Freelance Photography: Digital vs. Film Case Study
Last week, the British Journal of Photography helped spread the news that Kodak will stop producing digital products as part of their ongoing strategic review? What is Kodak going to do? Refocus on good, old fashioned film.
At first, this sounded like brand suicide to me. But then I read on…
The news comes as Kodak is undergoing a wide-ranging strategic review of its businesses with the “commitment to drive sustainable profitability through its most valuable business lines.” But Kodak is quick to point out that the move won’t mean the end for Kodak-branded digital cameras. Instead, the firm plans to license its brand to third-party manufacturer – a move that mirrors Polaroid’s action in the years leading to and following its own bankruptcy. —bjp-online
Film has a core niche market. There are still photographers out there who use it, and use it religiously. Jonathan Canlas, a popular photographer based in Utah, recently came out with a book titled “Film is Not Dead: A Digital Photographer’s Guide to Shooting Film”. He also leads FIND (Film is Not Dead) workshops across the U.S. (which Kodak helps sponsor). There are about 65 testimonials about the workshop on Canlas’s blog, from photographers all over the place. Some of them are so jazzed about the workshop they’re writing testimonials before they have even attended!
Canlas shoots ONLY in film, and his business hasn’t suffered from the trend towards digital photography in the least. In fact, I’d argue his business has grown from sticking to his chosen niche.
Stacey Hedman, a New England-based photographer, has been using film again for about a year. She started noticing that the photographers she most admired were using film, and she stared to pull out her family’s old cameras to play around with. In addition of going to film, Hedman and her fellow photographers are using manual light meters and cameras that haven’t been manufactured in over 20 years. “With film I feel more connected to the process—there’s more soul and art behind it,” she says.
Hedman suggests two reasons why photographers may prefer film over digital: the richness and creaminess of the photos themselves and the film’s ability to retain highlights. “What I mean by that is that digital may blow out the white in a wedding gown, to where you don’t see any detail at all,” Hedman explains. “With film, you can go really bright, overexposed even, and in the photo you will still see every piece of lace in the dress. Together these things can create an incredible color palate and tangible softness.”
Digital photography has created photographers who spend a heck of a lot of time using editing software like Adobe Photoshop to edit and correct for exposure or mistakes. “With film, you need to be more thoughtful and truly understand your situation before clicking the shutter,” Hedman says. “When my film comes back, it’s almost completely “done” editing wise, meaning less time in front of the computer editing thousands of images.” When Hedman uses film, she finds herself taking less photos because she’s being more thoughtful and money conscious—it costs her up to $30 to develop one roll. But the lack of necessity of retouching before sending them to her clients is worth the time spent behind the camera in the first place.
Hedman didn't retouch anything on these film prints.
When photographers send their film to a film lab to be processed, they typically scan your negatives immediately for a digital file. “The fact that I shoot film doesn’t mean that my clients can’t still enjoy an online gallery of their images with the ability to post to Facebook or share them on a DVD,” Hedman says. Some of her favorite photo labs on the west coast include Richard Photo Lab, Pro Photo Irvine, and Indie Film Lab. On the east coast she likes Chelsea Photographic in New York City and Old School Photo Lab in New Hampshire, near where she lives.
I know a slue of photographers who credit digital cameras with the rise in semi-professional photographers flooding the market—especially the wedding photography market. Just because someone has a nice camera, doesn’t mean they really know how to use it. They may have no idea what an aperture or an f-stop is, or bother to use manual settings on any occasion.
“The important thing to remember is that film doesn’t mean digital is bad, and digital doesn’t mean film is bad,” Hedman says. She personally considers her approach to photography to be a hybrid, because she prefers to use digital camera in the evening, or when an editorial client is on deadline. “Each medium truly excels for what it does, and it’s my job to know how and when to use my various tools.”
We’d love to hear from you freelance photographers out there about what you think of this “trend” back to film. Which do you prefer to use and why?
Photo credit: Some rights reserved by xilius.
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I’m not a freelance photographer – more like a serious dabbler for most of my life. But I am relieved to read this. Archival storage of this era’s photos is a big potential problem.
The move to 100% digital sourcing and storage of photos scares me for this reason: just try to find a computer now to read an Apple II or Commodore PET disk. (late 70s computers.)
I have boxes of family pictures (negatives) that go back to the late 1800s. Treasured photos taken now must be digitally curated to survive for the future. A negative in a sleeve is still there after 100+ years.
I shoot pretty much exclusively digital at this point, although I do love to pull out the medium format film for some of the couple portraits at a wedding. My RB67 produces negatives that are 4.3x the size of a 35mm frame, with an incredible amount of detail and dynamic range. I’m still looking for a good lab that will print true color prints from my medium format negatives, but there really is nothing quite like a 24×30 color print from a well exposed medium format negative.
Don makes a very good point about obsolescence and the danger it poses for images. I encourage my clients to keep their wedding photos on their computer, and make sure they transfer it to each new computer they get. Not only do DVDs fail, but it is very likely that in 5-10 years, nobody will have a DVD drive anymore.
Just try finding an operational 5.25 inch floppy disk drive today! They were still in use in the mid 90s.
While I now shoot primarily digital, I have been working with film again recently. I have been digitizing my old slide film and negatives and when I run across images from my 4″x5″ view camera or my RZ67, the images are just exquisite with a lot more dynamic range than my state-of-the-art digital cameras. I pulled out my Toyo view camera and am back to shoot more large format film, and have been wishing I had not sold my RZ67 a few years back.
I will probably remain a digital shooter, but plan to mix in more film over the coming year for certain projects, especially studio portraits. It is really hard to beat the quality of a 4×5 film scan!
I’m a professional photographer for about 4 years now and have always shot digital and hadn’t shot any film except for the early vacation photos with my parents. However since about a year and a half I’m doing all portraits on film, and especially on b/w film, the quality of my RB67 medium format greatly exceeds my digital cameras. On top of that in digital there is no true b/w it’s all converted color.
My clients really love it that they get a hand processed darkroom printed photo.
The look of a analog print really differs from a digital printed photo. For me it has been a real expansion of my bussiness and even a reason some of my clients choose my work over other photographers, although the other photographers are equal or even better than myself,
I also keep a blog about film photography since last year and I’ve noticed a vast interest in film photography. If you are into film photography check out http://www.talesonfilm.com
Like most others I shoot primarily digital for ease of use these days but I grew up on film (a Minolta X-700 of which I still have and use). I was very excited to read this article as I have never truly stopped using film. In fact, a friend of mine and I started a blog just this year that is back to film exclusively called No Megapixel ( http://locnessdesigns.com/no-megapixel/ ).
And I completely agree with Don, not only the storage method but the cameras themselves. You aren’t going to see someone using a digital camera made in the early 2000s (let alone anything older!) but I have a collection of antique cameras that were made in the early 1900s that still work. Or even pinhole cameras (that I also use) that are just simply a box with a small hole in it. As long as the light is falling on the film at a certain amount of time, you can take photos. And hey no batteries!
Great post, by the way.
It’s been a while since I’ve shot any pictures on film. I think I get better pictures with my film camera, although since digital images are free (not including capital cost) I get lots pictures I probably wouldn’t have gotten with film.
Recently I was looking for a picture in 3 drawers of prints (still haven’t found it) and came across some of my pictures of the Oregon coast that still wow me in a way my digital pictures don’t.
I’ve tried digital photography for about 4 years and now have moved to analog photography for almost a year. While many of my peers delved into photography as well, it is hard to distinguish a great photographer from a great photo editor when DSLRs are used.
With film, photographs are taken in its purest form. I’ve learned a lot from operating simple 35mm film cameras, so much more than handling my DSLR in an all-manual setting. For me, film is the best way to get into photography’s own basic foundations and concepts.
I recently had chance to spend the day with Thomas Joshua Cooper, the renowned landscape photographer. He only shoots on film (using 7×5 custom cut plates) using an old (100+ years old!) Agfa camera. He only ever takes one shot of the location he has travelled to – as someone who has ‘grown up’ using mostly only digital photography, it was the opposite of the point and shoot approach I take.
Some thoughts and photos from the day here -http://markmcgowan.co.uk/thomas-joshua-cooper-new-brighton-runcorn/