Spidersnaps: My first roll
Mar. 27th, 2022 11:02 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
spiderbraidsTime for something new for '22 :-) (Or should that be something old? ;-))
As a person born in the early-to-mid 80s, I'm old enough to have had my childhood photographed on film (I even remember having photos of myself taken on what I know now are 110 format pocket cameras :-)) But by the time I entered college, the digital revolution was well under way, and by the time I started taking pictures of my own (with a borrowed digital camera) in 2005, the convenience (and performance) of digital was starting to push film (huh, pun) towards extinction...
Fast forward 16 years: I've since had two digital cameras to call my own, but the latter of them had died a premature death in 2019 after falling into a pool around a year and a half after purchase :-( I'd been spending plenty on time on sites like Petapixel, DPReview, and local camera store chains trying to figure out what digital camera to buy next... thing is, this was well into the smartphone age (I myself was on my 3rd smartphone since 2013; I got my 4th a month after getting into film) and affordable consumer-level standalone digital cameras seemed not to be as much of a thing anymore; even when I was willing to get into mirrorless, it still meant spending (converting to USD) at least 500USD and/or taking a chance on slightly-outdated new-old stock: Looking now, the model I'd had my eye on most recently is out-of-stock at my go-to store (likely for good since it was discontinued fairly quickly in the states, but managed to stick around a while longer here), and the current cheapest relatively-current available similar model is about 600USD (For comparison, my latest smartphone was around 425 USD, slightly more than my 2nd digital camera... And there's also second-hand and even grey-market imports with "store warranty" instead of a proper manufacturer warranty; I'd rather not take a chance on those)
One day, I came across an article on Dora Goodman's 3D printed medium-format film cameras and thought how cool it would be to take photos on film (which against all odds, was enjoying a bit of a resurgence) That said, I'd eventually settle down to using the same old 35mm as "everyone else" by the time I pulled the trigger on a Kodak M35 in November (price: USD 20) I also gave a nice hard think on what film to use as my first roll, and I decided it'd be fitting to use a regular Kodak film with a Kodak(-branded) camera, in this case Ultramax 400 (price: around USD 8.5) And there's something particularly satisfying about the clack that the M35 makes when it's doing its magic :-)
Unlike the good old days of film (when film dev labs were common), one likely either has to send their finished rolls by post or hop on public transport to get it to the nearest lab; so I saved up three rolls with the intention of sending them all in at once and having the lab post back the negatives all at once to save money... Long story short, in February I had to pick up paperwork at my office, and since there's a relative hotbed of film dev labs on the way there (not very far out of the way from my house via metro) I ended up taking two of the rolls to one of those labs, and had them developed and scanned (price: USD 3, plus USD 1.5 to receive the negs back by post, because hey, why shoot with film if you're not going to keep the physical negs?) Incidentally, near those labs I even saw a second-hand camera store that was also selling APS film (doubtless long expired, but still)
(All pictures straight from the film dev lab scanner, except for resizing and rotation)
Due to the vagaries of how loading film cameras works, what I'd thought was going to be my second picture ended up being my first picture:
My dad sewing up a rifle case :-)
(For completeness: I intended my first picture to be of the potted plants in my house's front yard... because both my digital cameras' first photos were also of the plants, though most of the pots had been moved to a different part of the yard since the 2nd picture was taken, and the "mini-greenhouse" in the background has also since been dismantled:)
(Panasonic Lumix DMC-FH3, 2010)
(Canon Powershot SX720 HS, 2017)
A selection of other photos from my first roll:
A road near my house
Bird on a pedestrian footbridge
Loy Krathong at a river pier near my house... Normally, one would put their "krathong" directly into the river from the riverside, but for safety reasons, here someone else has to lower the "krathong" into the river, using an implement made from a long bamboo trunk and the front grille from a fan :-)
Gas station taken from a taxi
(100% PNG crop of the gas station)
Fountain near King Rama IX's palace taken from a taxi
Christmas tree at Samyan Mitrtown mall
My biggest takeaway from my first roll: Whereas I was able to get away with not using flash most of the time with digital cameras (and even now with smartphones), even ISO 400 film (at least with the M35) isn't really good enough for good nighttime or indoor photos without flash... Other than a couple of those indoor exposures coming out completely blank, there's also these:
Picture from a mall mini-concert
A "cube" of light strings hung at Samyan Mitrtown mall with other neon signs attached... The lack of response outside of the lights makes it look sort of cool, though :-)
As a person born in the early-to-mid 80s, I'm old enough to have had my childhood photographed on film (I even remember having photos of myself taken on what I know now are 110 format pocket cameras :-)) But by the time I entered college, the digital revolution was well under way, and by the time I started taking pictures of my own (with a borrowed digital camera) in 2005, the convenience (and performance) of digital was starting to push film (huh, pun) towards extinction...
Fast forward 16 years: I've since had two digital cameras to call my own, but the latter of them had died a premature death in 2019 after falling into a pool around a year and a half after purchase :-( I'd been spending plenty on time on sites like Petapixel, DPReview, and local camera store chains trying to figure out what digital camera to buy next... thing is, this was well into the smartphone age (I myself was on my 3rd smartphone since 2013; I got my 4th a month after getting into film) and affordable consumer-level standalone digital cameras seemed not to be as much of a thing anymore; even when I was willing to get into mirrorless, it still meant spending (converting to USD) at least 500USD and/or taking a chance on slightly-outdated new-old stock: Looking now, the model I'd had my eye on most recently is out-of-stock at my go-to store (likely for good since it was discontinued fairly quickly in the states, but managed to stick around a while longer here), and the current cheapest relatively-current available similar model is about 600USD (For comparison, my latest smartphone was around 425 USD, slightly more than my 2nd digital camera... And there's also second-hand and even grey-market imports with "store warranty" instead of a proper manufacturer warranty; I'd rather not take a chance on those)
One day, I came across an article on Dora Goodman's 3D printed medium-format film cameras and thought how cool it would be to take photos on film (which against all odds, was enjoying a bit of a resurgence) That said, I'd eventually settle down to using the same old 35mm as "everyone else" by the time I pulled the trigger on a Kodak M35 in November (price: USD 20) I also gave a nice hard think on what film to use as my first roll, and I decided it'd be fitting to use a regular Kodak film with a Kodak(-branded) camera, in this case Ultramax 400 (price: around USD 8.5) And there's something particularly satisfying about the clack that the M35 makes when it's doing its magic :-)
Unlike the good old days of film (when film dev labs were common), one likely either has to send their finished rolls by post or hop on public transport to get it to the nearest lab; so I saved up three rolls with the intention of sending them all in at once and having the lab post back the negatives all at once to save money... Long story short, in February I had to pick up paperwork at my office, and since there's a relative hotbed of film dev labs on the way there (not very far out of the way from my house via metro) I ended up taking two of the rolls to one of those labs, and had them developed and scanned (price: USD 3, plus USD 1.5 to receive the negs back by post, because hey, why shoot with film if you're not going to keep the physical negs?) Incidentally, near those labs I even saw a second-hand camera store that was also selling APS film (doubtless long expired, but still)
(All pictures straight from the film dev lab scanner, except for resizing and rotation)
Due to the vagaries of how loading film cameras works, what I'd thought was going to be my second picture ended up being my first picture:
My dad sewing up a rifle case :-)
(For completeness: I intended my first picture to be of the potted plants in my house's front yard... because both my digital cameras' first photos were also of the plants, though most of the pots had been moved to a different part of the yard since the 2nd picture was taken, and the "mini-greenhouse" in the background has also since been dismantled:)
(Panasonic Lumix DMC-FH3, 2010)
(Canon Powershot SX720 HS, 2017)
A selection of other photos from my first roll:
A road near my house
Bird on a pedestrian footbridge
Loy Krathong at a river pier near my house... Normally, one would put their "krathong" directly into the river from the riverside, but for safety reasons, here someone else has to lower the "krathong" into the river, using an implement made from a long bamboo trunk and the front grille from a fan :-)
Gas station taken from a taxi
(100% PNG crop of the gas station)
Fountain near King Rama IX's palace taken from a taxi
Christmas tree at Samyan Mitrtown mall
My biggest takeaway from my first roll: Whereas I was able to get away with not using flash most of the time with digital cameras (and even now with smartphones), even ISO 400 film (at least with the M35) isn't really good enough for good nighttime or indoor photos without flash... Other than a couple of those indoor exposures coming out completely blank, there's also these:
Picture from a mall mini-concert
A "cube" of light strings hung at Samyan Mitrtown mall with other neon signs attached... The lack of response outside of the lights makes it look sort of cool, though :-)
