Hi, I've been lurking for a little while and thought it was time to pop up now I have a few more film photos to my name.
I've been fooling around with photography for a few years now. I actually started out with film after picking up an old Lomo LC-A, but between its sticky shutter and the Lomography Society's terrible "don't think, just shoot" motto I soon got fed up of only getting a couple of usable shots out of a roll and gave it up for digital. I've done all sorts of bits and bobs with digital and fancy myself as a bit of a street/reportage photographer, but in all honesty I just shoot whatever I think's interesting at the time. I'd like to do more motorsport, but gear is very expensive and it's a pretty thankless task.
After I'd learned a bit about the science of photography, and after Roger Lean had worked its magic on it, I put a few rolls through the Lomo and actually started to like what I saw. Strip away all the cross processing and over-saturation and what you have is a robust-feeling (if not actually robustly constructed) compact with a nice sharp lens, with vignetting and softness near the edges that often draws the eye to the subject in a pleasing way. From there, I picked up a Canon A-1 and a few nice prime lenses and then I was hooked. This year, I decided I was going to do a Project 365, but on film partly because I hate the kind of in-depth post-processing so many photographers go in for these days. I believe that the hard work should end the moment the shutter closes. The project has started well, but the quality has dipped after I decided to rotate in a couple of 80s 35mm point-and-shoots that have let me down. I've also shot on cheap film so far, either Superia 400 or whatever old 200 speed I had lying around. I've got some Ektar 100 to take to Greece in a few weeks so I'm looking forward to seeing the difference.
Sheffield is the subject of most of my shots at the moment, though. It's not exactly a picturesque city, but it's certainly interesting. A large part of it was bombed out in WWII and replaced with some pretty craptacular brutalist architecture, and it's only partially recovered from a bad case of post-industrial decline in the 80s. My aim is to start taking fewer photos of buildings and more of the people, but it's daunting at first.
As far as cameras go, I'm building quite a collection, albeit mostly at the cheaper end of the scale. The A-1 and Lomo have been my regular shooters, but I picked up an immaculate Olympus XA last month and I'm very happy with the results. My wife's also a keen film photographer, albeit one who never takes any pictures, and I'm hoping to raid her collection for her Canon AF35M, Leica z2x and rather fetching gunmetal grey EOS 10.
Here are a few pics from my adventures so far:
