user error, so the prints that come back look what they deem to be as correct as possible to the costomer. This is something few people know, something even fewer know is that when compensating, they compensate to medium black. In other words often the black is incorrect. Also a lot of these labs do print from digital files, meaning that they scan the film into a digital format and print, that said, what gets printed is what gets put onto these photoCD's. Additionally still yet, print labs make money from selling prints, so it is common practice for these labs to put files on these CD's that are at a small enough rezolution that you have to go to them to get anything larger than a 4x5.

Below is a properly exposed photo as processed by one such lab.

Well, obviously the black truck is the subject here, so it's safe to assume that the I was exposing for this truck, and yes it is correct. However uppon further review and my own personal scanning of the negitive at the scanners default settings shortly after I got it. I found my unprocessed image looks just a bit different.

What's more, the rezolution of the negitive scan gives me control to print at any resonable size, 8x12 is a cake walk with these.

What I'm trying to say is, talk to her about not using the photo CD deal they have and get a film enabled flatbed or the 35mm dedicated. There is so much more control over the final image.

With this she can still use the walgreens processing for the negitives, She will be able to see what she really shot mistakes and all and she'll have the ability to process the final image to what she wanted it to be from conception All with out needing her own color darkroom processing equipment.

o hey tyler · Oct 21, 2009

Uh, she's in art school. She doesn't have the extra money to throw at a scanner. Especially since this is one of the few times in which she has shot her film camera, except for her darkroom class which was all black and white. When she decides to get a Medium format camera down the road, maybe I will get her a scanner. But I really think she's more interested in digital photo.

Battou · Oct 21, 2009

o hey tyler said:
Uh, she's in art school. She doesn't have the extra money to throw at a scanner. Especially since this is one of the few times in which she has shot her film camera, except for her darkroom class which was all black and white. When she decides to get a Medium format camera down the road, maybe I will get her a scanner. But I really think she's more interested in digital photo.

Uh...How serious are you with this girl?

What do you do for a living?

Seriously, even if it's a cheap film enabled scanner from staples. It will do the two of you wonders, perhaps even get her shooting more. Christmas is comming up :thumbup: I'm sure she would appreciate it. I would prolly would be single and without this newly expected baby if I had not spent the extra time and money on supporting my fiancée and her desire to get into photography.

battletone · Oct 22, 2009

Not to hijack the thread, but were do you get film of the non-drug store variety? I was a Nat Camera Ex and for 100 speed film all they had was the same Kodak and Fuji that Walgreens sells.

As or the original post, they definately have an overall feel of decades past.

Battou · Oct 22, 2009

battletone said:
Not to hijack the thread, but were do you get film of the non-drug store variety? I was a Nat Camera Ex and for 100 speed film all they had was the same Kodak and Fuji that Walgreens sells.

As or the original post, they definately have an overall feel of decades past.

35mm Film | B&H Photo Video